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Jessica Gerke
122 S Hampton Pointe Athens, GA 30606 jlg14985@uga.edu 7708436358

Exploration of Cultural Background:

Interview with Varsha Narendra
Jessica Gerke
University of Georgia

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When asked to interview someone to analyze culture, I decided to interview my

acquaintance that I met through my sorority, Varsha Narendra. Varsha is a 2nd generation
immigrant, but was born in Chicago, Illinois. Her parents were both originally from India,
but came to the United States, and divorced shortly after. She is a 19-year-old female, the first of
two siblings, and has three younger stepsiblings. She feels as though she can identify as an
American and Indian-American when regarding ethnicity and nationality. A common theme
throughout our informal interview I conducted was that she feels like she is split between her
different identities, and feels as though she can identify with the many diverse cultures she has
been raised in. She speaks only English, but she can understand other languages called Tamil
and Telugu, because her extended family will occasionally speak it. Her whole family practices
the religion of Hinduism, and her father, although very Americanized, still will go this year to
visit their holy city called Varn and Benarus. As we were interviewing, Varsha explained how
funny it was that her father, who is very traditionally Hindu, is also a very "stereotypical
southerner". He even makes jokes about succeeding from the union, and enjoys talk of bourbon
and gun power.
In Varsha's family, familial ties are extremely important. She spends most summers in
India to go visit a family that will probably never come visit her, but its extremely important to
her anyway. Even in college, she goes home to her father often, as he is the one who has raised
her for most of her life. Many times when she goes home, she is welcomed by what she likes to
call an "Indian party" that her dad hosts. She says that these parties consist mostly of their
Indian American friends, and they will do anything from watching Bollywood YouTube videos,
to cracking Indian culture related jokes. She looks up to her dad in many ways, and finds that he
is very progressive as person, compared to the culture that he descended from. Usually, the

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Indian culture can be very sexist and gender divided, but within her family, most of the women
have been encouraged to get an education and have become highly successful, despite societal
expectations. Both Varsha and her father identify as feminists, and do not like to be held back by
some of the traditions of Indian culture.
Varsha has a sense of pride for her family, because she appreciates the way her family
differs from the mainstream of Indian society. She feels that many times in Indian culture, being
a woman is extremely degrading, and she feels like everyone should be treated as an individual.
Her family emphasizes charity, starting with the maids and drivers that their family employs.
Most of the times, these positions are considered a "master/servant" relationship, but within her
family, these employees are considered part of the family. For them, this includes supporting
the helpers children. She strongly believes that these people are giving her family more than
they could ever give them, so any support is completely deserved. This mentality has to do with
the fact that her family has historically been considered the highest caste in India, and are still
considered part of that caste. Their name helps keep them in this high status, but each generation
is more successful than the last as well.
In her father's parenting style, he demonstrates a lot of trust by letting her make her own
choices in most situations because he wants her to learn from her mistakes. However, when it
comes to big decisions, like dropping out of high school, he draws the line, showing her he
ultimately knows what is best in the long run. Her mom raised her until she was 9, but then her
parents split, and her dad played the role of both parents for a long time. She highly respects his
advice and opinions, and does not have a very good relationship with her mother. As she was
raised, there were no verbal affirmations of love, and to this day, she does not express emotion

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within or outside of her family. They are all very logical, and show love through acts of service
to one another more than anything else.
Varsha greatly emphasizes that although she loves her family, she sees a great disparity
between the two cultures, and her and her father are very good at switching between the different
cultures when they need to. Some of the traditions that are held within her extended family in
India she deems quite ridiculous, but still interesting to say the least. Concerning Hinduism,
Varsha was Hindu for most of her life, until two years ago when she converted to Christianity.
Every year, her family still goes to a Hindu temple to pray for the health of their entire family, as
well as praying for her school success on their own throughout the year. Varsha, being able to
see both sides of each major religion, sees so much similarity between the two. They are two
major constructs based on how we should all be good to people. The values are almost identical,
with just differing practices and rituals. Even now, there are many things that in her mind are
deeply based on Hinduism beliefs. She used to have to follow practices like not stepping on a
book, because God was within that book. Now she follows that rule, but with the idea that she
respects knowledge and doesn't want to degrade the knowledge within the book. She feels like
she came to Christianity because she used to be a horrible person, but Christians still showed so
much love to her in spite of that. Although all Christians do not hold the same attitudes, that
love is one of the most important factors to her.
Within her family, they like to hold family reunions often, continuing this tradition every
year. In the language of Tamil, the word "uppa" means father, and the word "unna" means
brother. With that being said, most of the boys call their fathers by "unna", because they are
treating each other as equals and friends. When you meet an older person in this culture, you
greet them by a process known as "namaskaram". You must bow with hands together, call them

