I clear the table and wash the dishes every night after dinner in my family’s household. There are certain nights when I’m feeling more rebellious about fulfilling the role of domestic complicity typically expected amongst Mexican women, but other nights I just sigh as I see the towers of plates stained with remnants of the enchiladas that my five brothers devoured that night for dinner and just get to work.
I grew up as the lone sister amongst five older brothers. As typical of patriarchal Mexican American culture, my parents focused most of their attention on my brothers – something I have never resented them for, but it made me quickly learn that any goals and ambitions I had I would have to accomplish independently and through my own sheer grit and determination.
As a first-generation Mexican-American female, there has been more pressure to get a job than to claim an education. Compared to my white peers, the relatively small importance put upon education was limited to how it would affect my career and marriage prospects.
While the older generations of my extended family were not dismissive of education, they were apathetic. The actual benefits of being an educated individual—let alone an articulate women—never occurred to them. This is why I don’t consider my ethnic heritage to be the totality of my culture; my youth and gender have shaped me as much, if not more than it.
My rejection of the role of women in Hispanic culture is spurred by language barriers and influenced by liberal millennial peers in school. These aspects are what encouraged me to pursue higher education.
Even though my Mexican heritage is incredibly important to me because it helped shaped my core beliefs, causing me to place huge importance on my family, there are black spots to the Mexican-American traditions that I rejected, namely the importance of traditional gender roles.
For instance, I would grow frustrated whenever I am unable to concentrate on a homework assignment at the kitchen table My father, would see me pouring over papers, only to interject with trivial questions for attention. The television will play loudly for no audience the washer would be loaded with more clothes, and people would prepare dinner with the radio blaring for no other reason but to do something near me.
Although I appreciated their attempts to connect with me, however, their complete disregard for my studying grew tiresome. For example, they might encourage me to finish my homework, but the enforcement was irregular. I can count the times when my parents were actively supportive, instead of empty words without purpose. A large reason for my sharp divorce from traditional Mexican-American gender roles may have come about from the language barrier that exists between me and old generations of relatives because of my very limited understanding of Spanish.
While my parents were able to largely get rid of their own accents, with common day to day language, they still struggle with longer conversations in English. It was similar to the language barrier I have for Spanish—I can order off a menu or ask for the nearest bathroom, but the conversation can break down very quickly.
They could not communicate with me in a way I desired and the barrier has only increased in college. We all danced around the subject, where we would pretend they knew what I was learning in school to not damage their pride. This impacted me in a way that my parents’ culture did not impart in me. Whereas the first two generations of my family immigrated after growing up in Mexico, I am the first generation to be born in America.
The combination of me not being able to communicate with the older generations in depth, as well as being exposed to other cultures as an American, allowed me to be self-critical of my own culture. This allowed me to differentiated both American and Mexican cultures. While I cherished my upbringing and childhood, even with it flaws, American culture places higher importance on education.
Being isolated from my older generations of my family caused me to embrace my own new generation more than others my age. The children from my family can be divided into two groups: the ones that speak Spanish and the ones that do not. The ones that speak Spanish tend to be closer to the older generations, more conservative and more traditional.
The older generations in my family believed that women should simply graduate high school quickly and get a job to support the family. Alternatively, the ones that do not speak Spanish, like me, are more like the stereotypical “millennials” and are more open-minded.
By utilizing my culture’s traditional focus on providing for my family while eschewing their denial of the equal ability of females, education is not only a stepping stone to a better career but also a way to improve myself.
The limits that have been placed on me and the low expectations of me have frustrated me to the point of it being a motivation in my pursuit of academia. The support of my family has not gone unappreciated, but at a certain point, the pedestal for my femininity has become an island for my capabilities. However, by being a Mexican-American female has brought an influence in the millennial and liberal ideologies to allow me to realize my full potential as equal to my peers.
In a way, I am thankful for having language barriers that allowed me to be open-minded as a slight outsider to my own heritage to take the good out of the bad. However, as a minority, I was able to look at American culture also slightly like an outsider and to decide from myself what parts I wanted to assimilate into. With regards to education, I found that assimilating into both Mexican and American cultures allowed me to pursue higher education.
While I clear the table and wash the dishes every night after dinner in my family’s household, there are certainly nights when I’m feeling more rebellious but then I think of the news articles I read that day. I consider the impact of cultural patriarchal norms very evident in Mexican culture and decide this might make a very compelling personal statement one day.