A Narrative Of One Mexican American Woman - 1663 Words

Introduction: This is a narrative of one Mexican American woman’s experiences and her views on the importance of passing down the cultural beliefs of her ancestors. In the section of the country in which I live there is a large population within the community of Mexican American culture. Although I have frequent contact with people of Mexican American heritage either through employment or interaction out in the community, I have a limited understanding of their culture. For this reason, I chose to learn more about the population of people I have frequent contact with and as a professional work with as clients in the field of mental health counseling. The quest of finding someone knowledgeable to discuss the population, their cultural†¦show more content†¦One of the first topic points of our discussion was the importance of Mrs. Garcia’s cultural values. This was a very personal subject for Mrs. Garcia. She described the importance of passing these values down to her children and grandchildren, and is concerned that the importance of these values are not being passed down the way she would like. In her family alone, she witnesses her grandchildren not being taught to speak their native language of Spanish. Mrs. Garcia tries to instill these important aspects of their culture to them, but she becomes frustrated when her daughter does not teach them in her home. Mrs. Garcia emphasized the importance of family in the Mexican American culture, and with all families there is a bit of a hierarchy amongst them. Typically, it is the mother that holds this position within the Mexican American culture, therefore if these values and beliefs are passed down it is primarily the mother’s responsibility. Although if both parents are involved in the parenting both of them play a role in the development of the children, however the mother seems to be more influential. As reported by Knight et al. (2011) in Mexican American adolescent ethnic identity development a nd internalization of Mexican American values are facilitated by the mother through ethnic socialization. In the Mexican American community, religion is an important aspect of their lives and with Mrs. Garcia this no different. The majority of the culture is Roman Catholic and