Max

My name is Jeffrey “Max” Jaimes, and for this project we (group 1) decided to discuss the issue of identity as to how it relates to ourselves and to the world. This idea emerged because in our class with Professor Maris Bustamante at San Francisco State, we were asked to challenge ourselves into understanding why it is that being ourselves in front of other people makes us uncomfortable. For example, Professor Bustamante asked us to present in front of the class information about ourselves; in the process, we discovered that we had some difficulty speaking in front of others…. This lead me to ask why that is, and I wanted to explore how our identity about who we are plays a role in how comfortable we are in our own skins. For these reasons, we decided to tackle the issue of our own identity and how other people see themselves as part of a larger community, and within their own community. In addition, this topic aimed at understanding what Professor Bustamante suggested that as humans bombarded with so much information and with all the expectations on us, our identity becomes somewhat fragmented, and outside of our element; our element of wholeness that we had as newborn. As part of our project in group 1, I worked on issues of culture. In particular, I came up with some writing about what I think culture is and how it shapes identity. I was particularly interested in forced or instituted issues of identity and culture. For example, I suggested that as individuals, as soon as we start to learn, our concept of culture is given to us by our parents and society. At least at the beginning, we are in a way forced our family’s ways of experiencing the world though their stories that they share with us. As we grow-up, the indoctrinating continues though religion and educational institutions. As a result, our perspective about culture is what the government, religious leaders and our parents have either provided or forced onto us. Of course there are positive aspects of this type of culture sharing, such as traditions and a bond with our families, and others that are also part of this circle of similar views and values. The conclusion that this part of the project had on me is that culture is not static, and once one realizes that there is and was indoctrination on our view of self, then one can adopt new cultures and possibly improve on the continuous negative cycle that leads to fragmentation of the identity to others.