5 Ways to Take Pride in Your Identity
For many of us from expat/migrant, diaspora, or “in-between” backgrounds, our identity is layered. It lives in the language we heard at home, the music our parents played, the food we grew up eating, the stories we inherited, and the clothes, symbols, and traditions that connect us to somewhere deeper.
Taking pride in identity does not have to be loud or difficult. It does not have to be performative. Sometimes, it is simply about staying connected to the parts of yourself that make you who you are.
Here are five simple ways to take pride in your identity.
1. Speak your own language
Growing up in Pakistan, how well you spoke English was directly related to your social standing, level of intelligence and social status. It just seemed so normal at that time but a decade overseas speaking so much English makes me ashamed - such beautiful languages we have ignored and devalued at the expense of this colonizer's shallow foreign one. I speak it now more intentionally and to speak to others who understand it.
Living in the diaspora, many understand our mother tongue better than we speak it. Or we speak it with mistakes. Or we mix it with English halfway through a sentence. But you do not have to speak it perfectly for it to matter. Say a few words at home. Call your parents or grandparents and try. Teach your kids the words you know. Use the phrases you grew up hearing.
Sometimes one word in your own language says more than a full sentence in English.
2. Listen to your own music
Stop listening to American top charts. Instead listen to a song from home. There is a reason why they need meditation and sound baths more than you do. What deep soul-crushing urdu poetry does to my soul is something no sticks spinning on a bowl will ever do.
Listen to something old-school, folk, pop, qawwali, Bollywood, Arabic music, ghazals, Afrobeats, nasheeds, or anything else that connects you to your culture. Listen to Bulleh-Shah, to those hypnotic nostalgic pieces created by Rohail Hyatt (or now Coke Studio - the only time Corporate-sponsorship has done something for greater good!).
There is something magical and deeply authentic about our sounds that the West can only wish Taylor Swift can achieve.
3. Spend time with people who understand the “in-between”
Some of the best friends I have made here that are not from Pakistan (like I am) are not Australian either. They are Irish, Polish, Greek, Chinese, Indian, Egyptian. Despite living in the West for decades, there is something that connects the rest of us from the "East". Those of us who grew up with a different set of values - those from an immigrant household, the family expectations, the food that contains flavour, borderline offensive humor, our no-f's giving parents, the pressure to succeed, and the guilt and pride that comes with it. The awkwardness of sometimes feeling too Western in one room and too non-White in another.
Connect with those who relate, don't exoticize or triviliaze your culture. They don't weigh your worth with just how western you succeeded to become. Learn more about their culture and language and marvel at all that connects you.
4. Support the people and projects you care about
Put your money where your mouth is. If we want more cultural stories, brands, creators and projects to exist, we have to support them when we can.
That might mean donating to a cause. Subscribing to a creator. Buying from a small cultural brand. Sharing someone’s work. Supporting a local restaurant, artist, writer, event or community project. It does not always have to be something big. But culture does not survive on nostalgia alone. It needs people to back it. I subscribe to independent news channels (Hello, Zeteo!), listen to podcasts that you connect with and donate to causes that matter.
5. Talk about where you are from — and wear it too
My name is hard to pronounce (even sometimes by my own people). Saman.
For years I have allowed people to mispronounce my name. Samaaaaan. Sayman. But now I make sure it's said right. When they can say "Benedict Cumberbatch" with such ease, surely they can get my name right.
Tell people what your name means. Talk about your family, your food, the music, the traditions, the memories. Wear clothing that vbetter represents you - traditional clothing, jewellery, words, symbols. A piece of art. Or something modern that still carries a cultural story. That is part of why Dastaan exists.
Dastaan means story. And for many of us, our story is not just one thing. It is where we were born, where our parents came from, where we live now, and everything we carry in between. Wearing your identity does not have to be dramatic. Sometimes it is just a quiet way of saying: this is part of me too and I love it. Because where you come from is not something to shrink. It is part of your dastaan.