Identity Rethink

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What does it mean to be an American?

Recently I've been forced to confront that absurdly complex question. It began a couple of weeks ago after I received what I considered at the time to be a very flattering compliment. A friend and coworker had been experiencing some difficulties in her personal life and I was doing my best to be a good listening ear and source of support for her. After a few days, she began feeling better and then proceeded to tell me the following: "I feel like we have become good friends and that now I can tell you anything- I don't even consider you to be a foreigner." In that moment, I felt all warm and fuzzy inside; like, Wow! My Chinese is so bombtasically excellent that there are no communication issues and she's even forgotten that I'm 'different'.

This was not the first compliment of that sort I've received. Chinese friends and even random shopkeepers I interact with while running errands have told me I'm 'different,' not like 'other foreigners,' that I really understand China and am readily accepted into Chinese society. One of my Chinese-American friends even calls me an 'egg'- white on the outside and yellow on the inside.

For a long time, I felt pleased and flattered whenever I received a compliment of this nature. But lately, perhaps due to the longevity of my stay in the Far East or the increasingly worrisome news from the United States that filters into China, I've become concerned that I am losing part of my identity. Which brings me back to my original question-

What does it really mean to be an American?

Unlike most other nations on Earth, the American nation is not strictly defined in terms of race, ethnicity, ancestry, or religion. Being an American is not simply defined by anything, it seems. Certainly skin color is no definer; there are Americans of every color. Religion does not help us as there are Americans of many religious beliefs. There is no American racial homogeneity that defines us the way ethnicity defines Chinese, Japanese or Indians. Language? Even that doesn't seem to help us. There are Americans who speak many languages, Americans for whom English is a second language and Americans who speak very little, if any, English at all.

It is said that being an American means sharing a commitment to a set of values and ideals. But clearly, someone can believe in American ideals without being an American. To be or to become an American, a person did not have to be any particular national, linguistic, religious, or ethnic background. All she had to do was to commit herself to the political ideology centered on the abstract ideals of liberty, equality, and democracy. Thus, the universalist ideological character of American nationality meant that it was open to anyone who desired to become an American.

Our Declaration of Independence says that "…all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness." So, does being American mean that an American must subscribe to the idea that our rights are unalienable, that we believe in a particular Creator and that our purpose on Earth is the pursuit of happiness? No, clearly we have the unalienable right to believe that our rights are alienable and we certainly have the right to choose to be miserable. So even those stirring words from one of our most important founding documents doesn't seem to help us much either.

I've been having stimulating, thought-provoking conversations with the man I'm dating, who is not an American, about this very issue. Those tenets of the United States that Americans value the most- freedom, liberty, unalienable rights- are difficult to articulate and often overused in U.S. foreign policy. But yet, as a resident of a country that is most decidedly not free, I do sometimes long for those values. Perhaps that is my dormant American identity emerging, the desire to raise my voice in protest at policies with which I do not agree, the need to be able to choose those individuals who will steer the country in a new and better direction, the ability to feel as though I have the power, as a citizen of the country, to make a difference. Maybe that is what it means to be an American, to have dogged faith that the democratic system, which can sometimes seem broken, was indeed created for the purpose of assuring 'life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness' for all, regardless of whether they were born to or adopted by the greatest country on Earth.

I may not be able to write an eloquent definition of what it means to be an American, but now I remember how it feels, and perhaps that's all that really matters. I love China and will be forever grateful for the opportunities living here has afforded me. My life here is rewarding, full of good friends, adopted family, and endless possibilities. But I will forever be "Red, White, & Blue."

No matter how much I resemble an egg.

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Comments

[Lee Sorensen]

Rethink?
Profoundly thoughtful. Also an example of your excellent writing skills. Not so much a rethink as an opening of thought or a reflection of your inner thoughts. Your sojourn in Bejing has given you a unique opportunity to do this. Would that more people could have such an opportunity.

[Mom]

American Complacency
Hon, I think that your experience in China and its resulting questions about what it means to be an American is an opportunity that all Americans need. It is so easy to become complacent and never really understand the ideals of our country while living here. Of course, recent economic events have produced some unhappy situations for many Americans, but, overall, we are blessed people. It takes the experience of time in another situation to truly see what we have. Love, Mom