By Katie Vazquez

Anneliese Ayers recently gave a moving presentation centered around the “Voluntary Erasure of Cultural Identity”. This topic having been put into play since historical Ellis Island, where many immigrants were forced to shorten or change their names to sound more American. In her research, the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant have enforced this conformity. When supporting the fact, Ayers makes her point: “you can see how people move through society in hierarchical groups according to race, gender, and sexuality”.

Many Americans have not only been stripped of their cultural heritage but have lost sight of it through years of conformity. This erasure is also a common struggle among college students who are bi- or multiracial wanting to be more educated and have a stronger connection with their cultural identity. Being of Mexican and German descent, Ayers shares this obstacle among many others: “I want to be able to have these conversations about racial and ethnic identity without having my credibility called into question based on the color of my skin.”

Actively seeing the intentional deconstruction towards many, she admits: “Unfortunately, the aggression toward non-white groups has increased to levels I can’t even grasp. In some ways, it’s subtle and indirect, in other ways it’s horrifically outright.” Ayers stresses that the only way for society to become accepting of different cultural identities is to “remain active in the reform and hope for a better future”.