Andrew Ramirez

Professor Nichols

Comm 100s

July 29 2015

A New Perspective

            Anish Sharma is a junior here at Penn State University Park and is originally from India. More specifically Anish is from the Chennai region of Southern India. Anish is studying to become an engineer and is majoring in mechanical engineering. Learning about Anish and his lifestyle opens new doors to understanding people that are different than myself. Anish gave me an insight into what his family is like and more importantly what his culture is like. After learning about Anish and who he is and more about his culture, I began to realize, in some ways, he is not much different than myself. However, Anish gave some insightful answers about what it is like to be different here at PSU.

To start off, I asked Anish what were his hobbies/interest. Anish enjoys watching Netflix, typical among college students, as well as playing chess. At first glance these seem to be normal college student activities. Anish continued and mentioned that he used to play cricket. Cricket is an extremely popular sport globally and is also the most popular sport in India. He talked about how cricket is so popular in India that kids are pretty much obligated to play it some time in their life. I found this intriguing because in the United States there is also a certain sport that everyone plays as a child; soccer. Watching soccer in the U.S. may not be popular but most every kid in the U.S. played some sort of rec soccer when they were young. In this way, I find myself able to connect with Anish and share that feeling of being obligated to play a certain sport as a kid. As I divulged deeper in our interview I started noticing more and more similarities.

I continued to ask Anish about his life and who he is and then asked him to describe his culture. Anish responded by saying that his culture revolved around the family unit. He stressed to me that family is very important in his society and that they generally live in large groups. He also said to me that having large families was also a staple in his culture. I then asked a question regarding tradition and whether it was important in his culture. His expression gave me the answer. Anish said that tradition is extremely important in his family especially when it come to religion. He emphasized that his family was quite religious and that it was a big part of every day life. He also made sure to mention that retaining family values was also important. He said that the values of hard work and respect were important to his family and to pass on those values was equally important. Once again, I found myself being able to relate with Anish. Anish and I started to seem not so different at all. I find myself also believing that family is extremely important in my life as well as tradition. Those same values that Anish’s family believes in are the same ones my parents instilled in me. I started to realize that even though our skin was different colors, our inner qualities were much the same.

At this point in the interview I started to ask some deeper, more problematic questions that were personal to him. I asked Anish if he had ever experienced a sort of stereotype here at Penn State. He made clear that he never felt the pressure of a stereotype here but he said that he had experienced them before. The main stereotypes he was exposed to were that every one seems to think that Indians just want to be with other Indians. He said that was not the case, he wanted to branch out and be friends with people from different races and other ethnicities. However he said the general stereotype regarding Indians was that they wanted nothing to do with African Americans, Whites, or Latinos. Anish also mentioned some other stereotypes that he deemed common among Indians. He mentioned the fact that most people seem to think that all Indians are smart and smart when it comes to technology. He says that this is one of the bigger stereotypes that are common for Indians. He also talked about one stereotype that I had not envisioned being a real issue. He said that people seem to think that all Indians don’t eat meat and are completely vegetarian. He made it clear to me that that is usually not the case. He said most Indians that he is friends with aren’t vegetarian and enjoy eating meat. These are some of the answers Anish gave me that I found myself not being able to relate with. I feel that people don’t look at me and assume I only want to be with other white people or Hispanics. I also feel that there is no stereotype when it comes to the diet of a white person or Latino.

My final question I asked Anish was about whether or not he thinks that people appreciate diversity. He answered with an emphatic yes and that people do really appreciate the differences of other people. He stressed to me that here at Penn State he doesn’t feel like he stands out at all. He says that Penn State is most certainly a diverse campus and that he feels like people here are accepting of others and that diversity is common. I completely agree with the statements that Anish gave here; I feel that Penn State is a diverse place and that every one is accepting of each other.

When I was given the task to interview someone of a different race or different culture, I jumped at the opportunity to find someone who I thought would be vastly different than myself. That is how I met Anish and I came to realize that we aren’t so different at all. Anish in many ways is similar to myself; his interest, values, and the way he sees Penn State were all similar to my interests, values and views of Penn State. Just because we have different color skin doesn’t mean that we’re different on the inside. I found this to be an eye opening experience and would encourage any one to go and do the same to someone that they feel is different than themselves.