I’ll be honest. Cultural appropriation is an idea I am still working to wrap my head around. That there is something wrong with a member of a privileged culture (read:white 99% of the time) making money off of the symbolism and traditions of another culture – for instance for someone to create a company that manufactures imitation dream catchers and sells them for massive profit while the NA tribes that dream catchers come from are fighting to get the money to provide their people with food and housing… If anyone is going to make money selling cultural items and ideas it should be the culture they came from. People using trappings of another culture to try to look exotic or cool or hip? Yeah, that’s just wrong and I’m not going to pull any punches. But, the idea that, as some have maintained, it is cultural appropriation for my friend to practice Buddhism? Possibly it is because I grew up a culture where it assumed to be a good thing when someone converted to your religion, I don’t get this. TBH, I especially don’t get this when applied to Buddhism, which has a long history of proselyzation and, yes, forced conversions.
Would it be cultural appropriation for me to write a story set in Mongolia or India? I honestly don’t know. I also know it isn’t my opinion that matters.
But this intro is actually off topic from my musings today.
Stavver‘s linked to an old but good piece on reverse cultural appropriation. Now, the idea that it is reverse cultural appropriation for PoC to wear business suits, when it is impossible to get a ‘good’ job wearing anything else, that Native American’s should not be wearing jeans, when they have been stripped of their ability to make enough clothing for their people using their traditional methods AND their ability to evolve new methods… I have, in fact, heard more ridiculous ideas. But not many.
If white people think it is reverse cultural appropriation for PoC to wear business suits, then white hiring managers had better start welcoming applicants in kimono, sari and other formal clothing from other cultures.
But it was something in the comments that really got me thinking about cultural appropriation and intersectionality.
A person who identified as Irish (I don’t know if they were a person of Irish decent living in the US or a person of Irish nationality – and I don’t think it makes a difference) raised the issue of St. Patrick’s Day, and asked if her being upset with people getting drunk, painting themselves green and generally making a mockery of her heritage would be seen as cultural appropriation or just another whiny white girl crying ‘reverse cultural appropriation’.
To which I can only respond with the classic geek battle cry: Yes, no and 42!
Yes: The adoption of St. Patrick’s Day and its associated drunken celebrations are definitely a form of cultural appropriation.
No: This is not an issue of crying reverse cultural appropriation.
42: But factor in everything else, and it’s pretty damned complicated.
Okay, first off, Wales, Scotland and Ireland are where the English first practiced colonialization before exporting their oppression to the rest of the world. According to my father, I have ancestors who were forcibly shipped to America for refusing to swear loyalty to the British crown. The oppression of the Irish has a history that is actually longer than the oppression of PoC. That said, the suffering of my ancestors who were forced from their homes and thrown into what history tells us they would have perceived as a ‘howling wilderness’ is DEMONSTRABLY LESS then the suffering of PoC, in particular for purposes of this example, the Africans and Native Americans who were forced in slavery or subjected to genocidal campaigns. (There may well have been genocidal campaigns against the Irish, and I have been told that ethnocentrism in Great Britain continues to create and oppressive social structure for the Scottish and Welsh with some similarities to the racist social structure in the US.)
So the Irish are NOT a historically privileged group trying to divert attention from their own oppressiveness with cries of ‘reverse cultural appropriation’ and similar bullshit.
Historically, the Irish were part of the oppressed.
But intentionally or not, the Irish were also the oppressors.
Does the fact that my ancestors had no choice about coming to America change the fact that they and their descendants kept slaves, forced NA tribes off of their lands and were able to live comfortable lives off the suffering of others? No, no it doesn’t.
The history of the Irish in America, as opposed to the history of the Irish in Ireland and Great Britain, is not a tale of the oppressed. It is a tale of a people stuck in the middle. A people who were once faced with “No Irish allowed” signs as ubiquitous as “No Negros allowed”, but who were able to level themselves into a white identity and become part of the dominant, and privileged majority.
In the Appalachian coal mines, the descendants of Irish and Scottish immigrants still do a disproportionate amount of dying in the mines that feed the US’s need for electric power. But people of Irish descent are well represented in boardrooms, legislative houses and other centers of power across the country.
Yet the specific question for cultural appropriation is even more complicated.
EDIT: I had previously stated that the English never appropriated the cultures of the Welsh, Scottish and Irish. Several commenters have corrected me on this.
Sometimes I think the real basis of cultural appropriate is not modern avarice, but ancient awe. I think on some level Anglo culture has never forgotten that when London was a cesspit, the Mughals ruled a powerful empire, Istanbul with THE City, center for culture and power, held in awe throughout Europe, and Ancient China was a united power when William the Conquer was in nappies. And even if Anglo culture didn’t exist yet when the pyramids were raised, what European traveller, however firm in his superiority, could not be overwhelmed faced with the glories of ancient Egypt? Cultural appropriation happens, I believe, because we recognize the wonders of other cultures, and rather than being willing to come as students and learn from the wisdom and might of others, we insist on coming as thieves, taking the work of others and trying to make it our own.
