Excuse the lack of dessert photos. I’m dieting for the first time ever in my life and, right now, frozen mixed berries are serving to settle my sweet tooth. There’s a lot that can be said about it, but for right now it is what it is.
This past week a book was released called Rule Nostalgia: A Backwards History of Britain. I cannot wait to get my hands on a copy, which I pre-ordered (which is the best way to support authors you love). The woman who wrote it, a wit named Hannah Rose Woods, has made scathing political, social, and historical commentary on Twitter that I’ve eaten up for the past year. Her book is going to be outstanding.
British nostalgia made me think of a uniquely American nostalgia. I don’t think there’s a term for it as yet, but almost every single friend or family member I know has got it.
Imagine longing for a heritage that isn’t really yours. Identifying yourself and your family based on a country your ancestors left centuries ago, a place you maybe have even stepped foot in.
This is, of course, the heritage marketplace. I myself was told for my entire life that I am Dutch. My husband’s family is Czech. My best friend is Italian. My ex-boyfriend’s New Jersey family was SO Irish that they had shamrock wedding china. But none of us are really any of those things.
My father is an ancestry nut who has traced our family back to dirt farmers in nowhere Austria. We’ve done 23andMe which confirmed a German heritage. Nondescript Teutonic people who lived there before a German state condensed itself into one. But I thought I was Dutch?
Confused, I found the other Julia Steegs of the world on Facebook. They are all from Germany. I asked them where their families are from? Germany. And me? Well, I live in America but my family is supposed to be Dutch. This confused the literal, practical Germans very much. This is the moment I understood that, no, I am American and I sounded like a moron.
I’m not the only one either. Americans the world over are the butt of a joke. Scots love to tease Americans coming to visit their ancestral clan homes and claims to castles. Italians cringe when New Jersey Italians speak in Italian, but it’s GABAGOOOL or insist that fettuccine Alfredo is a classic dish. Americans still haven’t accepted it, but we aren’t authentic. We are very much American.
The American national identity is young. It’s unripe. We know it’s very much still trying to figure itself out, like a preteen. Insecure, zits and all, trying to fit in. Maybe that’s why we are so quick to align ourselves with more ancient dynasties, add some legitimacy to our lines.
I have a lot more to say about this. I’ve been thinking about it all week. I’ll probably churn out a few more posts on the topic including how (largely) POC do not have the same luxury of tracing ancestry, our obsession with the “ideal” 1950’s, American exceptionalism x Old World heritage, and maybe I’ll even talk shit about guns.
xx Julia