Reconnecting with Suppressed Ancestral Identities

Arriving in India, the heavy, humid air weighed me down. I struggled to stay awake in the car to our hotel after the 22-hour travel day. Since arriving on this familial trip, the non-western customs were becoming more present by the second. The people, smells, actions, and events all had a different twist from what I was used to. Sitting in the hotel room, I remember being overwhelmed. I watched out the window as bright yellow rickshaws full of local women going shopping passed by. I saw men returning home from fishing on the dock and street vendors selling fresh produce, gold jewelry, and hand-woven clothing across the street. I remember feeling like an outsider, a tourist, like someone who didn’t belong. Thinking I was part of this culture was far from my mind. At this moment, I just wanted to go home. But why?

I’ve always known that my mother’s family comes from India. I’m aware of its influence on my name and appearance, though not on many other aspects of my identity. It’s consistently been something I’ve tried to avoid all through childhood and haven’t often brought to the surface. Something that I don’t feel the need to express and don’t identify with. Because of this, I found myself hesitant to enjoy our time in India. We rode elephants, slept in traditional riverboats, and ate amazing and spicy food, and yet, the whole time, I was stuck in a phase of judgment. I didn’t like the intense smells of burning trash, thick dirt on the street, or the loud noises of the city. Looking back, I think 12-year-old me was scared of change. Scared of difference.

At the end of our three-week trip, we piled into a bus and drove to Pondicherry, the city of my Indian ancestors. Pondicherry is quite different from the rest of India due to its history as a former French territory. Unlike most of India, which was forced under English rule, Pondicherry was once under the authority of France. During the time of French rule, Indian people in Pondicherry were denied their individual rights and freedoms. It was a time of suppression and reformation, in which countless Indian men died for French causes, and countless aspects of vibrant culture were stripped away. A monument in Pondicherry today remembers the fallen Indian soldiers who died fighting French wars, bringing some remembrance for those whose culture and lives were taken from them. The shared cultural legacy of Pondicherry is complex, as the “colonial heritage should be located in a history shared between the colonizers and the colonized” (Jorgensen). Walking by this monument with my family, I remember the stark white marble against the backdrop of trees. This monument represents my family’s history, a complicated one. Seeing this sight stirred a sense of interest within me.

Looking back on my time in Pondicherry, I’m starting to understand that one of the reasons I’m so disconnected from my Indian heritage is that the culture of my Indian ancestors was suppressed and replaced with French culture. Following Pondicherry's independence from France in 1962, French culture remained heavily present in the city. To this day, Pondicherry maintains an Indian minority to French citizenship. This is unique as it means many locals speak French or dress in European attire while others choose to retain their French citizenship and yet live Indian lifestyles. People in Pondicherry are ethnically Indian while culturally French (Raffin). Walking down the streets of Pondicherry today, there is a mix of bright Indian architecture and soft European influences—French mansions surrounded by the traditional architectural styles of India. When thinking about my identity, I am sure that this French colonialism deeply affected my severed connection to India.

Maintaining a cultural and ancestral identity is a challenge many face, especially in the United States, where the dominant homogenous culture relies on stripping and forgetting any past cultural identity. My mother, Ghita, who also grew up in the United States, never felt deeply connected to her Indian identity as a child. Even though her mother, Marie Ange, had grown up and lived in India her entire childhood and early adult life, moving to the United States forced her to give up on many Indian customs. When Ghita was growing up in the ‘70s and ‘80s, people in the United States didn’t embrace other cultures. Since their family was not white, they had to do everything in their power to overcompensate by living the most “American” life they could. Though they spoke French at home, they tried their hardest to fit in.

My grandmother Marie Ange lived in French-occupied Pondicherry as a child. Her father, my great-grandfather, though ethnically Indian, was a magistrate judge for the French government. Living under French rule in Pondicherry, he was fortunate enough to be a part of the government rather than an afterthought of its colonization. As such, their family began practicing Catholicism and forgot the Indian customs of Hinduism. The combination of French colonization and moving to the United States made my mother’s life, and my own, lack almost every aspect of Indian culture that was present in my grandmother's childhood. Though we shared this initial disconnect, we are both now reclaiming our Indian identities, a common trend for 2nd and 3rd-generation Americans in the 21st century.

Ghita finally visited India for the first time as a young adult, and she describes it as an “amazing and eye-opening experience.” (Harris-Newton). Like me, she had never felt connected to the culture as a child and yet would become much more connected over the coming years every time she visited. As she told me, she now feels more in touch with her ancestors than ever before. She finally feels Indian and doesn’t just look at it. Like my mother, I am beginning to feel more connected to India. I am starting to understand my ancestors and their lives. I am beginning to form a new identity, one of collective Indian, French, and American assets.

Growing up in the United States, I had little Indian or French culture present in my life. Due to circumstances of time, proximity, and local culture, I have shared a common experience with other Americans of forgetting my ancestral identity. Though my childhood home is full of Indian artwork and tapestries, I have never truly explored this aspect of my identity. But, through reflection and research, I have now begun to feel more connected. Meeting relatives and cousins in India made me want to connect with my culture more. After visiting Pondicherry, I had a newfound understanding of my ancestors’ lives. I have since worked to fully understand this aspect of my identity, and I’ve recognized the unique blood that runs through my veins. I’ve become proud to include my Indian heritage when asked where I’m from, and I’ve even started including it without prompt. Though it may be a complicated facet of my identity, it is an important one.

India’s influence of vibrant culture, clothes, and spices, alongside France’s influence of food and romance, brings a beautiful place like Pondicherry into existence. Though undertones of war, inequality, and suppression may seem to taint its spirit, Pondicherry’s very existence rests upon these events and these histories. Being a descendant of a place like this brings many aspects to my life and the lives of my family members. It brings us many beautiful languages, which I hope to one day learn, foods, events, and myths, but it also brings the pain and suffering our ancestors went through. Embracing my Pondicherrian ancestry means accepting my ancestors’ life paths, journeys, and triumphs. It means understanding their suffering and their sacrifice. Like my ancestors’ identities were suppressed by the French, mine was also suppressed by America. I am now proud to be of Indian descent, and I am pleased to come from a line of vibrance, culture, and history. Though I have pushed it to the side for my whole life, I am now ready to celebrate my French, Indian, and American identities as one.