Community Education: Student Empowerment

Assignment 1: History and Autobiography

Essay Assignment (Autobiography & History): According to sociologist C. Wright Mills, we can always discover an intersection between autobiography and history. Each person’s life unfolds within a particular historical period, and an individual can understand their own experience by locating their life within history. Each person’s life is shaped by historic events such as war, immigration, racism, oppression of women, economic recession, civil unrest, etc. As C. Wright Mills states, this discovery "in many ways is a terrible lesson; in many ways a magnificent one." For this Essay Assignment, each student will write a three-to-five page autobiography linking their life to history. Students should provide some background information about themselves (where they were born, where they live, what are the important things in their life, what are their life aspirations, etc.). However, they should focus their essays on three main questions: 1) How does their life intersect with history? (Have certain historical events, such as war, immigration, etc. shaped their lives or influenced their life plans?) 2) Why is the discovery of the intersection of autobiography and history "in many ways a terrible lesson; in many ways a magnificent one"? 3) Once a person has discovered this intersection, what meaning does this discovery have for that person’s life? This assignment is due by Friday, Oct. 5.

Our America: Building a New World

By Christine Tran

Not only did my life unfold within the events of the 1980s, 1990s, and now in the beginning of the 21st century; but also it was shaped by past historical events of monumental as well as minuscule proportions. Therefore I must describe myself as being the product of the Vietnam War, the Boat People Migration, the Civil Rights Movement, and so on. Although I did not physically experience those life-moving events, my existence and directive in life is an effect of those causes. It is evident that not only does my life intersect with history, but also history intersects my life. It all comes together as a functioning whole. It affects not only my life, but also those who are around me. I believe that my autobiography, as well as everybody else’s, intertwines with history as much as any Au Co or George Washington.

My parents are the survivors of the Vietnam War, the dangerous Boat People migration, and great economical, emotional, and social hardships of the United States. If they did not endure these adversities, I would not exist today. I always hear the words, "You’re our hope." I never really knew what that meant until I grew older. With all I have discovered so far in my nineteen years of existence, the past and ongoing historical events in my life has taught me about the importance of struggle, determination, survival, and the very meaning of being others’ "hope."

I was born and raised in Southern California. As a child I grew up in Alhambra, California. It was an environment where the majority of the community was Asian, predominantly Chinese and Vietnamese. I experienced the emergence and growth of Asian ethnic enclaves within the Southern California at its early stages. Today, Alhambra has a high population of Asians. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, it constitutes almost 50% of the population with 40,520 persons. Not only does the city have a high Asian population, but also it is rich in the number of Asian businesses, such as restaurants. Now, Alhambra and Monterey Park are emerging as Southern California’s New Chinatowns. However, I was unable to fully experience this transformation of Alhambra.

At the age of eight I moved to South El Monte, California, which is roughly 7 miles from Alhambra. South El Monte is where my life as part of a majority turned into a minority. At that time, in 1989, South El Monte was predominately Hispanic and today it still remains the same. I found myself celebrating Chinese New Year in Alhambra compared to celebrating Cinco de Mayo in South El Monte. I was unaccustomed to the cultural shift. The adaptation to such a new environment was difficult and sometimes harsh for me. This was an influential, yet difficult period of my young life. For the first time in my life, I was being judged for what I looked like.

Like my parents, I experienced a displacement. Unlike in Alhambra, I was not interacting children who looked like me. Although there was commonality of being children of immigrants, there were cultural and religious differences. I was faced with childish prejudice or ignorance; where children compare and contrast each other and often falsely discriminate others who are different. This displacement in the playground played a great role in establishing my early perception of self-identity.

Discrimination can be found almost everywhere from the playgrounds to the home. It is a motif in historical world, national, community and everyday events. Often people are blinded by many of these events because they can be as subtle as a television commercial, a movie, a magazine, or even a simple children’s toy. As a child, I had the notion that if I looked more like the commercial or communal norm, I would definitely be accepted. When I was growing up in the 1980s and 1990s, I did not see many dolls that looked like me. The television commercials or the doll packages would scream out how gorgeous and wonderful the stereotypical American was. I wanted to be the All-American girl. I wanted that blonde hair and blue eyes. I wanted to look like the advertised Barbie dolls. Many children living in America shared this childish perception of the need to look like the commercial norm. I believe that all children are immensely impressionable; therefore the issue of identity was and is a vital issue in the history of self and community development.

Amidst all the childhood confusion, I learned that the issue of representation is key in educating generations about the diversity of the United States. As I grew older, I learned to accept myself and be proud of who I am. I am proud of my heritage. I’m not ashamed to say that my mother does not know how to make roast beef, my father hates baseball, and we don’t own a Cadillac. I am honored and proud to say that I come from two heroic people who faced death and survived a tragic war and lived to raise and teach me how to strive for what I want. Although my parents call me their hope, I consider them to be my hope. Their sufferings, hardships, and journey in life have given me hope. They strive. I strive.

Now that I have realized all of that, what do I do with my life? My outlook on life is presently very clear; I want to become a teacher. I want children to know that it is okay to different. I want to educate them about the diversity they live in. I want them to learn about the commonalities that they share with their fellow peers. I want them to appreciate, rather than hate their differences. However, ultimately I wish to diversify education curriculum. I want to extend the teaching and presentation of history and literature, so that it can allow students to learn more about themselves and their world. I want to introduced students to a more diverse array of literature such as Frank Chin’s Donald Duk, Carlos Bulason’s America is in the Heart, Rudolfo Anaya’s Bless Me Ultima, Frederick Douglass’ Narrative of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Toni Morrison’s Beloved, etc. They should be introduced to great historic leaders like Philip Vera Cruz, Caesar Chavez, Yuri Kochiyama, and Malcolm X, and so forth. Students should learn about the Japanese American Internment during World War II, the Chinese Exclusion Act, and so forth. Why is this important? In America is in the Heart, Carlos Bulosan said, "America is not bound by geographical latitudes. America is not merely a land of an institution. America is in the hearts of men that died for freedom; it is also in the eyes of men that are building a new world." This is what America is. This is what children should be brought up to believe. America is not limited to one race, history, religion, belief, or look. So why should its people be?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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