What our parents have shared with us and what our education has left out has a tendency to influence how we perceive our right heritage. We are provided with pieces of our heritage as children — tales that pass around the dinner table, traditions that pass generationally, and heirlooms that echo history. These tales can be a powerful filter through which we build ourselves, having a tendency to surpass the critical consciousness formal education might provide.
We can learn the sweep of history in our classrooms, but sometimes it is distant and disconnected from our own. The facts and dates fill out a skeleton, but not the rich interconnections we make when we listen to our family's history from the people who lived it. Our grandparents and parents fill in the gaps with stories of their own that imbue them with emotion and meaning that books cannot give.
As we step into adulthood, the stories of our heritage, the ones told and retold, define how we see ourselves and our place in the world. Are we the descendants of wanderers who voyaged across the seas, or were we from those who tilled the land? Either way, both stories shape not only our family history but how we see culture, belonging, and heritage.
Our heritage is a backdrop on which our identity is drawn, a mixture of what we have learned and what has been experienced. The tapestry that we weave is one of our own — a rich description of experiences that can breed pride or serve to inform personal philosophy. Our shared memories, as told by our parents, sound so real, reaffirming the bond we establish with our roots, reminding us that it is more about weaving the fibers of our lives together than about the dry facts given in books. In doing so, that which has been passed on by our parents fills the void left by the process of formal schooling, prompting us to discover who we are through the lives that have influenced us before ever taking a breath. Contemplating this blending of tales, history, and heritage can reveal profound things about our own lives. It makes us consider more than our own tale and to embrace the rich narrative quilt that is our own heritage. It finally compels us to reconsider how we view ourselves and how we convey those stories to the future.
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