(Reading time: 10 – 15 minutes)
I sat in for my last class of graduate school today. Semester endings are so anti-climactic! One minute you’re buried under this huge pile of journal articles, trying to synthesize your findings, the next minute there’s… nothing. You’re done. So I finished class and came home and my husband wanted to know how come I wasn’t out celebrating with my colleagues. I shrugged my shoulders and said, “I don’t know. I guess I’ve spent enough time with them.” He reminded me that only a week or two earlier I was gushing about how I loved spending time with my fellow grad students, how intelligent they were, how mentally stimulating our conversations were, etc. etc. He was right, of course. I did say all those things (and I meant them!). So I thought about this ambivalence I was feeling now, and I finally realized what it was about. Because it was only a little more than three years ago that I decided to pursue a masters degree and, looking back now, I am able to appreciate all the transitions that came along with the process. What I was experiencing now, I realized, is well-documented in the literature of… culture shock!
Culture shock describes the feelings of disorientation experienced by people visiting or migrating to a foreign country. Anthropologist Kalervo Oberg first identified this phenomenon in a 1975 address to the Women’s Club of Rio de Janeiro, describing it as “an occupational disease of people who have been suddenly transplanted abroad. Like most ailments it has its own etiology, symptoms and cure.” One well-established model of culture shock is the W-Shaped Model, which outlines seven stages in intercultural adjustment: The Honeymoon Stage, Hostility Stage, Humorous Stage, In-Sync Stage, Ambivalence Stage, Reentry Culture Shock Stage, and the Resocialization Stage. It is widely recognized that culture shock is not exclusive to travelers, but can be the result of psychological and emotional experiences that result from most major life transitions, e.g., marriage, divorce, loss of a loved one, job transitions, etc. According to experts, these passages can bring with them a degree of psychological upheaval – the result of being overwhelmed by new stimuli.
In the community where I grew up, the concept of formal higher education is foreign. This is not because education is not a valued commodity, quite the contrary. As befits the ‘People of the Book,’ scholarship in this Orthodox Jewish society is a respected and valued enterprise. It is the ‘secular’ distinction that makes it less than desirable. Children are educated in private community schools which offer a dual-curriculum in religious and secular studies (with an emphasis on the former). Upon being graduated, most girls attend a year of ‘seminary’ and then find some employment. The societal expectation is that they will ultimately get married, sooner rather than later, and hopefully start a family.
I married at a relatively young age, and so I did most of my undergraduate work while raising young children. My family (husband, parents, and siblings) were proud of my academic achievements, but also baffled to some extent about exactly what was involved. Then, 3 ½ years ago, I applied to graduate school. When I received my acceptance letter from Columbia University, I experienced the characteristic euphoria of the Honeymoon Stage. Suddenly I saw my all dreams unrolling before me like the proverbial red carpet and it seemed that all I needed to do was to walk along the bright path that lay ahead. My professional goals crystallized and I couldn’t imagine anything holding me back. I guess I knew, on some level, that I’d be entering a whole new culture when I went back to school, but I happily anticipated the changes and mentally minimized the challenges (financial issues, commuting, juggling roles, academic rigors, etc.).
I moved into the Hostility Stage quite abruptly while attending the admitted students’ orientation event. My understanding was that many students at a graduate university pursue their degrees part-time (as I intended to do). The school website lists the average student age at 35, so I thought “hey, I’m going fit right in!” Perhaps some senior students skewed that average, because at the orientation event I encountered scores of young prospective students (mid-20’s) accompanied by both parents! Program assistants fielded questions related to full-time study, while student volunteers advised prospective students against taking more than 5 classes per semester (!), directed them on how to search for apartments, and basically described a life that was completely dedicated to and defined by their student status. There seemed to be no room for people like me – people who had a demanding life beyond campus. All these incongruent vibes converged upon my subconscious, and during my drive home I cried because I was convinced that there was no way I could do this. The enormity of the financial burden, the dissimilarity of my lifestyle, concerns and responsibilities and those of the people I had met, all these became magnified and I couldn’t see how it could work for me. I arrived home depressed and disheartened.
Ultimately, my ambitions prevailed. But my first year at grad school was a lonely and confusing time. I had much to learn about life in this new ‘culture,’ starting with the NYC parking regulations (which I learned the hard way after my car got towed and I found myself stranded on the corner of Morningside drive late at night, all alone) to learning the specific jargon of my field (applied linguistics) and adapting to the expectations of my professors. I often felt like an illegal alien as I walked the hallowed halls of the institution.
Very gradually I began to move into the Humorous Stage. During my second year I took a teaching practicum which involved hands-on experience. I had a teaching partner with whom I had a great working relationship (shout-out to Kawai!). My academic success restored a measure of the self-confidence I had lost during my first year. I had many things to learn, and I often learned them in a circuitous way. I still sometimes found myself in strange situations – but now I was able to laugh at myself. After navigating the labyrinthine corridors, book bag and coffee in hand, only to end up exactly where I started, I just sighed and smiled and started all over again.
My acculturation was a slow process, but I gradually moved into a relatively In-Sync stage. I say relatively, since I think my religious lifestyle will always set me apart. As an Orthodox Jew, people are curious about me, not sure what to make of my dress code, my eating habits, my lifestyle choices and my worldview. I do not participate in weekend activities on campus due to my Shabbos observance, and I must take forced vacations from classes during longer Jewish holidays (since the academic calendar does not coincide with the Jewish one). Because I keep a kosher diet, I politely decline when people invite me to dine out with them or try to share their food with me. It is hard to explain these and other differences to my peers.
But now that I’m graduating everything is changing (again!) and I find myself entering the ambivalence stage. I’ve formed so many close and wonderful relationships, but I know that most of my colleagues will be going back home (to their respective countries all around the world) and the bonds that were formed as we faced our academic challenges together will slowly unravel. This makes me sad, and perhaps the ambivalence I am describing is the psychological defense mechanism that helps us humans deal with these sorts of transitions. People who have spent time in a foreign country report that before returning back home they go through this phase of ambivalence, detaching emotionally from the people in their host culture. Leaving grad school will also signal (at least for a while) the ‘return’ to my own community, in many respects. I am experiencing a similar ambivalent attitude on the part of some people I know, who are just not sure what to make of me now. Sometimes I enjoy being surrounded by this aura of ‘mystery,’ but often it is a burden. This leads me to the reentry culture shock and resocialization stages.
Experts on intercultural issues talk about the ‘identity disjunction’ that develops as a result of the distance between the two cultures one inhabits. In my case, the reentry has been an ongoing process, not a one-time event. I am constantly moving between cultures (family, community, work, school) and so I am often busy readjusting my cultural lens and switching between languages (literally and metaphorically). In conversational contexts, I mentally sift through available topics, deciding what is suitable for each one. Being by nature a people-pleaser, I’ve always tried to assimilate into, rather than transform, my environment.
Grad school life has added yet another layer to my identity and, difficult as the transitions have been, I’ve come to appreciate its challenges. Cultural hybridity has given me a far broader perspective on the world than I ever imagined possible. I’ve learned that the rewards of stepping into a new society far outweigh the difficulties involved in the transition; and I know I am going to keep expanding the boundaries of my personal world and integrating the new perspectives I encounter, as I (continuously) reconstruct my personal culture.
Can you identify with any of this? Have you experienced any life transitions in such a way?
Confessions of a Cultural Hybrid 