Hybrid Humanity

In Ethnicity, Race and Nation, Barker talks about different forms of racism, ethnicity and power, national pride, and so on. Basically, this chapter creates a solid foundation for our discussion of race and culture to be built upon.

Although it was broad and covered a lot of information, one concept that caught my attention was that of “hybridity.” Before reading this chapter I had never heard the word “hybridity” used in the context of race. When I hear the word “hybrid,” I think of cars. But that’s not quite what Barker was talking about. He says that cultures are not homogeneous, but that “each category is always already a a hybrid form that is also divided along the lines of religion, class, gender, age, nationality and so forth. Thus, hybridization is the mixing of that which is already a hybrid.”

The people who are able to function in more than one culture successfully are not so much faced with this huge process of culture shock. I mean sure, after having lived in Spain for nine months, I can personally attest that culture shock is very real and can be painful to go through. But just as I did, there comes a point when a person is able to function just fine in more than one culture; or as Barker puts it, “it is more valid to see these young people as skilled operators of cultural code switching.”

In many mediums I think this message is still a new concept; it’s not an easy message to find. Let’s look at the travel channel. There’s tons of shows on other cultures (Samantha Brown’s Great Weekends, Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations, etc.), but I think TV tries to really highlight the differences between cultures and portray them as homogeneous set of beliefs/unspoken rules, customs, a language, and a race that can only be understood by people of that culture. However, cultures themselves are a hybrid, and many people can function within two (or even more) cultures comfortably.

There many not be much representation on TV (like TV shows, I mean) for the “bicultural” lifestyle that is a reality for many of us, but one outlet of the media that has a decent amount of depictions of this is in film. Movies like "Sisterhood of the traveling Pants," "Spanglish," and "Bend It Like Beckham" are just three examples of many films with characters who function in two culture spheres with equal success. I think this is an important concept to highlight because humanity is constantly intermixing and changing. Race and culture lines are being crossed more and more, and I would argue that this is becoming more of a norm than an oddity.