My response to Hilaria Baldwin’s charading as a Spanish person and a discussion of how this flavor of identity fabrication is actually quite common among Americans.
I grew up with my grandmother telling us that we were part-Native American. Though everyone in my family was pale and fair-haired, our heritage manifested in other ways, such as my grandmother’s house. There were feathered spears propped in the corner and headdresses hanging on the walls. Displayed on the mantel was a photo of my grandmother next to a man, whom she told me was named “Sitting Bull.” She kept at the ready an easel, where she painted subjects having a natural or spiritual theme, like canoes, wolves, and constellations.
I wore my heritage proudly, taking every opportunity to make my classmates aware. They usually responded with awe and incredulity (probably due to my carrot-colored hair). I joined a club at the YMCA called “Indian Princesses” that was dedicated to celebrating Native American culture. Pocahontas was my favorite Disney princess, in-part because there was a chance we could be related. For a time, this piece of my ethnicity formed a large part of my identity.
But, as I grew older, I became more inquisitive. “What tribe do we descend from?” I asked my parents. They weren’t sure. “How many generations back is our Native American lineage?” Again, they didn’t know. But, what they did know was that it was “too far back to get any kind of scholarship.” The more I asked, the more it dawned on me that our Native American roots were miniscule, if existent at all. And, I felt I could no longer lay claim to them.
When I first heard about Bostonian Hilaria Baldwin guising as Spanish, I thought it was a strange thing to fake. Why not lie about something more impressive, like having graduated from a prestigious university or having won a ballroom dancing competition? But, then I was reminded of my own family and our clinging to the myth of our Native Americanness.
I know my family is not alone. Many Americans suffer from an identity crisis stemming from an inability to identify with any particular culture. For Americans that descend from generations of previous Americans, it is difficult to determine where our familial predecessors who initially immigrated to the U.S. came from. But, we obviously care.
Genetics test company 23andMe boasts more than 12,000,000 customers to-date . As of 2018, Ancestry.com had more than three million paying subscribers . Americans spend millions of dollars on genealogy research services every year, largely in hopes of gathering some clues about their ethnicities. Even before these products were available, Americans often speculated as to their ethnic backgrounds based on their physical characteristics. For example, in my family, the large number of redheads led to the rumor that we are also part Scotch-Irish.
Our ethnicities are important to us because we have long relied on them to shape our identities. But maybe this practice is lazy. Who cares if your great-great-great-grand-something came from Italy if you don’t speak Italian, cook Italian food, or practice any other Italian customs? If your association with a country goes so far back that you have to employ a third-party service to become aware of it, then your legacy is of little relevance.
Perhaps it is better to base our identities on other aspects of our personhood, such as our accomplishments, passions, upbringings, political stances, communities, religions, and adversities, as examples. We all have unique experiences, even if they aren’t tied to another country. In fact, with its relative diversity, wealth, and freedom, this country is an incubator for great stories. It’s simply a matter of reframing our biographical narratives to center around the attributes that define us. And, to take a cue from Hilaria, we need no embellishment in order to be interesting.
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