Identity

One country can have many identities hidden inside itself and only local might be able to recognize the difference between vocabulary, accent and daily activity. In Puerto Rico for example we all speak Spanish as a main language but as you go deeper into the rural side of the island you will begin to notice a difference in accent between the people from inside the island to the people from the city. Maybe as a tourist, an outsider, you wouldn’t notice this because is a language you are not use to hear but for local inhabitants is pretty obvious. A person from Jayuya for example will have a more native accent than the one living in San Juan. This difference could be marked by several variations as the working place and how packed the population is. People from the city usually have to adapt to a more industrialized atmosphere being forced to change the way they talk and to be fluent in other languages like english with is the world’s main trade and business language. The fact that people live so packed in the city makes it easier for the accent and new culture and way of live to spread than if we were more deeper inside the island where sometimes your closest neighbor can be two minutes down the road and you see him every two or three days.

In the United States there is a much bigger difference in accent and language than we have in Puerto Rico. The United States has a much bigger contribution of nations on it soil than any other country in the world. Almost every country if not all are present in the States today. These people walk between American people and maybe we don’t notice them but native people do, the way they act, the way they speak, the way they dress is different but we don’t notice because is not our culture and they all look the same to us. For example the most common would be the Jewish people, I couldn’t tell the difference between them and an American person because I’m not entirely aware of how both cultures are because throughout the years the have blend into the society and make it their own. Difference between accents is very difficult to get, but it is said that a person from Boston has a much stronger accent than a person from lets say Arizona.

The same way we have cultures that blend in very good we have others that doesn’t even bother to blend in. Latin communities usually stick together and is easier to tell the difference. Mexicans and Puerto Ricans in the United States for example have a more distinguished and marked accent than those other communities that have been longer in the States. Normally theses groups try to stay together in the same area for example Mexicans concentrate in areas like California, Texas and Chicago while Puerto Ricans Concentrate more in Florida and New York. These settlements are this way so that the people can feel that they still have their identity as a group being a minority. They take their culture, their language and their style and make that place their own. Like Cubans in Miami they have their own town and is called little Cuba and is place where you can go and live the Cuban culture because they took all what identifies them and moved it with them. the identity of a group is not made only for their own country but it is something that you carry with you anywhere you go.