Issa / Uyanik / Uyan?k Just So You Know

1. Auflage 2020
ISBN: 978-1-912681-83-9
Verlag: Parthian Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 155 Seiten

A young woman weaves her experience of abuse into the folklore of her ancestors. A student addresses his OCD by writing letters to it. A Paralympic medallist reflects upon his journey into a challenging new lifestyle. From language politics to neurodivergence, cultural heritage to sexual identity, from immigration to race, these are insights shared with great care, sincerity, and often humour.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Issa, Hanan

Uyanik, Özgür

Uyan?k, Özgür

Shahwar, Durre

Leseproben

I, Invisible Immigrant Derwen Morfayel I examine the word ‘marginalised’, trying to decide whether I interpret it as excluded or overlooked. The latter sounds unintentional, the way lifelong friends continue to mispronounce your name and at the same time love you very much. I consider what it means to be a margin. At its worst, it is empty space, and at its best, it is the frame of a text. I am sitting on a margin and from there I can better read the page. I can look into the pool of words as a whole. This topic is significant in light of the settled Europeans who are right now in an inconclusive situation, sidelined during a crucial time that makes us question our place within our community. Distinctions regarding birthplace have been emphasised in people who were, until recently, comfortably immersed in their British lives. Cultural identity is not limited to what your passport dictates. However, like any relationship, your commitment and connection to a culture can depend on how it treats you back. In my fiction I often create characters that are in constant emotional transit with regards to identity, not unlike an immigrant. My own experience trails after me still, even in my creative writing. For an immigrant who is lucky to have positive experiences that outweigh the bad, I find myself on this border temporarily, transiting to and from and beyond it at times when my British and Spanish identities are questioned by others or even myself. There was a particular line in the guidelines for this project that is relevant here because it invited writers who are born in, living in, or have a connection to Wales. It suffices to say this is not always the case in calls for writers within certain communities, and ‘writers from’ can sometimes exclusively refer to ‘writers born in’. It is almost as though what they really want to ask is ‘Is this the “land of your fathers” or not? With the UK going through significant changes, I have become more appreciative of publications that allow me to self-identify as Welsh or British. Recent events have shone a light on the fact that, like most settled Europeans, I had no voice in a referendum that affects me in more ways than one. When the subject came up, I was met with surprise and appalment by people who believe it makes more sense to take part in all elections and referendums of the country you are a long-term resident in and directly affected by. It is a minor curse of the immigrant that others are unaware of the rights you do and don’t have. ‘What do you mean you can’t vote?’ Depending on the country you were born in, you might not be able to obtain dual nationality to resolve this. Furthermore, not everyone can afford to go through the entire process of changing their nationality – the cost being a common barrier for many working class people. Personally, I would say that full voting rights are the main social handicap I have experienced and therefore the essential motive for a citizen to do this but not everybody wants to for reasons ranging from practical to emotional. I can understand the two sides to this argument equally: that it makes sense for the residents of a country to elect in everything that affects them, and it makes sense for only citizens to vote in matters to do with the country they are nationalised in. The fact is that at times of division and of breaking ties, a familiar idea surfaces again: this place we are closest to is not letting us come any closer. I am writing from the position of a person who did all their growing up outside their birth country. A passive immigrant if you will. That is to say, similarly to language acquisition, I did not learn this culture as an adult trying to piece out its logic; I assimilated it as a child and it was blended softly into my early years. My experience may ring bells for many immigrants with varying personal circumstances, who have been influenced by more than one culture in a significant way. The picture is more or less as follows: you reach a point where your current environment overrides the small portion you know about your country of origin. Your parents’ words, visits to the motherland if you are so lucky, foreign channels through which you learn of the macrocosm that is your foreign side. You do not forget but you clean out to make room for all your Britishness. After all, you understand the social references better, its humour and punctuated politeness, please and thank you. In my particular amalgamation of cultures, I knew not to kiss my British friends as often as I would my Spanish ones. I was quiet on buses and when people spoke too loudly, looked around me awkwardly. (I really miss the word ‘awkward’ in Spanish; incómodo/uncomfortable just doesn’t get the right feeling across. Awkward sounds like something you wedge in a door to overhear an inappropriate conversation.) I said sorry even when it was someone else who had bumped into me. I still do. To belong to more than one place can mean never feeling at home in one more than the other. You are always missing something. Nan is getting old. Friends are confused about the skin colour you should tick on forms. Are you sure you’re white? Is it tanned or is it permanent? Grandad is getting sick. Your aunt had a baby. Remember to read a bit in both languages to practise! Your cousins grew up. Why are you mixing English words? Uh, that’s just the way I think. Sorry. Your friends had the best time last summer while you were away catching up with your family after a year. How are you doing with your Spanish grammar? Nan died. Do we have time to get to the funeral? It’s tomorrow. Why is it so prompt over there? I don’t know. Relationships become strained by distance and there are moments you feel you are shifting towards the margins again. Memories come to mind in a cold, practical manner, much like information acquired at school – of moments when you experienced a clash of cultures. Sometimes they happened to you, or you empathised with others. I could tell you about nasty little kids repeating to classmates words of misplaced frustration they hear at home. Like that time in primary school when I heard a white boy say to a black boy, ‘My dad’s taxes paid for your new trainers’. When I became aware of racial slurs, I initially thought they were mistaken and that in my case ‘Spani’ must be to Spaniard what ‘Paki’ was to Pakistani. Words charged with offence follow no particular logic because a thing that stems from anger makes no sense. I could tell you about the time a colleague with very little English started to cry when asked about a robbery. ‘Did you see anything?’ they were asking, concerned too for her own belongings, but a moment of revolt, a clash of language and previous prejudice towards her nationality resulted in her feeling interrogated rather than tended to. I could tell you about having to put up with prejudiced comments from other women about the lingering sexism in Spain and inside my head rockets are going off and I want to pass them the mic and ask, ‘How would you weigh this opinion against your tradition of changing your surname to your husband’s?’ I personally find changing such a defining part of your identity for a (male only) partner outdated and difficult to understand. I can tell you stories from today such as headlines that give you the place of birth of criminals before you even get to the article. Now you’re in the world of those adults the schoolyard kids used to copy when they insulted each other, remember? And they talk about things like immigrant children getting free lunch at schools because they heard someone say so. Racial insults continue to slip so easily off the tongue when charged with anger. ‘But I am not racist, I just lost it,’ my friend, who had been an immigrant too, explained following an argument at work. ‘How would you have felt if your nationality was first on the list of insults? The very first thing that was picked up on?’ If you absolutely have to, I recommended, try something along the lines of F*** you which spits out your rage and is pretty much nonspecific. Of course, try not to. A clash isn’t always negative. In fact, I think feeling strongly about something, even if against, can be the path to better understanding. It got your attention, after all, so it matters more to you than to a passive observer. It is necessary that we appreciate that a blend of cultures is not just about foreign people arriving and adapting to the British way of life but a conversation on both sides. There is much to be taken in from what people bring with them. We may be territorial animals when it comes to protecting our traditions, but I think you will find that when it comes to taking these traditions with us, we are more open to sharing. I am enormously lucky to have grown up in a multicultural area with a variety of places of worship and schools that celebrated all the different traditions, watching American shows featuring black families and white families, reading in more than one language and having friends who could think in different languages...