I’m studying for my English class and need an explanation.
This journal is split into two parts. Make sure to complete both for this journal assignment.
Part I
In our last unit, we talked about educational borders. Now, we will switch gears, and think about a different kind of border, a cultural border. These borders, like our educational ones, aren’t necessarily borders that we can physically see, but they very much exist.
To get you to think about cultural borders, please answer the questions below. There are no wrong answers here. You are just meant to give it your best guess:
- What is “culture”? What aspects are part of someone’s culture?
- How would you definite a “cultural border”? What do you think a cultural border is?
- Can you give a couple of examples of cultural borders you have seen or experienced?
- Think back to your reading of Freire. How can a “banking system” of education create a cultural border of a kind?
Part II
Read the following statement from Carmen Cristina Moreno, a singer from Cathedral City, California, who spoke about her own background.Then discuss the statement using the questions below.
It’s very difficult for a Hispanic, a Chicano, a Mexican American child, a child of Mexicans born in this country, to find identity. l felt thot strongly.l felt ambiguous- you’re neither here nor there. The Mexicans do not accept you because you were born here. They’re resentful because you were born in the land of plenty. And you go down to Mexico, and to them you are an American, a gringa. You ore on outcast, and they discriminate against you. And, here, of course, there’s a cultural barrier.
- Carmen Cristina uses different terms to describe a child who is born in the united States of Mexican parents: Hispanic, chicano, Mexican American, American, gringo. How do these meanings differ?
- Why do you think Carmen Cristina felt “ambiguous”? Have you ever felt this way?
- Why did Carmen Cristina feel like an “outcast” when she went to Mexico? Have you, or has anyone you know, ever had an experience that made you feel like an outsider? Describe how you felt.
- Wha does Carmen Cristina mean by”a cultural barrier”? How does her statement connect to what you know so far of cultural borders?
