Living an American Life: Is That Sushi?

Living in the 21^st century in America means being exposed to hundreds of different cultures and customs via many sources, including, but not limited to the internet. When I think of my childhood I don’t reminisce about a typical American life where I had a white picket fence and grew up on good ol’ American cooking, I think of all of the cultures that influenced me. In this day and age what is being American or having an American culture? It seems that as the world has shrunk, due to globalization and the spread of the internet, it is harder and harder to define something as American for me.

Starting with my entertainment as a child, which was based solely on Japanese games and shows, I can truly say that what I was entertained by was not what would be considered American. All of the TV shows I watched were Japanese anime shows like Sailor Moon, Pokémon, Naruto and YuYu Hakasho. These were Japanese cartoons that they had dubbed in English and I was obsessed! Not a single TV show I watched was produced or made in America. This means that I was being exposed to Japanese styles of animation, writing and ideas. I also was obsessed with Pokémon the Japanese game that took America by storm. I along with thousands of other American kids were crazy for Pokémon. As far as I can remember, I really was not entertained by anything that was not Japanese as a child.

When someone thinks of the typical American meal what comes to mind, a giant tray of meatloaf, a traditional turkey dinner? When I think of the meals I ate as a child so many different cultures and cuisines come to mind. Even when I was young, my parents were feeding me meals that most people would not think of if you asked them what a typical American family would eat for dinner. I remember getting Chinese food, sushi (A LOT!) and many other types of ethnic cuisine. As I was growing up, I was unintentionally learning about cuisines of the world and all the foods that were traditional to the Asian, South American and other countries that the food I was eating originated from.

As I was growing up I was introduced to many types of music, one of them being Zap Mama, a French-African group that my aunt introduced to me. This group was funky and very cool and I loved it. On top of Zap Mama I was introduced to other French artists and even some Chinese ones that I really enjoyed growing up. This type of music differs from what people would think of as typical American music, country music. Country music was and is a huge part of the music industry and I was not listening to it at all. So, growing up, the music that was influencing me was not Americana, but a mix of African/European/Asian.

Growing up in America, did I grow up American? I believe so because even though what it was watching, eating and listening to was not originating from America or in an American style, I was experiencing all these different cultures in America. I grew up not actually liking many typical American aspects of society/culture, but what really is typical for America? It is a mish-mosh of so many different people and cultures that eating sushi or watching anime isn’t seen as foreign, but as a typical thing that Americans experience. So, “traditional” American foods, shows and music don’t have to originate from America or really be in English to be considered part of America. This is truly because I grew up in a global culture and I currently am in a global culture. With the internet and as the world modernizes, cultures spread so quickly and root themselves into other countries, becoming typical parts of these countries’ societies. Looking back on my childhood, I grew up as an American living in a global culture because through the lens/society of America I was experiencing aspects of other countries/cultures that had rooted themselves in American culture and had over time assimilated into everyday American life. From the track it has naturally taken, it seems that globalization and the advent of a global culture are here to stay and have really permeated most every country in the world. This means that not only did I grow up an American, but I grew up a citizen of a global culture.

The 7th Graders with iPads

I went to a progressive high school, but that does not directly mean that we were supposed to use technology to learn. In many schools students are not allowed to use laptops or other electronic devices because teachers don’t want students to be distracted, but this was not the case at my high school. I wouldn’t say that we were the most high tech school in the country; it was just that the use of technology/ the use of new technology was something that I experienced on a regular basis. I typically took notes on my computer for at lest ¾ of my classes. This helped my stay organized and allowed me to go back and edit my writing or make study guides from my notes. This was my normal interaction with technology while in a learning environment. But, my school tried to really integrate new ways of learning with technology as well. I remember that for a French project we corresponded with a Moroccan class where we wrote plays for each other and acted them out via a large video chat. I would say this is just some light integration of technology, and this is what I experienced, but my school went even deeper with their use of tech. Last year they started out the whole 7^th grade with ipads and fully integrated them into all of their classes. Literally every class of everyday was ipad based for these 7^th graders. But, the program was met with great confusion by many older students at my school. I was actually surprised that many of my peers were saying how this would ruin these kids’ education and that these ipads were not that good for classroom purposes. I tried to keep an open mind because I liked new styles of teaching like this. So, when the 7^th graders made a presentation, I got to experience first hand what it was like for them to go through all of their classes using the ipad. It really seemed that with the help of some great apps for the ipad, classes were going well and students were responding well to the use of new tech. What was cool was that the whole presentation was done on ipads. After seeing this presentation, I was quite impressed and could really see this being the future of many other classes. What was so interesting to me was how many of my peers still saw these ipads as mere gaming devices and not so much as a tool that could be utilized as a learning device in the classroom where as many of the adults in the community responded positively to the use of ipads. I would expect the opposite where students would be praising the use of new tech while the older people would be denouncing this radical way of teaching. I think that the reason many of my peers saw the ipads as distraction was because they thought that the way they grew up learning was good enough without ipads and that bringing in this tech was unnecessary. From this experience plus some others, it seems like tech is being rejected in the classroom by most people, but progress never stops. And because progress never stops, there is always going to be new ways to teach using tech that schools, teachers etc. are going to have to/want to use because that is the way of the future. Why not utilize the best tools available for learning? Often it makes the class more interesting for the student and gets them more engaged in their own learning experience. This is what I saw firsthand coming from these 7^th graders, a group of kids that were really excited about what they had been learning about and were able to make a whole digital presentation about what they were learning and how they were leaning it. This is just a small slice of what living in a digital culture means.  The use of ipads is just one example of how teachers are actively using the digital culture we live in to educate their students. There are thousands of other ways that are available to utilize as educational tools and they are becoming more and more advanced everyday/ new devices and programs are coming out faster and faster these days, so it seems like there are a lot of possibilities for educational devices for the future. To me, pushing forward with the use of new tech seems like the way to go.