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An interesting question came up in a debate I was having with someone so I thought i'd post the question here to see what you guys think.
Take these 2 cases:
Case 1: American goes to a country, say India, when he is 30, he has been living there for the past 20 years and is now 50 years old.
Case 2: An Indian comes to America when he is 20 and has lived here for 10 years. He is now 30, and has gone back only for a few weeks during that time.
Who do you think has more experience with India and who do you consider more "Indian". Do you think there is something about being born and raised in a country that will always make you understand it more than someone who has not been raised there?
The person I was debating with seemed to think that no matter how many years a foreigner spends in a country they will NEVER quite understand it like someone who was born and raised there.
I don't think you can ever truly understand another culture, I am not even sure understanding your own is necessarily that easy as we simply absorb and accept our culture rather than understand it. Most of us never even question our Native culture and understanding has little to do with belonging in a way. We are what we are simply by an almost blind "acceptance" of our roots. Understanding really does not come into it.
I have lived in the Uk for over 20 years now and I am stillbaffled by many aspects of the culture, on the other hand being French I am also puzzled by certain aspects of French cutlure too...
I think in a funny sort of way sometimes though it is easier to understand and analyse certain aspects of a culture if you are looking from the outside in as you have no preconceived notions and can be more objective. It is not so deeply ingrained in your psyche and as such your observations and understanding can be clearer. You can never feel like a Native, I think that is impossible as much of our culture is what is absorbed at an early age and our environment does shape us greatly. But you can come to understand if not always fit in whichever culture you come into.
Being an observer can be as enriching as being a "joiner" sometimes. I have lived over the world and moved around a hell of a lot and I never have really fitted in anywhere . Not even France ( possibly because of all the moving...)
On the other hand though nowhere really ever feels like home to me , I find it much easier to adapt to other cultures and settle in with a reasonable understanding of how that culture works. I will always be an outsider but sometimes an outsider with pretty good insider knowledge nonetheless.
For example I am French but in many respects feel quite British , yet some aspects of both cultures still do elude me.
Humanity is a hugely varied casserole of cultures, faiths, rituals and habits and we can adapt quite easily but abandoning the culture we shaped you as a child is IMO virtually impossible. We cannot escape our past but aim to incorporate current and future experiences to the shape of our lives.
Hmmmm. That's a really good question , a real head scratcher and one I'm not sure I have an answer to.
Ignoring the obvious answer that it depends on the person, I'm going to assume that we are hypothesising that these two different people somehow magically have identical personalities so we can remove that variable from the table.
My first instinct is that indian born in india is the more "indian", but I really don't know why I think that (and actually, I don't really want to think that). But then the question becomes more complicated if we start to move the age of the indian downwards when he moved to the states, what about 15? what about 10? at some point I would say that the American is then the more "indian", but at what point?
In Case 1, the American goes to India with the American perspective. So, as an adult, he will already have his likes, dislikes, prejudices already established. However, in Case 2, the Indian is growing up as a baby so, all the culture, biases, prejudices, etc. are being taught to him. So he accepts it. He may disagree with them after comparing to his new life in America, but the fact is they were instilled in him from a young age. So, no doubt, the Indian is more Indian.
I grew up in an immigrant receiving country (South Africa) and during apartheid we received huge volumes of western and eastern europeans, americans and alot of other nations. How much a person integrates into their new country I think depends alot on the political situation and how it shapes the social and cultural sphere. At the time in South Africa, non-whites were being sidelined while anyone white was given alot of advantages. If I draw a like for like comparison, immigrants from my age group never really became south african from a cultural perspective, they weren't interested in integrating nor learning about our very diverse culture. They really only integrated with each other and even then, it depended on a number of factors, for example, greeks, cypriots, lebanese tended to stick together in very tight communities. I'm not sure if it has something to do with how new a concept diversity is in say Europe. Not to beat a dead horse or be too stereotyped, I think it has alot to do with the dominant demographic and of the country and how they're affected by the political situation as to whether or not the immigrant/person will fit in irrespective of the nationality. Not to contradict or punch holes in your very specific questions about indians/americans/age group migration. Maybe someone else will have a very different take on this.
I think it's up to the individual. The individual may feel more Indian or American. You'd be surprised, after moving to somewhere for a long time, you may find yourself baffled by your own birth country.
Each individual may retain more of the birth country, or gain more of his/her new country. I think its impossible to make a blanket statement.
A good part of the alienation that expats feel even after having been in another country for many years is the unstated concept of being an "insider" as opposed to being an "outsider".
The Indian who has lived outside India for many years, will still be considered an insider if and when he moves back. He may not feel that he is the same as before, but his looks will allow him to fit in. A white person, for example, will not likely be considered an insider no matter how long he lives in India. Some cultures have a stronger feeling regarding this inside/outside dichotomy than Americans do because they are less exposed to immigrants than those in the USA.
A good part of the alienation that expats feel even after having been in another country for many years is the unstated concept of being an "insider" as opposed to being an "outsider".
The Indian who has lived outside India for many years, will still be considered an insider if and when he moves back. He may not feel that he is the same as before, but his looks will allow him to fit in. A white person, for example, will not likely be considered an insider no matter how long he lives in India. Some cultures have a stronger feeling regarding this inside/outside dichotomy than Americans do because they are less exposed to immigrants than those in the USA.
very good point. add to that the somewhat "narrow" (and exclusive) definition of an "expat". (imho)
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, a real head scratcher and one I'm not sure I have an answer to.
