Embracing Your Liminal Identity
[Music]
so
where i’m from i’m from
poppies and the twisted vines of
cabernet
from coffee shop happiness
to buzzing stinging blissfulness
down a lavender walkway
i’m from stuff to the gills in
multi-night
from carne asada fries to cup ramen
at night i’m from
love is patient love is kind
from sunday best
to shinto shrines
curled up by the fireplace gathered
round the dining table
i listen to my family’s tales
i am from the war-torn the
immigrants the meek hard
working earnest furthest
from weak
generations that chose that road less
traveled by
strong men and women more than what
meets the
eye i am from the ashes
where the phoenix rises hopeful
adventurous a life full of surprises
i’m from two worlds bridging together as
one i don’t know where i’m going
but i know where i’m from
hello and welcome my name is erica i’m a
teacher here at csun international
school and i teach language and
literature
today i’m going to be talking about
embracing liminal identities
now a few years back i wanted to return
a textbook
and i went up to the counter handed the
textbook but the cashier
looked me up and down and said
what are you
i thought maybe i misheard so but the
person said again
what are you
uh i’m human
i don’t know what you want from me and
he said no no no i mean where are you
from
what’s your ethnicity
i sighed and i went into my five-second
rehearse bio that i’ve always said
all my life well i’m half
my mom’s japanese my dad’s american my
dad met my mom when he was in japan i
grew up in america oh
coco coco that’s what i wanted to know
can i return my textbook now
i’ve had so many interactions like these
where i’ve ended up having to talk about
my identity and share my whole life
story
with complete strangers
and now that i think about it when i
think about what that person said to me
what are you that person probably
genuinely didn’t care about my identity
or my family
but really was wondering
how should i label you what box
should i put you in
when we define people it’s a matter of
convenience
we can label someone we know how to
organize them into our mental
system and then from there on out we
know where that person
sits in our worldview
we know how to interact with that person
how to talk with that person
but what about someone like me
on my american side i’ve been told that
i’m not american enough
on my japanese side i’m not japanese
enough
i’ve even been told that i’m not
japanese american enough
so where do i fit in
my identity is somewhere between those
defined
and prescribed societal definitions my
identity is a liminal one somewhere in
between
so what are liminal spaces
in architecture they’re often defined as
the transitional
in between spaces where people often
go through them and then quickly leave
where they’re forgotten or abandoned
maybe some of you can connect to this
where you felt at some point in your
life
you don’t fit into those prescribed
spaces your identity
doesn’t fit neatly into one of the boxes
that already exist
you lie in the liminal space
today i want to talk about those
identities especially
children and young adults who really
haven’t developed a strong sense of self
and they might feel that they are lost
in that liminal space
as an educator i have the wonderful
privilege of working with children from
elementary all the way up to high school
and
one of the observations that i’ve
noticed is that children
when they’re young they are just
brimming with questions and answers
if you ask them who are you
they will confidently tell you about who
they are
and what they believe themselves to be
i’ve heard things like
i love cats i’m an artist
i’m caring or i’m going to be a unicorn
but then as the children grow older
there seems to be a disconnect when
their minds were once filled with
their passions and dreams it becomes
filled with the worries and expectations
often put onto them by their teachers
and adults around them
the poem that i shared at the beginning
was actually an assignment that i gave
my seventh grade class to start off
to start off our poetry unit i asked
them to write about
where they’re from for me i had a lot to
say about my identity so
it poured out in a matter of minutes but
what i soon realized was that my class
actually
they really struggled with this they
didn’t know where they were from they
didn’t know where they belonged
and it was a challenge for them to
express
who they are their identity was lost in
the liminal space
so educators
how can educators embrace liminal
identities
especially our students who might feel
that they don’t have a place they don’t
have a strong sense of self
the first way is to build positive
relationships
when i was in high school a teacher
called on me
in front of the whole class and asked me
and said erica
how did your parents meet followed by
did your mom marry your dad for money
and even further i heard that japanese
wives always
walk three steps behind their husbands
because they’re submissive
now this was totally unprompted
completely unrelated to what we were
learning
and you can imagine i didn’t know how to
respond to that
in fact i don’t even remember what i
said but i know how i felt
maybe maybe that teacher genuinely was
trying to build a relationship
maybe that teacher was just innocently
inquisitive
about my life and my family
but on the receiving end it was
absolutely intrusive and so insensitive
and i never wanted to share about myself
or my identity with my teacher
so then educators how do we build a
positive relationship
we need to step into their limital
identities
let the students talk to us let them
