I understand if everyone looking at me is seeing a Jew and seeing me as a kind of 'other.' But I can't be expected to see myself that way. That is, to me, Jewish is the normal way to be; it's not a type of being.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of self-identity versus societal perception.
In this quote, Nathan Englander reflects on the distinction between how he perceives his Jewish identity and how others might perceive him. He asserts that while he recognizes that others may see him as an 'other' due to his Jewish background, he views his identity as normal and intrinsic, highlighting the complexity of self-identity in the face of external judgment.
In practice
In a discussion on identity politics, this quote can highlight the importance of self-perception over societal labels.
It's so easy to call something a Jewish story or a gay story or a woman's story. Aesthetically, if a story is not universal, it has failed. Your obligation is to the story. One rule creatively, and emotionally, is its universality.
I have always wanted to be both man and woman, to incorporate the strongest and richest parts of my mother and father within/into me - to share valleys and mountains upon my body the way the earth does in hills and peaks.
For me, having a gender identity that was different from my sex assigned at birth and that wasn't seen by society felt like a constant feeling of homesickness - that unwavering ache in the pit of my stomach.
I was a mixed black girl existing in a westernized Hawaiian culture where petite Asian women were the ideal, in a white culture where black women were furthest from the standard of beauty, in an American culture where trans women of color were invisible.
I would rather be a member of this [Afrikan] race than a Greek in the time of Alexander, a Roman in the Augustan period, or Anglo-Saxon in the nineteenth century.
I'm a Black woman and I've always been told that I wasn't Black enough because of the way that I grew up, the experiences that I had.
I've often felt like an outsider, not necessarily because I'm Korean, an immigrant, or female. I think writers are odd people.
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