Parul Saxena

 

April 29, 2004

 

 

 

When my mom's family came to America in 1980, they were amazed to get their first welfare check.

They were amazed that the government of the United States would care about them, a family of foreigners, two middle-aged adults and their five grown-up children.

I owe a lot to America.

There are a lot of use here today that owe a lot to America, because America is a melting pot.

What's the point of diversity?

What does it mean to be diverse?

The truth is that on a certain level there is no such thing as culture, or race, or ethnicity, or religion, or any of the other labels that we use to identify ourselves.

There is only one universal human culture that all of us share.

On another level, we are all entirely different from each other--regardless of whether we happen to share a certain ethnicity or not.

Each family, each group of friends, each individual has his or her own unique culture.

Either way, the traditional definition of culture--the one that encompasses the labels of race, ethnicity, and religion--is completely void.

So why do we learn about those labels on Diversity Day?

What's the point?

It is only by learning about those labels that we learn about how they join to form our common human culture.

Those labels are only a possible starting point for our understanding, a possible springboard from which we can begin to learn about others.

The labels are not an end unto themselves.

By beginning to learn about those labels that we can begin to relate to the individuals behind them, and by relating to them we can appreciate what we have in common.