Why is having a cultura/nationall identity important?

I'm not sure we have a choice in the matter, if we are brought up in one culture. No matter how much we might succeed in resisting our socialisation, the cultural identity is almost imprinted into us. I imagine it wouldn't be too hard for relatively felxible people to take on at least the externals of a second culture if circumstance demands it, and perhaps even enjoy that and embrace it enthusiastically, but underneath I suspect the original culture will remain. Lash

I am not sure. We do not always take on our parents cultural identity. I know I did not. The hippies all shed theirs. But changing to another country's culture I am not sure if that is possible. You can try but what you grew up with is always part of you. If you took on another culture as a child then it might be different but as an adult your core will always be what you are born into. A friend of mine is Sri Lankan and he has been here for 2 years now and he feels the cultural strain. He likes working in Australia but he misses his home and the totally different culture. He will always miss it but the loss may ease a bit in time. His children are growing up in Australia so they will absorb both cultures. Who knows what they will feel when they grow up.

I like being an American... I am glad that I was born here. I also like being Irish, French and German... These things are important to me... Both Nationality and Culture... I have been imprinted with the belief that these things are important. Those who have loved me valued the Nation we live in, and also the ancestors who braved the seas to come here in the days of old (the 1800s). I am the product though of those who came to a new land, and who were adopted by it and who chose to adopt the prevailing culture of this land and its people... I speak only American English. I have chosen to learn of many other cultures and religious traditions practiced by these cultures and have become one of the many people in my country to decide which things are of value to me and which things are not in the culture I find myself in. I have taken on some things that are from outside of my own culture while maintaining things that I was taught. I watch as the Native American people (and the others in this land who have suffered persecution) attempt to reinvent, revitalize and maintain their cultures and watch too as the newcomers from the South and from elsewhere are looked at with some fear and anger at times because they are not seemingly acclimating to the culture fast enough, learning the language, adopting the majority of the customs here, etc. It is important to maintain one's culture and also important to be able to get along with one's neighbors; to follow the laws of the land one is in; to learn the language of the Nation one is in so communication can occur, and to at least attempt to follow some of the social customs of the people of that Nation so that the society runs smoothly. I think that adopted children should be given a bit of the culture of their birth parents and that they should be able to take pride in that culture and perhaps meet some people from that culture to teach them more about it. I also think that their adoptive parents should teach them about their cultures too... I think that it is great to be bi-cultural and bi-lingual as it gives people more options later in life and enriches the fabric of society.

I'm a first generation American - born here to a mother who emigrated from another country with her parents when she was 9 years old. I grew up in a family that was pulled between the Old Ways (they don't do things like that here, Ma! Let them grow up to be Americans!) and the New Ways (Where is the respect for family? For history?). Perhaps because I grew up surrounded by it in the person of my grandmother, who knew all the old stories and the old songs and lived the old values, I've never felt a need to seek out my "culture" - in my mind, my culture is here - multi-cultural, inner-city, melting pot. I watch my daughter struggle with the issue of cultural identity, though, wanting more than two generations of roots to help her understand her place in the world. A couple of years ago, I wrote a performance piece for her that has these lines in it: [i]I want to tell her it shouldn't hurt to name yourself; you shouldn't have to reach beyond today to know your past but she is looking for the echoes that blood leaves, listening to images of yesterday to tell her what she is. I know what she is doing, trying to push her roots past Ellis Island to find where they sink into sweet earth and she can't see beyond herself to understand the seedlings rooted in the here and now, If she would listen, I would take her to the Tobin Bridge, put her hands on steel cables, tell her, "This is your great grandfather's legacy. These bones are here because he was." turn her to face the Boston skyline and say, "His sweat flavors Boston Harbor. Your blood runs through the Central Artery. This is the city he built for you." Someday soon, I'll walk with her on City Hall Plaza, show her the bricks her uncle laid, tell her how the workers wrote their names in mortar then laid the patterned tiles over them and hope that she can see her heritage written in the stones around her instead of drawn in ink beneath her skin. [/i] I believe that our "culture" is built as much by what and where we live as it is by who we "are". I have far more in common with my Argentinian next door neighbor than I do with my cousin who, like me, was born of immigrant parents and who was raised and continues to live in a small town eighty miles away. My cousin and I share a national identity, family and relatives, and many core values, but our day to day lives have shaped us - and our children - very differently. My neighbor and I share the same streets, deal with the same problems, learn from each other, face and overcome the same obstacles, participate in the same celebrations. To me, those are the things that make up your cultural identity.

Cultural or national identities are just... normal. I don't feel like it's important, but for a lot of people it's a great help. However, the important fact is not that they are associating with a culture or nation, but that they have an identity. The identity is a large issue for everyone. Even if you don't have a cultural or national identity, you have some sort of identity for yourself. Without one, people are lost. Identities work as a firm foundation for the mental and social explorations of an individual. Without it they can't learn about themselves or the world as efficiently. Identities can change however, so yes we can switch and change if we move to a new country of if you don't like the one you are born into. Even within one country identities constantly shift depending on changes on larger scales. As for the adopted children... it's up to the people involved I guess. The children will eventually develop their own identity regardless, though, be it along the same lines of what they were raised in or something altogether different.