Interview A Cultural Interview

I interviewed my friend, Artina Tarokh. She is 13 years old. She goes to Portola and is in 8th grade. She came to America in 2016. She came from Cyprus, which is a country in the Eastern Mediterranean. Artina was born in Iran and left when she was 6. Artina left behind her family in Iran and moved to Cyprus. She was 11 years old when she came with her mother to San Diego. Her dad came a year before. She immigrated to America because her parents saw more opportunities here.

Culture is defined as the boundary between different people from different ends of the earth. For my project I had to interview another person from a different culture. This was difficult for me because I had no idea where to start because I didn’t know what made my culture specific to me. I found my interview subject relatively fast and I sat down and asked the questions. I found my subject from my boss I interviewed my bosses boyfriends sister and we went at it.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the culture and beliefs of four Hispanic groups. The groups I have chosen to cover are: Puerto Rican, Mexican, Dominican and Cuban. Included in the paper will be each group’s linguistic, social, economical, political, familial and religious ties or beliefs.

As my cultural other, I interviewed EMG, she is 26 years old and the au pair for my nephew and niece. She lives in their home since she moved from her hometown Cartagena in southeast Spain. She will be leaving this May to return to Spain, for her sister’s high school graduation, after about 18 months with the family. In the time she has been here, I have seen and interacted with her at family gatherings, usually holidays and birthdays. I have not personally created a bond or relationship with EMG, but I think she is a sweet girl. EMG has become friends with my daughter; they have gone to New York City for New Year’s Eve and Pennsylvania for a Taylor Swift concert.

My sixty-year old grandmother, Helaine Bondar, conveniently lives in Baltimore, MD. This made the interview quite convenient, and we were able to sit down face-to-face on her dining room table chairs with a plate of cookies for the interview. "Bubby" as I call her, was born in New York City and lived there her entire youth. She only had one sister, Suzette, who still lives in New York City (my grandmother recalls at this time that my great-grandmother was very fond of French names.) When asked about her grandparents she reminisced on her days with "nanny" and "poppy," her maternal grandparents who practically raised her. She spoke about their personalities. Nanny was the bulldozer go-getter of the family, my grandmother said her favorite phrase was "my way or the highway." Poppy was more calm, and they balanced each other out perfectly. Bubby 's paternal grandparents were Anna and Sol Gross, and despite their close proximity-- they also lived in the Bronx -- Bubby just wasn’t as close with them.

Part I: Melinda Gutierrez and I, decided to meet on a Sunday after church. We decided to have lunch at her house with her family since she is the one who is married and has children. Since we are both Mexican, we both decided to have tamales for lunch since it is one of our favorite foods. Since I am from Oaxaca and she is from Nuevo Leon, our tamales were different, so we can say that we try out different tamales. While having lunch, we talked about our lives, families, and culture. From this conversation, we both learned that we are very close to our families. She explained to me that her family lives in the same neighborhood as her so they always get together for celebrations or

Author Blanco indicates that it is unnecessary to seek for recognition from others to buttress one’s belief in one’s cultural identity. The narrator is not reserved with his cordial welcome to his cousins, who are from New York and are the most “American” girls in his Cuban family. However, when the cousins arrive, they are thrilled to be entertained with the Cuban food they have been craving for months. The narrator is bemused by this contradiction and says, “How weird. Why should my primas crave anything Cuban?” (Blanco 121). The author draws a dramatic contradiction between the girls’ obvious American identity and their longingness for their Cuban heritage. Thus, the author promotes the narrator’s confusion and leads him to reconsider his

Maria Garcia-Rada, now 20, was born May 13th, 1995 in Lima, Peru. Maria moved to the United States in 2001 because her father got a job offer in Maryland. It was a sacrifice that her father was willing to make because it was an opportunity for a better life for their family. Even though Maria moved to the United States she still follows many of the traditions and practices from her old culture and incorporates them into her everyday life while also following traditions of American culture. When she moved to America, Maria only knew how to speak Spanish. Throughout this interview the interviewer will discuss Maria’s traditions, customs, power distance within the Peruvian culture, and how the two cultures clashed at times.

For this project, we both interviewed two of our relatives who all share the same ethnicity, but experienced life in different ways. Isabel’s mother and grandmother were born and raised in Mexico, while Jennifer’s mother and grandmother were born in the Midwest, but lived most of their lives in California. During the interviews, we found differences as well as similar points in their transitions and ideas of adulthood.

My cultural informant was a friend who I have known for about six and a half years, Lisa. Lisa’s sister, Liya, and I became close friends during my freshman year of college. Liya, two other girls, and I became roommates from sophomore year through senior year. Lisa is a year younger than me, so I met her during my sophomore year. Liya and Lisa were international students from Ethiopia, so they often spent holidays and breaks with my family and I. The three of us became close during our college years, and I had the opportunity to visit them in Ethiopia in the summer of 2015. Liya is currently living in Ethiopia; therefore, I am not able to speak with her as frequently as Lisa; however, modern technology does

In “The Myth of the Latin Woman” and “If You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I?” the subject of feeling like an outcast due to being of a non-white culture is examined. From the perspectives of two different women from two separate cultures (Puerto Rican and Indian), a series of anecdotes show the discrimination they face throughout their lives, all because their heritage does not match up with the world around them. “The Myth of the Latin Woman” focuses primarily on the stereotypes of Puerto Rican women, and how these stereotypes have followed the author no matter where she traveled. “If You Are What You Eat, Then What Am I?” focuses on the lack of belongingness felt by the author both in childhood and her adult life through food.“The Myth

Learning from people from past generations is an awesome experience. Not only does one get more knowledge from the experiences, but one can learn about oneself even further. I person I was interested in interviewing was my father. My father who left his hometown at the age of 20, for a better future, remembers his upbringing in the small town that is a speechless witness of my dad’s early life. My dad was born in a rural town in Mexico, which is about an hour and half away from where tequila is produced. He was the third oldest child out of five children. My dads ascribed status was of the poor working class. At an early age my dad tells me that he was expected to help out my grandfather with the farm animals, such as the horses, pigs, and

In our media centered culture that we live in we rarely have to think for ourselves or use any critical thinking skills. Before we have a chance to analyze something we are being told what to think and say about the issue. Even with the movie going straight to video on demand it still earned $18 million in the first weekend. They say that all press is good press, thus the huge scandal surrounding the movie only helped to promote it

fter the interview I conclude that there are many things about beliefs and cultures I don’t know

Throughout this interview process, it was extremely difficult to find a family not similar to mine. However after many weeks of searching, I found a wonderful family that lives not to far from my hometown, the Lindsay family. While interviewing this family, I spent approximately four hours at their small home in Lake City, TN. This experience was difficult and rewarding at the same time. To me, meeting new people is very hard because I am a really shy person. However, I strived to gather a lot of information from this family because it is very important to get a lot of details. So, therefore, this paper will explain my own family, the Lindsay family, and the comparison amongst our families.