Sociological memoir - Grade: A PDF

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Essay on my life including sociological concepts and theories...

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Josselyn Mejia 12/16/2019 SOC 100-002 Professor. Castro

Sociological Memoir I am the oldest of five. My siblings Sharon, Katherine, Leon and Kaoma all look up to me and come to me for advice. I am Brazilian and Salvadoran and I have been to exposed Salvadoran culture more than my Brazilian culture. I love to learn about other cultures as it is a way for me to bond with people and get to learn what morals and beliefs have shaped a person. There are many sociological concepts that I have learned in this introductory sociology class that I can connect to aspects of my life such as different ideas, theories and concepts from class.

Let’s start with the people responsible for my existence, my parents. My mother was from Brazil, she was short and feisty just like me. The reason why I talk about her in the past tense is because she is no longer with me. She passed away on June 23rd  , 2010. She was born in Brazil however; she moved to El Salvador and grew up there. My grandfather was from El Salvador and wanted my grandma to live with him. He was a painter in his country and didn’t want to lose his clientele. She immigrated to the United States when she was 18. My father is 100% Salvadoran. He immigrated to the United States when he was 7. At a young age he resocialized himself and quickly gained his citizenship. My dad met my mother when he was 19 and she was 18. They met working at an airline company. I was born in 1998, meaning my dad

was 20 and my mom was 19. My father was in college when he found out the news about me. He was enrolled at SUNY Oneonta and had to drop out to help my mother. He was a citizen however she was undocumented and needed to work to suport us.

My dad and I have bonded over social interaction because we have shared experiences through which we can relate to each other. He went to the same middle school and high school as me. We even had some of the same teachers although he graduated much earlier than me. He graduated in 1997. Not many children with immigrant parents can say this and because of this, my dad is my primary social agent. My father has always been more cultured than my mom. He knows the slang words that I know, he knows all of the “spots” to hang out with your friends, he knows how Lawrence High School is, he knows football, baseball, and wrestling because he joined the team in high school, he knows so much about the American culture, you would think he was born here! Due to this reason, I always looked up to him for advice and help. He was very familiar about the social norms and he was the one to teach me how to participate into society the “accepted way”. The reason why I wasn’t as close to my mother was because there has always been a cultural lag in our relationship. She didn’t know much English and was the one who taught me Spanish. My father knew Spanish, don’t get me wrong, however he was exposed to American culture for so long that he mostly spoke Spanglish. My mother and grandmothers were the ones who taught me more about Salvadoran culture and Spanish.

My father worked really hard to support my mother and I. Around the time I was born, gender role played a big part in family households. The mother was to stay home to cook, clean,

and take care of the baby, and the father was expected to work and provide for the family. My dad dropped out of SUNY Oneonta to work as a truck driver where he was able to get paid more than minimum wage. It took my father 18 years to become the manager of that same airline company. My dad still works there to this day and makes a lot more today. He started off living in my grandmother’s apartment with my mom and I in a single room and we all slept on the same bed. Through hard work and dedication, he was able to save up for his own apartment. Throughout my whole life I have been moving from one house to another throughout Long Island. Luckily by 2007, my father got enough money for a down payment on a house. I was finally able to live in my own house at the age of 7. We climbed up the social stratification hierarchy and went from being in the lower  class to upper middle class. I have witnessed my dad go through a lot and work 14-hour shifts. He had a tough time connecting with me when I was younger because work consumed his life and he didn’t have time, which is considered as a role conflict. I admired his hard work and spent a lot of time at home with my mom. It wasn’t until my mother passed away that my dad took responsibility of us and started to be more invested in my life. I was already grown and knew how to take care of myself by the age of 15 because I was used to figuring things out on my own and always tried to do the right thing.

Now let’s talk about my siblings. My sisters Sharon, Katherine and Kaoma all try to look up to me whether or not they make it obvious or not. When my mother passed away, Katherine was 5 years old, Leon (my brother) was 6, Sharon was 8, and Kaoma wasn’t born yet because she had a different mother. Ever since my mom was gone, my childhood was taken away from me. I had to start cooking for the kids and help them with homework when my grandma and dad were at work. It was VERY hard for me. I was only in 5th grade and I had so much on my plate.

My father knew that I was very mature for my age and expected a lot from me because I was the “oldest”. I had to come home from school and be everyone’s “second mommy” and on top of that do my homework. This role taking process exposed me to adulthood and motherhood (to a certain point) at a young age. This role strain continued until my dad noticed that I didn’t seem happy and decided to find a partner that could take care of us and love us as their own. This is where Kaoma comes into the picture. My dad met Mayra, and she took care of us living in cohabitation and was like a second mom to us. She got pregnant out of wedlock and had Kaoma who is 9 years old now. She didn’t stay with my dad for long and decided to take Kaoma and live on her own. I don’t have a strong bond with Kaoma as I would like, but that’s because she doesn’t live with me. Katherine and Sharon have two completely different personalities. Sharon is more of a deviant child and I feel that she is like this because she grew up in my shadow. I was the one who was always in charge and I never really bonded with her or played with her ever since my mom died. Like I said, I had to give my childhood away to help my dad. I believe that Sharon became a bad child because of secondary deviance. She was always getting herself into trouble ever since we were little and almost always got caught. She was always labeled as the “bad child” and I feel that because she was always labeled this, this is what she became. She never tried to change, and I guess liked being the bad child? She is 19 and still the bad child. She recently got kicked out of my home and left to live with my grandma because she tried to tase me with her taser that she got from a friend. I always thought she hated me and always wanted to harm me but I also noticed she tried to be like me. She always tried to steal my clothes, shoes, boyfriends, and friends. It was very heartbreaking having a sister so closely aged to me, be that way. She would sometimes be my best friend, however other times be my enemy; it was really

hard to trust her. Katherine on the other hand is a very sensitive girl however puts up an act to look tough. Her reference group consists of “ratchet” girls (Sorry for being so stereotypical), potheads, and kids that are always cutting class. Katherine was that type of child that was under the radar and nobody really worried about and always was annoyed by. I personally feel that Katherine became rebellious to get my fathers attention. Leon, my 15-year-old brother is probably the type of sibling to brag about. He is a student athlete, very kind, generous, studious and mature. I had always had a bond with him since he was very little, and I try as much as possible to advise him about school and girls. My siblings taught me how to be patient and have showed me how different social groups could affect a child’s personality. I personally feel that the social groups that Katherine associates herself with has really had a bad example on her. The functionalist theory would state that this type of social group, although bad, still has a part in society as a whole.

As I mentioned that I have always been mature for my age, there was not a day I didn't go without thinking about what I wanted to do in the future. My number one goal was to go to college to get a great salary to help out my dad after seeing him work so hard for his kids. I know I am going to grow up to have the same work ethic as him to achieve my goals. At the age of 17 I applied to my first job, Panera. I worked there for 4 years all year long. Although I didn't want to give up my paycheck to my father, I knew I had to help out. I felt that my social role was to use the resources my family has provided me to become a better version of myself and become somebody important in life that others can look up to. In all honesty, I want to make my family

proud and be the first to graduate college, however I feel like that is a norm among children of immigrant parents.

In conclusion, my family has played a huge part in who I am today. The experiences that I have gone through shaped me into the person I am now, and I wouldn’t have it any other way because my life is unique. I have enjoyed the privileges from my father’s hard work such as educational attainment which is by far the most important thing to have....