“We always felt we were Indians first and Jews second.”A quote from a member of the Bene Israel community in the NY Times article, “Jews of Mumbai, a Tiny and Eclectic Group, Suddenly Reconsider Their Serene Existence” had me wondering whether or not I was Dominican first and Jewish second.

Or is it American first and Jewish second? Dominican last? Never. It is possible to be Dominican and Jewish and American first or to scramble the different parts of my identity situationally.

I’ve always felt like a Dominican-American, Dominican first in American, American first in the Dominican Republic and at once home and homeless in both countries. In college, I wrote an article, American Woman!, about wanting to be seen as just American, mostly because I felt that as a hyphenate people saw me somehow as less American than Americans of white European ancestry who dropped their hyphenated identities long ago.

I know better now. I’m just as Jewish, as Dominican, as American as anyone else and I want to be seen as such. But I never forget that my identity is a cross of sometimes layered, sometimes juxtaposed cultures. I don’t have to sacrifice parts of myself to form a cohesive whole.

Do you feel you have to pick and choose between different parts of your identity? Is there a part of your identity you feel has more importance than the others?