share
about us before you start asking
questions
before you start imposing your belief
systems
on them let them come to you and share
what they think what they believe
what they’re experiencing
the other aspect that we can do a simple
step for building a positive
relationship
is getting their names right
if you don’t know how to pronounce it or
spell them spell it just
ask them take the time what they care
about is if you are making that
connection
giving the effort to create a safe space
and when they’re ready they will come to
you
they will share about their lives
the second thing we need to remember as
educators is that identities
are precious and language absolutely has
power in another experience
it was december 7th we were learning
about pearl harbor
the teacher asked me to read that
section out loud to class
i did my part i read that section i sat
down
teacher then turned to me and said erica
what do you have to say for your people
that one comment maybe that teacher
doesn’t even remember saying that to me
but that one comment i carried that with
me from my teenage years into my
adulthood
it became a part of my identity
it made me ashamed for my japanese side
it made me feel guilty for something i
personally didn’t do
language has power what we say as
educators can either build or can hurt
students even if it’s a passing comment
language has power and identities are
precious
the last thing that we can do to embrace
liminal identities is to represent them
later on when i went off to university
this was the first time that i was
actually surrounded
by a diverse group of people i started
to see people who looked like me
who spoke like me just like me thought
like me
and i felt visible it was the first time
where i could feel comfortable in myself
and start to share
who i am educators it’s so important
that we look at our curriculum
we need to amplify liminal identities
by choosing texts topics and issues
that represent them we also need to
consider
what narratives what narratives are
being
privileged which ones are being
de-emphasized
and which ones are missing altogether
it’s so important that our students can
see themselves
in what they are learning
but what about those of us who are just
trying to
figure ourselves out how can you embrace
your own identity
now i thought about how i could approach
this
and i decided the best way would be to
write a letter to myself
to my teenage younger self so bear with
me for this
dear erica
as your older more mature self
there’s so much i want to tell you i
know that you just
want to fit in you’re of two worlds but
you feel like you’re really in neither
you’re stuck somewhere in between
you have to field so many questions
about yourself
and you wonder why do i have to answer
so many questions about myself
why do i have to work so hard to prove
myself
why can’t i fit in why is my thinking so
different
from people around me well
i’ll admit you’re not going to have the
answer and you’re going to be
really working on that even in your
adult self
but i can tell you the process that
helped you understand
who you are and we’re going to look at
it through a literary approach
the first thing you need to remember and
it’s not a no-brainer for you
is to read read read
you’ve always been surrounded by books
like a cactus
in a barren desert trying to soak up as
much as you can
and all the stories the experiences the
truths that are
in this world
you’ll start with what you know books
that you have
and then slowly dip into
some of the more complex but still safer
comfortable topics
and then when you’re ready you’ll dive
into the vast sea of context
concepts and conflicts
by now you’ve got all that knowledge in
your head and you start to have this
growing question who
am i what are my own beliefs
this is when you need to look at your
life and study your life like you would
study a story
your background where are you from
your themes the themes in your life what
patterns are emerging
the characters who are the people that
have shaped
who you are the events
what defining moments
challenged or affirmed your identity
when you think you’ve got that sorted
and you have a building sense of self
next you’ll realize that you’re ready to
be part of a community
now some people they have their
stronghold beside them
from when they’re little and they’re
ready to go out into the world
but for others for you erica you’re
going to need to forge
new bonds new connections and that’s
okay
look for people you can talk to be
honest with
who can challenge you whoever they
are they’re going to empower you to have
a voice and finally
when you think you have that voice and
you’re ready
to share with the world become a
storyteller
share your unique story with the world
tell
people that this identity exists
make yourself visible
maybe it’ll start with a short poem
a little creative piece here or there
but whatever way that you story tell
make sure that you’re including the
important moments the emotions the
memories that are so dear to your heart
and my young self i wish i could tell
you everything that you’re going to go
through
joy love happiness but also
heartbreak unbearable moments
things that you don’t want to remember
whatever happens
always remember to read
keep analyzing
keep discussing keep sharing this
will be the way to your identity the
path for you to understand yourself
and at some point you’ll realize that
your limital identity
it’s not a forgotten passage it’s not
something to be ashamed of
it’s a celebrated promenade a bridge
that connects identities together
thank you