Passion for Languages

As Easter rolls around, we will see an abundant array of documentaries, special features and films related to Jesus Christ’s life and resurrection. I just happened to stumble my thumb across the remote to find the movie “The Passion of the Christ” airing on screen. For the ones who haven’t watched the Mel Gibson directed film covering the  final 12 hours of Jesus, it is completely subtitled in English as the protagonists dialogues are held in Aramaic and Latin. I remembered the hype about the movie when it first came out but never watched it due to lack of interest of a 16 year old. As I watched the movie, I had to read the subtitle but I mostly paid attention to the spoken language and frantically waited to hear familiar words. The more closely I listed the more familiar words I heard. Just to clarify, I never took Latin in school or had any Aramaic lessons in my life. Nevertheless, I spotted words from both spectrums of my language knowledge. I grew up speaking Urdu and Punjabi in Pakistan; and speaking German with my family and friends in Germany. In school I took French and Spanish. All of these languages fall into the Indo-European language family. German is derived from the Germanic stem of the Indo-European language family and most of its vocabulary is derived from Latin and Greek. Similarly, Urdu is derived from the Aryan stem of the Indo-European stem and the vocabulary is mostly derived from Arabic and Sanskrit. 

Anyhow, I put a list together of words from the movie with their identical meaning in contemporary languages:

Latin/Greek	Tumultus	Kaisar
German	Tumult i.e. Trouble/Uprising	Kaiser i.e. King/Emperor

 

Aramaic	AeMuOT	Khatar	Malik/Malka	Abba	Karza
Urdu (meaning)	Mot i.e. Death	Danger	Malik i.e. Lord/Master	Abbu i.e. Father	Depth/fault (i.e. ‘penalty’ in movie)

 

Latin	Idiota	Quen	Mundous	Veritas	Quando	Diceme
Spanish	Idiota i.e. Idiot	Quien i.e. Who	Mundo i.e. World	Verdad i.e. Truth	Cuando i.e. When	Digame i.e. Tell me

 

As of now, I can confidently say that it was worth doing the drudgery work of reciting Spanish vocabulary and rehearse the tough grammar and spelling rules of German because now I am abound in linguistic knowledge which I can apply to even understand an ancient language! So do not pass on a chance to lean a foreign language. It’s worth it!

Multicultural Parenting and Dysfunctional Moms

We have all read about the different cultural parenting clichés, such as the Panda Dad, the Chinese überstrict parent with high expectations or the Jewish overbearing mother. Well, last week I discovered another one: the ‘French mother’. Last week I read two articles regarding parenting, one was about French parenting, how French mothers are permissive by giving their kids a lot of autonomy at a young age, and the other one was about the ‘All-American helicopter mom’, who hovers over her children constantly, tangling herself into dysfunctional patterns (i.e. she would even cut the applesauce if the child asked her to). I never thought about my parenting style but those articles just made me realize one thing: I am not a helicopter mom and I give my one-year old as much autonomy as possible. This revelation also made me grasp that my husband and I had different parenting styles based on our cultural difference which leads us to many clashes about parenting. He is more of the ‘All-American-hoverer’ category parent, where a parent’s worry is tantamount to love and my European autonomous style parenting is afflicted with neglect. For example, when we go to the playground, I let her run around as she pleases and socialize with other kids. My husband on the other hand will only be five inches away and pull her away as soon as she approaches any other child. At home, it’s a strict taboo for our daughter to touch any pens because in my husband’s opinion she could displace her eye with it. I on the other hand, see nothing wrong with a pen because it trains her fine motor skills and she loves them. 

The American author who wrote about French parenting seemed to have found a secret trick to parenting, but for me, the methods she described seemed just natural. The other article, to my defense, tallied numerous reasons why not to be a hover mom (e.g. not call the school because a child has stared at their child). Being a hover parent restrains the child’s development and spontaneousness, and feeds the parents with paranoia and depression. The longer I live in the US, and deal with other hoverers, the more it is rubbing off on me, forcing me to convert to hover-ism. In order to avoid rolling eyes and shaking heads from others when my child is trying to explore strange territory, I have to fit in to the social norm, which amongst others, entails hovering! I am trying to convince myself that the hover method has protective qualities I have never encountered before. I am starting to hover away my eyes and brain that it is just another disguise of paranoia!

Universal Chauvinism

If you have watched or heard any news lately, you have probably noticed the buzz about whether contraception medication should be covered by health insurances. Now, Sandra Fluke, who spoke on behalf of contraception coverage in front of congress, finds herself in the political crossfire. A republican commentator called her derogative names and even associated her with prostitution by manipulating the subject into something where she wants to ‘get paid to have sex’. For some this may seem like political playhouse but the underlying subject is female authority and her sexuality- and both combined, quite frankly, intimidates some men! The same commentators who insulted Sandra also claim to live in the most progressive and greatest nation in the world. However, in my view they are not far from any other repressive, patriarchal, sexist nation.

Last week, after Sharmeen Obaid Chinoy won an Oscar for directing the documentary film Saving Face, she seized criticism for representing Pakistani men in a shamefully negative light. She exposed the torturous physical abuse women suffered when burned with acid by their husbands. Sharmeen and Sandra are both trying to promote female rights through their work. Likewise, the attacks at Sharmeeen and Sandra are very similar in nature –to silence them and the female voice in general. We still live in a world where verbal and physical attacks on women are tolerated, where women are sexualized and where the cultural perception is still alive that women are less worthy and come secondary - a mentality also known as double standard. Back to the subject of health insurance coverage, the beloved double standard has taken comical heights which can be summed up as following: Viagra that serves to enhance and maintain sexual pleasure for men is ok; contraception that averts unwanted pregnancies and other medical conditions (such as cysts on ovaries) for women not ok!? 

