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Defining Identity in Maharashtra:

            When I asked friends and interviewees in Pune what made them feel Indian, they searched with little success for an explanation of their Indian identity. One friend often pointed out what made his step-mother a typical Brahmin or his friends typical Kshatriyas (two overarching caste categories) without ever offering a description of his Indian-ness (I barely ventured out of the Brahmin or Kshatryia castes in my interviews, only because they were the students that generally commanded solid English and were available to me, so I cannot say what people of traditionally lower castes feel about caste identity). Within the upper castes, many students rejoiced in the characteristics that made them Brahmin. A neighboring family that I became close with delighted in the rituals exclusive to Brahmins in celebrating holidays. My professor of political science, Shrikant Paranjpe, described his identifications: “I am first Brahmin, then Maharashtran, then Hindu, then Indian,” a hierarchy that almost everyone recited to me without my asking.

            Thoughtful White Americans often stutter (if only in their minds) to use a politically correct description of Black Americans. My college classes are filled with awkward descriptions that overcompensate for the majority whiteness of the class. In classes where one or more black student is present, White students are sure to always use ‘African American’ rather than ‘Black’ or ‘Black American.’ That puts the white students into a thorny corner, do they use ‘European-American’ to describe White Americans?

Black Americans call themselves Negro or worse, however White Americans have no right to employ those terms. Such derogatory terms originated in White vocabulary that demoralized and dehumanized Blacks to legitimize slavery and unfair treatment based on race. Using this vocabulary associates White Americans with their racial segregationist predecessors. Black Americans reclaim their identities with such terminology.

            Privileged white Americans tend to hope that if we neglect a vocabulary of race, the problems that race has raised in our national history disappears. White Americans disregard our “whiteness” traits since we compose the dominant group racially and religiously and see past those distinctions that lie at the root of American hierarchy. White Americans consider themselves blank whereas we think of minority groups as the ones with culture. Many White college students seem to envy Latinos for the way they swing their hips, or Black people for the way they talk or the music they produce, whereas white culture is considered normal, i.e. boring. The word “normal” implies that Black or Hispanic differ from the American norm.

            America boasts equal opportunity in law and economy-anyone can make it with enough drive. Yet few expect Black Americans from the ghetto to participate in the American dream. Typical American culture is represented in American Eagle not Triple 5 Soul (two brands of clothes, the first represented in white middle class culture, the second in black middle class culture). If America does not accept Hip-hop culture as a typical American culture, why would they feel obliged to participate in America’s standards of liberty, equality, and fraternity?

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