in which there is a poll and I ramble about my Cuban identity crisis

[that_september]

So, I've been having some thoughts lately on race and ethnicity, and I was curious to hear back from all of you.

Poll Race and ethnicity!

Comments

[nocturnes]

I'm ethnically entirely Western European (3/8 Dutch, 3/8 German, 1/8 English, 1/16 Scottish and 1/16 Swedish -- I'm not really sure how applicable any of this is) so I never feel like I have any place in any discussion about ethnicity.

I was born in the USA (Michigan, and I also lived in Buffalo NY for a little while), but I moved to Canada when I was 7. I really love Canada a lot because of the focus on multi-culturalism. Not to say that racism doesn't exist, because unfortunately it does, but I like that the government policy in general encourages keeping your own culture if you wish to, as opposed to the US melting pot. Toronto is a really wonderful city; if you ever come to Canada, I definitely recommend visiting there. :)

My high school, on the other hand, was in a very small town and is definitely proof that racism still exists. My parents sent me to a very tiny K-12 Christian school made up almost entirely of the grandchildren of Dutch immigrants after WWII, and that other tiny part is just German instead of Dutch. Without going into detail because I would be writing an angry rant (again) I never want to go near that building ever again, and am so glad to be out.

I don't know, I suppose with my background it feels like I don't really have any sort of thing to pursue, regarding ethnicity. I really do love learning about other people's backgrounds, but more so out of interest than because I think they're somehow different in a weird sort of way. It's more that I like learning about experiences that are different from my own, because I don't just want to have a narrow perspective.

(Also Cuban food is so amazing. Reading this post made me hungry, ahaha.)