---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Roland Mascarenhas <roland...@gmail.com> Date: Fri, Oct 5, 2012 at 11:20 AM Subject: Re: Have We Lost It? - Stray Thoughts of a Toronto Goan To: bo...@goanet.org
Hi Bosco, Hope you're doing well. My comment below: --------------------- An interesting discussion sparked by a provocative, if not inflammatory column by Mr. Francis. Although my namesake is an eloquent writer, his claims (“What apologies can be made for very rich individual Goans who have winged their way into the economic stratosphere without a second glance to their hoi-polloi far behind?”; “Today's Goan corporate bigwigs have their noses so far up in the air they couldn't smell their own odors”) are questionable and lacking balance. It seems as if every few months a new comment has emerged focusing on the Goan identity crisis and its link to generational and cultural differences (East-West), and community organizations. But many of these auto-thoughts are superficial and polarizing in nature, lacking both social history and refusal to acknowledge the complexity of the modern day. As a 20-something cultural straddler born in the Greater Toronto Area, I have seen first-hand the harms of this ‘selective’ nostalgia for the past by my elders. Goa’s emigrant patterns in the first half of the past century are a product of economic circumstances, but have left our culture balkanized and fused with identity politics. The nation-state, be it Kenya, Uganda, Karachi or UAE, has replaced the village communal, but has splintered Goan diasporic communities into sub-cultural organizations. Correspondingly, nearly all of the organizations in Toronto - bar the 55+ associations – attempt to capture a niche market, leading to augmented attrition rates in membership, event and committee involvement, and dare I repeat Mr. Gabe Menezes’ comment, a higher proportion of interracial relationships. “Disco clubs” and “village feasts” are channels for young people to meet, but what constitutes a suitable number of participants is dubious: are 20 young adults enough? How about 60? The contemporary problem is not solely the deficit of avenues to meet, but also the perception we have of our community and the rampant self-loathing demarcated by the ethnic optioning (Goan young adults tell their friends they’re “Goan,” yet are oblivious to the history of the region and are fastidious in their selection of Goan traditions. When they leave the country on vacation they’re “Canadian”). As well as the common disassociation from our ‘homeland’ (“I’m African,” is the frequent mantra uttered by Goans. Tellingly, one Goan Soccer League team in Toronto, Margao Simba, maintains a strong bond with their African heritage, witnessed by the symbol of a lion, one player even getting an extensive back tattoo of a pride in a jungle. Read more here: http://alturl.com/gooqj). Post-2000 has been a time of technological advancement, but also cultural erosion. Years after its’ initial inception, the debate on what constitutes the current Goan Identity has yet to conclude. Instead, it continues to be ‘caught between two worlds,’ one of which is the nostalgia politics of the past (Mr. Francis’s comment), the other revealed in the subsequent responses about the Goan pioneering spirit. Goans continue to demonstrate this tension in the present: full-of-opinions yet unwilling to act on them. Have we ever truly broken the shackles of the colonial empire’s ‘Othering?’ Roland Mascarenhas Toronto, ON -- Thanks, Roland Mascarenhas Ed.M, Harvard University '12 B.Ed, University of Toronto B.A, York University -- Thanks, Roland Mascarenhas Ed.M, Harvard University '12 B.Ed, University of Toronto B.A, York University