This is the very reason why women still have to fight for their rights.

Sim Sim Hamara

Sim Sim Hamara is the Pakistani version of The Sesame Street and was funded by the USAID with 20 billion dollars. The programs' goal is to promote early childhood education, with language, problem-solving, and critical thinking skills but also to "promote positive attitudes among young Pakistani audiences". To make it culturally relevant, the female puppets have dark braided ponytails and the puppets going to school wear uniform (which is very common in Pakistan).
Below is a link of its promo trailer.

How Hybridity Benefits Marketing

Danzy Seena captured the notion of hybridity, as she calls it, the best in her book Half and Half (see last blog post). She predicted something that we see every day in commercials, movies and in the entertainment business. Marketing companies have realized the changing racial composition and present us ads with racially ambiguous faces. For example, Arabs, Indians, Hispanics and Whites are more than likely to identify with a tanned brunet ad presenter. If she appears to have hints of Black genes, African Americans and Africans are covered as well. The Kardashian sisters, Halle Berry, Christina Milian and Freida Pinto are the best examples for racially ambiguous faces. This strategy saves the (multinational) companies time and money because they only have to cast one product presenter, shoot one ad and simply dub it into all the different languages. From the companies’ standpoint, it makes everyone happy because no ethnicity was left out. However, this strategy does not promote understanding of the various groups to the vast majority which tends to group all the different ethnicities into one. Arabs and Indians have a distinct cultural and racial identity from each other; the same applies to African Americans and Africans.

Mixed is the New Normal!

Last week the Associated Press released the news that interracial marriages are getting more and more common. According to the Pew Research Center Study, 1 in 12 US marriages are interracial marriages and the number is even higher in certain states, such as California and New Mexico, where 1 in 5 marriages are interracial or intercultural. The article also states that due to the increasing number of interracial marriages, multiracial Americans are a small but fast-growing demographic group, making up 9 million of the American population (read the full article by Hop Yen here).

The news was broadcasted as groundbreaking news but seemed overdue to me. The U.S. Census Bureau estimated that Blacks, Hispanics and Asians will make up the majority of the U.S. population by 2050, years ago. However, to me the most compelling prediction was made by Danzy Seena in her book Half and Half that appeared in 1998. In one of the book’s chapter named The Mulatto Millennium, she writes: “according to the racial zodiac, 2000 is the official Year of the Mulatto. Pure breeds (…) are out; hybridity is in. America loves us in all of our half-caste glory”.

Europe is facing a similar trend. Roughly, 20% of the German population is of immigrant background. That means 1 in 5 Germans have at least one non-German parent. Today, most of the newborn babies are of mixed ethnicity or children to immigrant parents in Germany. That Same goes for countries like France and the Netherlands. It is safe to assume that the industrialized world is going to be made up of a heterogeneous demographic landscape, advantaging people of mixed heritage; from being mixed and being the odd one out to being the new norm!

Can you relate to me?

 

Eddie Murphy and Cliff Curtis in A Thousand Words ( Image via fandango.com) 

Personally, I have never been a big fan of movies starring Eddie Murphy. The last movie I remember seeing with him in it was Daddy Day Care years ago. However, I am pretty sure I will go watch A Thousand Words. Why? Because there is an Indian character in the movie! Cliff Curtis (who is Maori and not an Indian in real life) is playing ‘Dr. Sinja,’ the role of a spiritual guru who will have a Bodhi tree rise up in ‘Jack McCall’s’ back yard (Eddie Murphy). Same thing happened to me with Immortals and Planet of the Aps. I have no interest in Science Fiction or Greek Sagas but my husband was able to drag me to the movies for those films because, (yes you guessed it right) it starred the Indian actress Freida Pinto! That leads me back to the subject of what I call relate-ability, to be able to relate to or identify with someone in a personal way that you make an emotional connection. A lot of times, we do not make any friends or a connection with people who are different, especially culturally different from us because we have no relate-ability to them.

For instance, when my husband was stationed in Kuwait, he used to supervise Afghani and Pakistani cooks. After their work was done the cooks would cook their own meals. The curries they cooked reminded my husband of the Jamaican food and curries he grew up eating, especially the goat curry. My husband’s genuine interest in the Afghan and Pakistani cooks’ food made him more cordial and sympathetic in the cooks’ eyes and definitely improved their work relationship. Before he showed interest in their food he was just an American soldier supervising them with a superficial work relationship. Fast forward to a few years later, qua si the same thing happened again. My husband now working in America, only became friends with one of his colleagues after showing him my last name on an envelope. The colleague was very surprised to see a Pakistani/Indian last name there and even more so had overlooked the fact that his colleague (my husband) was married to someone from his region (btw I have a very common Pakistani/Indian name). And yes you guessed it right, the colleague is Indian.

So next time you are facing someone or something you think you have nothing in common or you cannot relate to - look closer and be open. You might just have something in common with them or something that will spark your or their interest. Or be the SPARK. And in the end you will come out with a deeper knowledge and insight about the other. It’s all about relate-ability! Even though, I resisted Science Fiction and Greek Sagas for a long time, Freida was my spark to go to the movies. Now, I at least know what the epic movies are about and I loved them both.

Can you relate to me?

 

Freida Pinto & James Franco in The Rise of the Planet of the Aps (Image via moviefanatic.com)

Freida Pinto in Immortals (Image via fashioncirqle.com)