There was no cultural appropriation of the Irish in Britain. That waited for the US. Yet… within the US, Irish culture was not sought out by Anglos and other ‘white’ folk (b/c the Irish were not considered ‘white’ for long periods of US history). Irish culture came to America with the Irish themselves, as they worked to recreate and hold onto the traditions that had been stripped from them. The popularity of Irish music in America is as much cultural appropriation as the popularity of rap or jazz. Both are attempts by a displaced and broken people to create or retain something of their own in a place where they have been stripped of their past and made into the ‘other’.
But… St. Patrick’s Day. Oh, that may be the most complicated of all. For Saint Patrick’s Day is the day when EVERYONE can be Irish. It is literally day publicized specifically for the appropriation of Irish culture by everyone in the US. It is a holiday built on cultural appropriation. Isn’t it?
Well, let’s get back to where we started – yes, no and 42.
You see, while St. Patrick’s Day celebrations in America originated in Irish-American’s desire to connect with each other and their cultural heritage, in the mid 19th century when discrimination against Irish was at its height, Irish-American’s organized politically and used St. Patrick’s Day as part of their organization. They pushed to make St. Patrick’s Day a revelry celebrated across the nation. The transformation of St. Patrick’s Day from a relatively sedate celebration of pride in one’s heritage into the drunken revelry it is today can be directly linked back to this push. So is it oppression and cultural appropriation for the non-Irish to take up a celebration vigorously promoted by the Irish? in a country where the vast majority of people are a quarter this and a quarter that when we look at nationality and national culture rather than race, is someone with an Irish great-great-grandparent celebrating their heritage or stealing someone else’s when they get drunk on green beer and wear “Kiss me, I’m Irish buttons?” Factor in that commercially St. Patrick’s Day is widely promoted by Irish companies making money off of Irish traditions being celebrated by both Irish and non-Irish people…
And what about St. Patrick’s Day in other parts of the world? St. Patrick’s day is celebrated in several Asian countries, parts of the Caribbean and even Russia.
In the end, I can understand an Irish person trying to hold onto their culture being upset, insulted and dismayed by the drunken revelry that St. Patrick’s has become in the US. I do think it is a kind of cultural appropriation, when non-Irish try to claim for themselves Irish-ness on this day that is traditionally an important holiday and a cultural unification for people of Irish decent in the US. But I also think that such a person needs to recognize that whatever cultural appropriation may be happening one day a year, is not in the same league as the culture appropriation going back centuries faced by PoC from around the world.
And whatever oppression the Irish have faced in the US in the past, they have levered themselves into a position of privilege, and it is important to recognize that fact. Any structural ethnocentrism which remains in UK is oppression and needs to be fought. But oppression is not always international, and a person of Irish descent in the US is not dealing on a daily basis with the oppression in the UK, while they are benefiting on a daily basis from the privilege of being white.
We all function in a matrix of both privilege and oppression. Recognizing the ways we or our cultures are oppressed does not give us a pass on the privilege we benefit from.
Inter Section 
I really enjoyed this, and it hits on several issues I have had without knowing there was a name for it. I used to be a buddhist, my spouse still is, we often felt uncomfortable with the wholesale adoption of cultural artifacts alongside the religion. We both believed that the west would be better developing it’s own form of Buddhism, as had happened in every Asian country spread too.
AS for the St Patricks day question, I totally agree with the commentor (half Irish here) as far as I and most Irish people seem to see it, its an American festival. I think the thing that highlighted how it had nothing to do with Ireland, and was cultural appropriation, was discovering ppl drink “car bombs” in the States.
Interestingly Scotland has been the victim of cultural appropriation, and continues to be. The Victorians were obsessed with it, and almost everything from tartan to Braveheart comes from their view of Scotland.
Cultural appropriation was a new term to me a few months ago, which is probably part of why I’m still getting comfortable with what it is and what is and isn’t appropriation.
Thanks for sharing about appropriation of the Scottish culture. For someone self taught and lazy I know a decent amount of Irish history and culture, but most of what I know about Scotland comes from that same media that’s descended from English bias.
Sadly, there just isn’t time to truly learn about every culture and every country and every issue in the world, and still take care of ourselves and our families. Maybe if we all do the best we can, and demand change, eventually the media will start showing more accurate depictions and it will be easier to be educated and aware. (I can hope, right?)
The cultural appropriation of Scottish cultural icons like the Great Highland Bagpipe, and the kilt by Americans to celebrate an Irish festival like St. Patricks Day is what is absurd, and mildly offensive to Scots. It’s like a Swedish American dressing up in lederhosen to proclaim his identity.
A small country like Scotland has its iconography squashed because 40 million Americans think their Irish, and cherry pick cultural symbols from a completely different country with a mindset that it is close enough. Your article I’m afraid says more about the rise of identity politics in your country than the reality.
