Lost in Translation Analysis
Globalization, a significant phenomenon that has increased universal connectivity and drawn correlations among markets, individuals, and nations, has brought about genuine benefits yet various negative impacts as well. This sweet and sour deal has the potential to blur and deteriorate an individual’s cultural identity. As the world has evolved, migration has become a prominent portion of globalization. However, according to Friedman, in his book Globalization: The Super Story, and Reed’s America: The Multinational Society and the Lost In Translation, the indigenous identities of migrants are forever instilled in their minds. Reed refers to the United States as a "cultural bouillabaisse attributed to its diversity but the original identities of the migrators are still deep inside them" (Reed 256). Moreover, Friedman states the globalization is only integration instead of assimilation and in the last chapter in Lost In Translation Eva still possesses her Polish identity because her momentous decisions always echo in her native tongue. In the following essay, I will present two major reasons to the audience in order to help them understand how language affects an individual’s cultural identity, which is indistinctive by the process of globalization or migration is something deep in one’s heart that shapes an individual’s identity. The first example of validating my thesis statement is how Eva adjusts to English and the English-speaking environment as a whole. Language is one of the substantial tools of proving humans' ability of acquiring, communicating and even representing themselves in the sense of background and their cultural identities. The United States is the most diversified country in the world, with plenty of different nationalities and a sundry of cultures and languages. Ishmael Reed depicts this as a “blurring of cultural styles occurs in the United States and refers to this as a cultural bouillabaisse” (Reed 256). Eva feels lost in a new language