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uncle or auntie, and as you leave, bow to the floor and ask for their blessings. Other Indian
customs are rules such as not being able to spend time alone with single person, if you are single,
and having someone to monitor a courtship as it is happening. Women are also expected to be
quiet and soft-spoken around men, even though Varsha's family doesn't acknowledge this rule
very much. Women are expected to not drink alcohol. Men can drink alcohol, but are expected
to hide it. Varsha has always personally been raised to be assertive in her opinions and what she
wants, which is completely different from the passivity that is expected of women in India.
However, sometimes she must hold back and know when to not approach an issue, like feminism
with the more traditional people.
At bigger social functions that they might participate in, like weddings, Varsha's mom
dresses her in the finest diamonds and the most vibrant dresses. When Varsha is trying to be
respectful of Indian culture, she must refrain from wearing her usual neutral colors and tank tops,
and can only wear 4 of the 14 piercings that she has on her. Regarding health, the grandmothers
in the family pray in a temple for the family's health many times, but they also consult
astrologists every time someone has fallen physically ill. She also said that most of her family
panics a great deal when someone has fallen ill, even when many of the members of the family
are doctors. Varsha's father does not support visiting a doctor for mental illness. India as a
whole very much loves cricket and tennis, and her family enjoys playing these as well. When
asking Varsha what kind of art stood out to her as different, she said that Henna tattoos were a
big deal, however, they are looked down upon in her high caste system.
When I talked about prejudices with Varsha, she said she feels different kinds
of oppression for each part of her major identity. As a part of her Indian identity, she does not fit
into that mold, as she dresses differently, is pierced a lot, and has short hair. They consider her

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as only "kind-of Indian". As a Christian here in America, she feels like most people expect
Christians to look a certain way: white. As an Indian American, she senses and notices a lot of
the micro-aggression that takes place in her everyday life. People will ask to touch her hair, and
then note on how it feels less thick than they thought it would feel. However, in her mind, she
feels more culturally "white", so its hard for her to see herself in the way that others judge her on
first meeting her. In fact, when she was younger, she was even afraid of people that weren't
white, because she was only friends with white people, and thought she was just really tan. It
was all based on how she was socialized in America, and she feels like she doesn't truly fit into
any of these molds very well. For her prejudices against others, she has a little bit of bitterness
towards her Indian roots, but for the most part she wishes to see each person as an individual, not
as a group with preconceived ideas about them.
Personally, I find Varsha's culturally upbringing to be fascinating. I know her through
my Christian sorority, and I knew that she grew up of a different religion, but I wanted to know
if that made for a much different life than my own. When Varsha talked though, I found that she
was not much different from me in many ways. As she spoke about her mindset changing from
Hinduism to Christianity, I really enjoyed what she had to say. Some Christians look down on
other religions in an arrogant way, but she still respects the ideas that she grew up with and
learned how to incorporate them into her newfound Christianity. Something I related to as she
spoke was her idea that people should be seen as individuals rather than stereotypes, and she
follows this by showing that she doesn't have to be confined to a specific cultural stereotype
within her own life. It is hard for me to understand what Varsha has gone through, however,
because she is a minority in America, where as I am a white women with privileges that I don't
even realize sometimes. Varsha's culture has helped her become more of an advocate for

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women's rights and wants to be a politician. She is very feminist and outspoken about her
political beliefs, which are both things that I am not. I agree with ideas of women's rights, but
there are many ideas that I cannot compromise on to label myself as a feminist. I also have many
conflicting values about politics, and I don't enjoy discussing them, because I grew up knowing
that no one is ever completely correct about their opinions, but everyone tries to convince each
other otherwise. She spoke of being very liberal, and of loving President Obama because he
brought humanity to the office. This interests me because I have an opposing opinion on this,
and it makes me wonder if I can ever be unbiased about my beliefs as I am a majority when it
comes to race. It also makes me wonder if race has anything to do with it, because I know many
minority upbringings can give them a completely different outlook on life and thus, political
opinions.
Although Varsha is a minority, she is well off in America, and probably even more so
than my family. Her family name is very important in India, and is highly revered, while my
family came from very humble beginnings to where we are now. Comparing and contrasting our
families, I see a lot of similarities in how we view family as extremely important, but I also see
that she views extended family as just as close. My family loyalty is much more focused on the
nuclear family, but I also have a very close-knit and emotionally expressive family. Many of the
parenting styles are similar between us, as my parents give me the liberty to choose on most
decisions, and advise me whenever I need it. I also found it interesting that Varsha's father
doesn't support going to the doctor about mental illness, which I directly related to the fact that
they are not very emotional people. Because I feel that my family understands emotions very
well, we are big supporters of helping people through depression and other mental illness,
because it is all around us. Its interesting to see that her culture is much more phased by physical

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ailments, where as American culture seems to focus a lot on mental health awareness. Some
people say that this is a "first-world problem" in general.
As a whole, I found that Varshas basic moral to be good to people very much aligns with
my life purpose, and it encompasses both of our daily lives. This core value seems to permeate
social scripts and bring many different cultures together in many ways, and it was intriguing to
see how it played out in this interview.