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.

My Family and My Culture

By Elizabeth Delgado

“Mi familia y mi cultura han sido el base de, no nomas mi educacion, pero de mi ser de vivir.”
(My family and my culture have been the base for not only my education, but also my reason for living.)

Coming from a strong Mexican family has supported my outer and inner growth, in high school and at the university.   Like many Mexicans, my mother and my father illegally immigrated to this country from Chihuahua, Mexico to escape an economically and politically unstable country, and to seek a brighter future for themselves and their three children.  Their constant struggle in this country has taught me the necessity for persistence and dedication to achieve success in all my endeavors.  Thus this persistence and dedication did not come from the encouragements I failed to receive as a young child, but from learning how my life intersected with the history, I understood my position in society and assisted in self-affirmation, self-determination, and empowerment.

Thousands of children are born every day, thus more and more children of immigrants are born in the United States as the years go by. On October 27, 1979 I was born Elizabeth Delgado Chavez (the mother’s maiden name is traditionally accompanied in Mexico) at 1:20pm in Holy Cross Hospital in Mission Hills, California. The second daughter born to Jose Alfonso Delgado and Guadalupe Chavez de Delgado, I was born two months premature both my parents upheld two jobs each to be able to pay for the extensive hospital bills that covered over a month of my stay at the hospital after I was born. Thus, November 30 of that same year, I was released to a world that would expose me to a whirlwind of experiences.

Ever since I was a little girl, living for the majority of my life in the city of San Fernando, a city located in the northeast San Fernando Valley, I have isolated myself in my schoolwork. It was the way I found a kind of fulfillment that I didn’t have elsewhere. However, by indulging in books and study, I was also ridiculed by my peers for being a "nerd." When you live in a society where survival is the key to moving forward, education is not a high priority for the youth in my community. Going to a public middle school after coming from a private elementary school, where the surrounding community, and the students who attended the school where primarily Chicana/o Latina/o background, I was held back a grade because I lacked knowledge of the English language. So I was always a year older than the majority of the children.

When I entered seventh grade, my family moved to a suburban town of Redlands (south of San Bernardino in the Inland Empire, where I was no longer part of the majority, but the minority. Searching for private schools in the area, my parents concluded they lacked the financial resources to continue paying for a private education for me and my younger brother, so we was placed in the local public elementary and middle school. That middle school opened my eyes to a reality that I now comprehend at a much larger level. I began to notice a difference in the treatment of counselors and teachers to students of distinct racial backgrounds, especially non-English speaking and underrepresented students. Upon my arrival, I was baffled at the contradictory courses I was given, because I had an advanced mathematics course and a sheltered science course (a course which is given to students in the transition between English as a Second Language and regular English speaking courses). Although, this contradiction made me confused, it did not encourage me to question my schedule. I was not alone in my confusion and my loneliness. During middle school, my schedule remained unquestioned, hence I was laughed at and called such ghastly names and phrases such as "wet-back," "spik," "run to the border" and "go back from where you came from" while running in physical education. I always ignored such vulgarities, and cried my sorrows at home. Why would these kids be so cruel? Was it because I never stood up for myself? Was it because I came into the class late? What was it? These are just a few questions that I continually asked myself, it never occurred to me that my race could be a major contributing factor to my confusion which, at times, caused a lack of confidence in my abilities, and self-hate in varying aspects, as a result.

I didn’t finish my eighth grade year in that school before we returned to San Fernando, the community my family had lived, and continues to live in for many years. During my remaining years in San Fernando Middle School and High School, I was placed by my counselors in honors classes and began to get involved in various organizations and clubs. During this return to my community, my "head blew up." I began to see myself as being above those students with fewer resources and opportunities than myself. Just as other students once humiliated me, I was now the monster who saw others, even though they were from my same community, as nobodies.But all that was about to change.

Being accepted to UCLA in the first freshman class that was not admitted under the guidelines of Affirmative Action, I came in with a “bootstrap” mentality. "If I made it, others could make it too." But my reality in the university was not what I expected. I was sometimes one of few people of color in my lectures, and many times felt isolated from my community and myself. This longing for my community initiated an extensive reflection on my life and the various experiences I have been through. I began to open myself to others who like me had similar experiences, people who tied their own histories to the larger historical context. I was no longer alone. As C. Wright Mills states, this discovery "in many ways is a terrible lesson; in many ways a magnificent one."Definitely my experiences, through terrible in many ways (I would never want ANYONE to experience such experiences), I attribute every aspect of who and what I am today to these experiences, thus making them magnificent ones. I see myself in a continual process of reflection and action, and though I continue to experience things that are tied to the history of oppressed people in the world, I see this as a method to build upon the compassion and love I have for others and myself.

An American Indian elder once said that the circle is a sacred method by which life prepares you for future endeavors. My life has definitely gone around this sacred life circle various times, but each time it has, through reflection and action, it has made me a stronger, more grounded, confident, and compassionate person.  Definitely learning about history and how the events in my life intersect with such history has definitely brought a larger meaning to my life, as a whole.  I believe that things happen in life for a reason. I have overcome many obstacles to be where I am today and I couldn’t have done it without those people who truly believed and continue to believe in who I am and what I’m all about: my community (this is, I think, something that I discovered).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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