Ethnographic Interview
I chose to interview my wife, Jenn. She was born and raised in Utah and is Caucasian. Her culture is different from mine because I was born and raised in Nigeria and I am black. In order to get all the information I wanted, I interviewed her three times. The interview went well and I was able to get the information I needed. I was comfortable doing the interview and it was interesting to be able to talk to her and get her opinion on things we don’t normally talk about.
In my wife’s culture, family is very important. She defines family as the man, wife and children. It also includes grandparents, brothers and sisters, aunts, uncles and cousins. The family is the basic unit of society. Much of the time, family roles are defined by the husband being the breadwinner and the wife being responsible for the care of the home and the children. However, it is becoming more common, even in Utah, for both parents to work. Then the care of the children either lies with friends and relatives or a day-care center. If both parents work, then the care of the home is often shared. This contrasts with my culture because the woman is always at home. If the woman has to work, she would take the children with her.
For Jenn’s family, holidays and celebrations always involve family. Even if it’s only a family dinner on President’s day, family is central to the celebration of a holiday. There are more holidays to celebrate in her culture than in mine. Birthdays always involve family. The celebration of Christmas includes playing carols. Her parents host the celebration for Christmas. This includes her mom and dad, her brother Chris and his girlfriend Katie, and Jenn and I with our son. The Christmas dinner takes place on Christmas Eve and always consists of ham, au gratin potatoes, peas, a lemon Jell-o salad, rolls, wassail and fruitcake. They usually have a steamed pudding for dessert. She told me that there has only been one year that this menu wasn’t followed. Exchanging of gifts is important on Christmas. Jenn always exchanges gifts with her parents and Chris and Katie. Santa Claus always brings presents to each member of the family. Part of the LDS culture includes giving Christmas gifts to your visiting teachers, home teachers, the ladies you visit teach, and the families I go home teaching to. Our neighbors also exchange gifts. In Nigeria, there is not money for gifts, but food is often exchanged between family and friends on Christmas. In the United States, Christmas has become very commercialized. Emphasis is placed on material gifts and what Santa Claus brings. Businesses used to wait until after Thanksgiving to put up Christmas displays and play Christmas carols. This year, Jenn said they were playing Christmas carols in stores on Halloween.
My wife’s family usually includes food in celebrations. Christmas and Thanksgiving always have the same menus. Her parents host family dinners for each birthday in the family, including mine and Katie’s. Family dinners also take place for Easter, the Fourth of July, and occasionally lesser celebrated holidays like President’s Day or Labor Day. Food and family are important in my wife’s culture. Birthdays always involve a special dessert and gifts. This is different from my culture. Most people in Nigeria don’t have much money. While growing up, my family didn’t ever purchase a gift for me on my birthday. We never went out to dinner. There was no special dessert on my birthday. It’s not common to have big birthday celebrations in Nigeria.
Food is an important part of the culture in Utah. Religious activities almost always include food, whether it is a dinner or just a treat at the end of the activity. Food is an important part of weddings and funerals. Following a funeral service at the church, the church members provide a dinner for family and close friends of the deceased. This is similar to my culture, but the church doesn’t provide the food. The family of the deceased is responsible for providing the meal. I learned from Jenn that the choice of food is important for wedding celebrations. Weddings in the United States are very different from my culture. In Utah, the typical LDS wedding celebration includes a wedding breakfast paid for by the groom’s family. The wedding reception in the evening is paid for by the bride’s family. This reception typically involves the bride, groom, and bridal party standing in a line to greet the guests. The food is often a dessert buffet or very light supper, but almost never a sit-down dinner. The bride and groom invite everybody they have ever known. This means standing in the line greeting guests for several hours. When Jenn and I got married, neither of us wanted to follow this cultural tradition. Jenn always wanted a formal sit-down dinner with dancing. Since dancing is a major part of the wedding celebration in my culture, I agreed. We skipped the wedding breakfast and got married in the late morning. Our evening celebration was a sit-down dinner followed by dancing. The guest list was much smaller than what the culture would dictate.
Jenn has had the opportunity to travel to more than half of the states in the U.S., as well as several countries outside the U.S. She has experienced a few prejudices, though none were harmful. Most of the time, when people hear she is from Utah, they ask one of two questions. The first is “You’re from Utah? Do you ski?” She does not ski, but people think that everyone in Utah must be a skier. The second question is “Are you a Mormon?” One time, when the person found out that she is a “Mormon” they asked if she had horns on her head. After Jenn and I met online, she came to Africa to meet me in person. We met in Ghana and I asked her about her experience in Africa. It was definitely a different experience to be the minority in the population. There was one time when she felt that a person was discriminatory because she was white, but most of the time she didn’t feel uncomfortable. She did notice that most of the people thought she was rich because she was a white American. It was difficult for her to make them understand that she’s not rich. Jenn and I have traveled to a few places together since we have been married. There have been a few times when she has noticed discrimination for us being an inter-racial couple.
One of the cultural differences that Jenn talked about is the perception of beauty in the United States. So much emphasis is placed upon physical appearance. In order to be beautiful, you have to be thin. There is a problem with eating disorders because of the desire to be thin. Women spend money on plastic surgeries to have breast implants, tummy-tucks, face lifts, and such in order to be considered as beautiful. There is a perception that women with blond hair are more desirable. So women spend money to change their hair color. This is such a contrast to my culture. Women are expected to gain weight after they get married because it shows that their husband is a good provider. If a woman is very thin, people think she is sick.
Dance is an important part of the culture in the U.S. Many people enroll their children in dance classes when they are young. Most large cities have ballet and modern dance performances. Ballroom dancing performances and instruction are also available in big cities. Many forms of dance in the U.S., such as ballet and ballroom, are very structured. There are specific steps that must be followed. The music is also set for the dances. You would never go to a ballroom dance performance and see someone doing the Samba to Waltz music. Even modern dance is choreographed so that a specific step happens at a specific time.
Since, coming to the United States I have realized that the perception of beauty is different. I was surprised that so much emphasis is placed on a specific physical appearance. It doesn’t make sense to me that there is one definition of beauty, which is how thin you are. To me, it’s not how much a woman weighs or the color of her that determines beauty. I have seen many heavier women who are very attractive. Because family is also important in my culture, I really appreciate the family activities that are so important to Jenn. I love celebrating Thanksgiving and Christmas here because it involves family. I was surprised to learn that so many weddings here involve standing in a line greeting guests, and that often there is no dancing. Dancing is such an important part of my culture. Even though the dances at our wedding were different than I was used to, I was happy that we were dancing.
