Hi! I'm still here! Yes, I know it's been a month since I posted last - and I'm going to improve on that - honest. I've been sort of struggling with exactly what I want this blog to be about. See, the main things that occupy my mind are (1) my job, (2) my husband and (3) my daughter. But none of those topics really provide consistent blog fodder. With respect to my job - even I am not oblivious enough to imagine that the things I find interesting would be at all remotely interesting to anyone else. Besides which - I'm not allowed to write about the things that might either be interesting to other people or put the things I could potentially write about in context. With respect to my husband - I love him dearly, but don't really feel comfortable writing about our relationship on the internet. Good things I would have to say would likely seem trite and boring. Bad things I have to say should probably just be kept between the two of us. I might occasionally have some amusing and interesting anecdotes, but they don't ordinarily give me the incentive to turn the computer on and start typing late at night after everyone else has gone to bed. The same is true about my daughter - although the anecdotes might be more frequent and possibly more amusing.
So, I've decided to keep this blog as a place to identify and wrestle with questions about life and living that come up as I read other blogs and books. I think it will be useful for me to actually write these things out as I think about them. It might possibly be entertaining for others - but the primary purpose will be for me to put some thought and structure to some of the things whirling around my brain.
A couple of things that have stuck in my brain lately. First of all, over on the anti-racist parent blog, http://www.antiracistparent.com/2008/01/30/the-ultimate-cultural-appropriation/, there was an interesting post about cultural appropriation relating to a necklace that the author had for years that had the Korean characters for "mother" on it that she now feels uncomfortable wearing because she feels that it might make her children feel that she was discounting or diminishing their first mother. I have a similar necklace, with the Chinese characters for "mother" that I recently asked for as a mother's day present. This post has stuck with me, and made me think about when cultural appreciation crosses the line and becomes cultural appropriation and how, as an adoptive parent, I can honor and encourage my daughter to be proud of her Chinese heritage without losing sight of the fact that it is HER heritage - not mine. I have more to say about this, but that is a post for another time.
The other thing that has stuck in my brain lately relates to a book I've been reading - The Emperor's Children, by Claire Messud. I think I'm going to pick it for the next time I host my bookclub - partly because I really liked it, but mostly because I think it would be a great conversation starter, and I would really like to hear what the other members of my book club think about it. It has gotten me to wondering how much of who I am is a result of how my parents saw me and treated me - and how much of how I parent my children will affect who they become as adults. Again - I have more thoughts on this, and will post on it later.
Until then, it is half an hour past my bedtime, and tomorrow is a work day.
I promise - it won't be a month before I post again.
Meg
1 comment:
I know I'm a little late here, but I'd like to put forth what I would call "the voice of reason."
Of course, I'm biased.
The question of cultural appropriation baffles me. I can't think of very many cases where I would find the appreciation by a person of one culture of another culture's art or artifact to be offensive. I think to be offensive and disrespectful, it has to be deliberate.
And in the case of your "mother" necklace, your daughter married a piece of her culture to you when she became part of your family. You may not be able to claim to know what it's like to be Asian in a largely Caucasian world, but you are certainly allowed to at least take pride in the sharing of symbology as universal as "mother."
Of course, these things might embarrass her when she's 14, but everything will, so keep that in perspective.
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