Term Paper on "Autobiography All About Me Because I Immigrated"

/>

While many people focus on my differences and the fact that I am not Americanized, I do not really think I am that different from the average American. In fact, I personally believe that all human beings have more similarities than differences. Every person who I have ever met has had the same set of basic emotional needs: love, security, and validation. I believe that diversity does not change basic human needs or desires, but can have a tremendously profound impact on how someone pursues those needs, and even when someone considers those needs to have been fulfilled. I have come to this conclusion through personal observation; my parents had a mixed marriage and came from extremely diverse backgrounds. Spending time with the two different sides of my family, I came to see that they were not very different, though an outside observer would probably have seen far more differences than similarities.

My family of origin was diverse for a few different reasons. First, my parents had different ethnic backgrounds. My father's family was from Lebanon and was Muslim. However, my father's immediate family moved to Russia when he was a teenager. My father's family spoke Russian, Arabic, French, Armenian, and English. Their knowledge of so many languages came from their Lebanese background, and reflected the cultural diversity in Lebanon. Despite knowing so many different languages, they spoke only Russian in public, and spoke almost always in Arabic in the home. I learned my Arabic from my father's family, and did not discover that the Arabic spoken by Lebanese people is a pidgin language that mixes Arabic, French, and Armenian words, and can be very difficult for other Arabic speakers to understand, until after I moved to the United States.

My father's family had a very stereotypically Muslim structure. My paternal grandparents had an arranged marriage, and my grandfather was the patriarch of the household. Even as an adult, I do not know whether my paternal grandmother ever had a strong opinion about anything in her household, because I never saw her give her own opinion. She was married to my grandfather at sixteen. My grandmother wore a hijab, though my father's sisters, who were raised in Russia, do not consistently wear a hijab; they only do so when attending the mosque or going into religious-based social settings. There is a strong chance that, from an American perspective, my paternal grandfather would be considered a spousal abuser, because he made all of the decisions in the family and expected my grandmother's complete and total obsequience to his will. My father hated my grandfather's treatment of my grandmother, and rebelled against his Muslim background. He rejected the notion of arranged marriage, which caused him to become estranged from his family until shortly before I was born. While I could not imagine treating my own wife the way that my grandfather treated my grandmother, I think that most people underestimated my grandmother. I remembered her as incredibly strong underneath the surface. She is the one who spoke to my grandfather and made him ask for my father's forgiveness, causing the two of them to reconcile. When my sister, who was born before me and had been born premature, died, it was my grandmother who provided comfort and wisdom to both of my parents.

My mother's family is Russian and had been in Russia for as long as the family could trace its history. They are Russian Orthodox Christians, which means that they are members of the Eastern Orthodox Church. It is impossible to explain my mother's family without explaining their religion, which is also my own religion. Orthodox Christians differ from other Christian denominations in that the Orthodox Church can trace its roots straight back to the church initially begun by the Apostles. For Orthodox Christians, Christ's resurrection is not an allegorical element of storytelling, but an actual historical event. My experience with churches in the United States is that, while many of them talk about the resurrection with reverence, they use the resurrection as part of storytelling, and do not always seem to believe that it occurred. This was a serious issue of contention between the two sides of my family. It is important to understand that my father's Muslim family believed in Jesus Christ. In the Muslim tradition, Jesus was a prophet. However, that belief in Christ was almost more insulting to my mother's side of the family than it would have been had my father's family entirely disavowed Jesus' existence. Despite some heated discussions, I would say that the religious differences did not have a negative influence on my upbringing, because both sides of my family tried to be respectful of the other side's feelings and views. In addition, my mother's family was far more devout than my father's family, so that my father's family did not resist when my parents decided to raise their children as Orthodox Christians.

There are elements of Orthodox Christianity that helped shape who I am in a very dramatic way. For example, when we worshipped, men sat on one side of the church, while women sat on the other. My understanding is that most orthodox religions engage in similar sex-segregation, and I blindly accepted it as part of my faith when I was younger. Men and women simply did not worship together. However, I am somewhat bothered by this distinction, especially because I do believe that many of the conventions of Islam, such as the hijab, are sexist, and my father's family has pointed out the similarities in custom and ritual between the Orthodox Church and Islam.

Another example of my religious heritage is that I have a strange love-hate relationship with art. One of my pastimes is artwork, and I am very interested in sculpture. However, I have never sculpted the Virgin Mary or any of the venerated saints, because my mother raised me to believe that statutes were a form of false idol. We did, however, have painted representations of God, Jesus, and Mary. I am also fascinated by the form and function of pieces of art, from the mundane to the complex. I believe this is because form serves function in the Orthodox Church. For example, many of our churches, including the one that I attended as a child, are shaped like an ark, to represent Noah's ark and its attendant blessedness.

My religious upbringing also gave me a passion for ritual, and I find ritual reassuring in all areas of my life, probably due to my religious background. Every single day has a different service, though some elements of the service never change. Each day is also broken into time periods, with a specific religious service linked to the time of day. The year is broken into several different periods, with some times celebrated by feasting and excess and others observed by demonstrating restraint. In addition, celebrants chant while participating in services, which is very reassuring. At the church I attend now, Orthodox members from many countries come to worship, so the chants are repeated in several different languages. The church also uses incense, and the altar is venerated by the priest who chants and waves the incense during each service. To me,… READ MORE