Cultures, Beliefs And Values Of A Traditional Hmong Family

“Choua”, which is my name, means wind in Hmong. Hmong, an Asian ethnicity who does not have a “land” or “home” to call. Many of us come from Laos or areas nearby like Thailand. In the Hmong culture, there are varieties of religions in the community, but two of the most common ones are animism and Christianity. There are two different perspectives of life in the Hmong community as well: American modernized and traditional. Likewise, my family is a traditional Hmong family who believes in animism. Being raised in a traditional aspect has shaped my beliefs and thoughts of who I am today. I would say that the practices, beliefs, and values of a traditional family have impacted the way I view life. For example, I was raised and taught that women

I say this because I took one test based on gender from the IAT website, and my results were a tad shocking to me. It claimed that I moderately associate men with science and women with liberal arts. Now that I think of it, I have always had more male teachers for science topics and females for liberal art classes. Learning a different language, my primary teacher was a male as well. It is interesting to see how my education career has shaped my internal thoughts about gender, but I wonder if society played a part in shaping my internal

As I have gotten older, I feel that I have become more open-minded about it such as the values of a son and daughter. Besides beliefs and values, communication itself is hard in the Hmong community (as a whole). Men are taught to be more resilient with their emotions and to be the strong individual they are, Women are seen to be more emotional and expressive in their families, but this seems to be common in many cultures. With this kind of view, I have seen my brothers struggle with being the “strong” individual they need to be seen as which makes it harder for them to be expressive about their emotions. I believe it causes a lot of chaos in themselves and the situations they put themselves in. Growing up, I cannot recall a lot of my neighborhoods and what it was like. The only one I can vividly remember and can speak of is the neighborhood I’ve been living in for the last decades. When we first lived here, it was predominantly white families, more like white older families. The neighborhood was always quiet and calm. I remember most people being friendly and open-minded; some even worked with my father at a medical assembly company. It always felt calm and welcoming, until one day something