由 Kooper » 週六 3月 19, 2011 3:33 pm
Lost in between cultures
I once read an autobiography. The author was born and brought up in a primitive tribe in a rainforest. Her father was an anthropologist and was studying the tribe. He and his wife lived in the tribe for decades and were delivered two lovely children, the author and her brother, during their stay.
Though having been with the tribe for decades and getting along well with the local residents, the parents didn’t have problem with their self cultural identity – they were white and belonged to a civilized culture. This, however, was not the case to the author.
Born and raised in the village, she embraced the tribal life and customs and had never doubted that she was different from her tribal friends. Her happy and carefree forest life, however, came to an abrupt end when she turned fifteen.
Her parents decided to send her back to the England, her home country, to learn more about her ancestral culture and to receive a better education.
Living without her family around, the author experienced great difficulties fitting in with the alien English culture. The values and customs that she had long held from birth couldn’t help her survive modern life. She was confused and felt sad, frustrated, helpless and lonely all the time. She didn’t like the new life and missed her life in tribe and her friends there.
A couple of years later she finally got a chance of returning to the tribe. She was ecstatic at first but later realized that she could no longer accustom herself to the primitive life. She got back to the city and stayed there, living like an ordinary urban citizen but never felt the sense of cultural belonging at the England as of the end of her autobiography.
It was a sad story. She got lost and stuck in between the tribal and the Western culture. Her tragedy was mainly attributed to the wrong decision made by her parents. They underestimated the degree of struggle between one’s two cultural identities and didn’t provide enough emotional support by accompanying her. Her family could have become a haven for her during her early years in England. One thing I learned from her story is making a person losing their self identity could sometimes amount to killing them - or even worse.
