Those of you who follow my sadly sporadic writing on this site probably know that I shy away from sharing any personal stuff. Today something happened. Something that has me wondering if I overreacted or if I did the right thing. I am going to let you judge.
Like many of our readers and like all my blog mates, I am a proud DBD. I was born and grew up in India. Nine years in the USA may have added Americanisms to my speech but my accent remains firmly Indian. I am not self conscious about it – I live in the Bay Area and I am surrounded by a myriad of accents. My hairdresser has a glorious Russian accent. The guy who changed my kitchen countertops has a charming Mexican accents- I love its cadences. I have worked with people from South America, Turkey, Ukraine and Britain and each spoke with a unique accent. I *love* the British accent and can listen to a Britisher reading aloud from something as boring as a Telephone Directory just to hear that marvelous accent. I don’t believe my Indian accent is something I need to be ashamed of – its as much a part of me as eating mango pickle with curds and rice is, as celebrating Diwali , as speaking in Hinglish when at home.
An American co worker has – several times – imitated an “Indian” accent in front of me. I have so far chosen to ignore it. Its a terrible imitation in any case , the “Apu ” accent which is one that does not exist in real life as far as my experience goes. Today it happened again during a lull in a meeting. I snapped. I did something that is probably not wise. I told him that a) the sound of someone imitating an Indian accent is like the scraping of nails over a chalk board to me and b) the “Apu” accent is just plain wrong. Its not accurate and is the American idea of what Indians sound like ( There is no one single “Indian” accent – it changes every few miles in India). I asked him to never do it in front of me again. Obviously, he was taken aback and apologetic and promised never to do it again.
Did I overreact? I don’t know. I just know that I reached the point where this seemed to me to be bordering on racist. I do not understand at what point it becomes acceptable to mock the way an entire subcontinent speaks. Who gets to decide the “right” English accent anyway? The British may rightly claim ownership of the English language- I do not hear any Americans sounding like the British though!
Why are Indian immigrants singled out for speaking in native accents? The Scotsmen and Irishmen who work with me continue to speak with Scottish and Irish accents and I have never, ever heard anyone complain or make fun of them. I have heard people say that Indians do not assimilate – that unlike many Chinese immigrants we do not westernize our children’s names. Yet I have worked with a bunch of Irish people who name their children staunchly Irish names, who celebrate St. Paddy’s, do Irish dances and no one ever accuses them of not assimilating.
I wonder- does this have to do with us looking different? Is it ok to be differently white but being different and brown is unacceptable?
UPDATE: I got another, personal apology today. So the matter is over as far as I am concerned. In retrospect, maybe I could have handled it better. On the other hand, if I had not spoken up no one would have realized how deeply I felt about this.
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