“a person of Irish descent in the US is not dealing on a daily basis with the oppression in the UK”
Have you ever actually visited the UK? People of Irish decent don’t suffer oppression on the mainland which is universally ambivalent, and perplexed by 19th century squabbles of Northern Ireland. It’s now popular for the English middle classes to claim some Irish descent. Scots were happy imperialists when it suited Scotland. Scots were highly educated through universal education, and became a powerful, and rich community within the British Empire which allowed the Scottish Enlightenment to take place.
Bill O’Reilly, and Sean Hannity probably dress up like Scots, decry English oppression against Ireland, and spout anti muslim bigotry all in a days work. This kind of American identity politics is the big problem.
In Dublin no one objects to everyone getting truly hammered on St. Patricks, and whiling the night away. Perhaps, appreciating Irish culture should be more about actually looking at the rich literature, authentic Irish music, modern cinema, and comedy of Ireland.
Thanks for writing this. I’m an American of Irish ancestry, and this is pretty much how I feel about the appropriation of Irish-American culture. I think I’d add that Irish-Americans can be just as bad about romanticizing Irish culture. You can be an O’Shaughnessy or Monaghan and it’s still going to be fucking annoying if you take a trip to Ireland and expect it to be all about Enya or charming wee thatched villages.
>There was no cultural appropriation of the Irish in Britain.
But this statement is entirely wrong, throughout the centuries as Ireland under British administration developed Britain learned to strip it of it’s problematic differences (like religion, language, lifestyle) and keep the quaint and benign and present them as fundamental links in the creation of the “British” identity, the appropriation of the traditional Gaelic instrument, the Harp is the classic one which still exists today often indignantly seated under a British crown. Even odd Gaeilge phrases and symbols that suited Imperial sentiment was tolerated at times so long as they were sterilised- “Faugh a Ballagh” and the Red Hand of the O’Neills
As for St. Patricks day, growing up it was always primarily a religious holiday of service and wearing your shamrocks as a reminder of Irish christianity. The commercialised cultural arse-fest was created by Irish-Americans and spread by plastic paddies.
Thank you for correcting me on this. I’m learning a lot from the comments on this post.
I’m not familiar with the term “plastic paddies” but everything I’ve learned is inline with what you say about the “commercialised cultural arse-fest” being created by Irish-Americans. WHich is kind of the heart of the question–because if (for instance) St. Patricks Day had been turned into a cultural arse-fest by the English, or Russians, or Spanish, or Americans not of Irish descent, I’d say ‘no question, that’s cultural appropriation.” But the cultural arse-fest has been created by the descendents of the culture in question. I certainly wouldn’t argue that Christians are being appropriative when they make Christmas a ‘cultural arse-fest’ (which, speaking as someone who grew up in a Christian family, many of them have).
So when Irish-Americans turn their own culture’s religious day into a drunken revel and invite the whole neighborhood to join them, I think we can both agree that’s a pretty shitty way to treat a religious holiday–but is that stealing someoneelse’s culture (cultural-appropriation) as some feel it is, or is it just people treating their own culture like shit? This post was basically my wrestling w/ that question.
I differentiate between genuine Irish-Americans who care about the well being of their proud identity and the rest who join in who appropriate an outdated and stereotypical view of Irish identity, and often don’t know much or want to know much about being Irish apart from drowning their shamrocks and behaving like general bell-ends. St. Patricks Day in America is the cultural cringe in Ireland, it is all kinds of embarrassing from our crowd and taken to extremes by plastics, aswell as continuing outrageous appropriation that continues the rest of the year (do not get me started on Gaelic names in America, it’s all kinds of insulting and stupid).
How about the cultural appropriation of so called ‘Irish’ Americans, (most whom have never seen Ireland in their life) stealing Scottish culture and claiming it as their own? As a Scotsman it drives me crazy every time I see a Highland Pipe band in the States with a huge shamrock on it. Highland Pipe bands are not Irish and have nothing to do with Ireland. The kilts, the Pipes, the music, the tartan, the history and culture of it are 100% Scottish not even slightly Irish. I wouldn’t mind if these bands had American flags on them, but they are Irish American people,claiming this as part of their own culture and it’s not. Pipe bands came from the Scots who settled in Ireland and who had army regiments in Ireland, as they did worldwide. The same as India had pipe bands, but you don’t see Indians claiming it as their own. It’s like having a load of people who are French Americans going round with Lederhosen and playing German music acting as if it is French. A joke really.
Please stop referring to St. Patrick’s Day as ‘St. Patty’s’. Patrick comes from the name ‘Padraig’ which is anglicized to read as ‘Patrick’ – so by using the spelling Patty you’re creating a nickname from the anglicized version. (When the English nickname would be Pat regardless).
( & Patty is a woman’s name.)
Gawker.com/5990788/its-st-paddys-day-not-st-pattys-day
Thanks for the correction