Hidden in Plain Sight

When the choices you make are obvious to some but oblivious to others

Recap

In my previous two newsletters, I shared the small discoveries I found in conversing with Anna Lu, a Chinese American. In particular, I talked about how bilingualism is a superpower and how children of immigrants carry invisible burdens. This week I will continue sharing another discovery from my conversation with Anna.

D is for Decisions

“Should I only speak English here?” is a question that may have run through your mind if you are a child of immigrants. “Here” refers to the supermarket, at work, at the post office, at the park, etc. Whether you are fully fluent or speak your home language with an accent, you make a choice of which language you will use based on the people surrounding you, the political climate, and/or the situation at hand, to name a few. In speaking with Anna, I realized that this is something that we do nearly every single day.

Here is an example that Anna shared: During the Covid pandemic when hate crimes were rising against Asian-Americans, Anna said that she was hesitant at times to speak Chinese with her mom at the supermarket. She was afraid of being verbally or physically attacked for speaking Chinese. Why are we so hesitant and so afraid? Is it because we hear stories left and right about how people are verbally attacked for choosing to speak any other language besides English to their kids? Are we afraid of being victims to these crimes as well?

I believe that we we also are hesitant to speak our home languages because we are afraid others will make assumptions about us. What assumptions, you may ask. I’ll name a few.

• Strangers sometimes assume you do not speak English at all just because you are speaking another language.

• Sometimes they think that just because you speak another language, that you must not know how to speak English as well. I remember telling Anna how one time someone asked me if I knew a certain idiom in English. Why wouldn’t I?

• Sometimes they focus on the volume of your voice. Anna and I discussed how we tend to speak louder in our home languages (Chinese and Armenian, respectively) so those who do not speak our home languages sometimes incorrectly think we are angry or arguing.

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What seems like a simple question “Should I only speak English here?” is not so simple after all. What often goes by unnoticed is this mental thinking process, repeated day after day. An invisible cognitive load. There are so many things that need to be considered before you actually make the decision to speak your home language or not. It makes me think of the Iceberg Model developed by Edward T. Hall. The top of the iceberg are the things that are visible and the bottom part are partially perceivable.

What people see is you speaking English. What they do not see is that this decision involves mini tasks: evaluating the environment, the people involved, and the number of people, to name a few. Some of these mini tasks may involve asking yourself : Where am I? Who is in the room? Do they understand another language?

It’s quite exhausting and frustrating when others do not notice nor understand this thinking process. But usually others who have experienced the same things do notice them, right? When I was looking for a word to describe this invisible cognitive load, the word hidden came to mind. This brought me to the conclusion that this invisible cognitive load is hidden in plain sight.

For some reason, my interest took me back to the days when I used to search for the etymology of certain idioms or words (like airball in my Language and Sports class as an undergrad). Although I didn’t go as far to read the history of this idiom, one thing led to another and I found a book called Hidden in Plain Sight and got the sample from Libby (a free app to get ebooks from Los Angeles Public Library). I started reading the sample.

According to Eviatar Zerubavel, a professor of sociology at Rutgers University and author of Hidden in Plain Sight: The Social Structure of Irrelevance,” What we notice and ignore, in short, is also a function of whether we are detectives or philosophers, Koreans or Americans, omnivores or vegans. In other words, we notice and ignore things not only as human beings but also as social beings.” (Zerubavel, 2015, pg. 18) What Zerubavel is saying is that we see things from our own social lenses. He also notes that “…we actually notice and ignore things not only as individuals but also jointly, as parts of collectives.” (Zerubavel, 2015, pg. 18) Groups of people, which he refers to as communities, are socialized into noticing and ignoring certain things. For example, if you are a bilingual speaker who has had to make these decisions, you will recognize the “hidden” thought process but if you are monolingual, you will ignore it (not recognize it in the moment) because you are unfamiliar with it. There may be cases where the individual strays from the collective as well, too.

Although I specifically talked about language and how it is an invisible cognitive load, hidden in plain sight, there are many other thing that may fit into this category: translating for your parents, helping family and relatives with English, and feeling an identity shift in different environments and with different groups, to name a few.

How about you? What else would you say is an invisible cognitive load?

Reflection

• Have you ever avoided speaking your home language in public? Why?

• What kind of questions run through your mind before you make the decision to speak English or your home language?

• What does this though process feel like to you?

Key Takeaways

• “Should I only speak English here?” is a question that may run through the minds of children of immigrants. “Here” refers to the supermarket, at work, at the post office, at the park, etc.

• Child of immigrants may be hesitant to speak their home language outside our homes for many reasons including:

  • Afraid of being verbally or physically attacked

  • Afraid of others making assumptions about them such as: strangers assuming they do not speak English at all, that they must not know how to speak English as well, or are angry or arguing based on the volume of their voice.

• There is an invisible cognitive load. Before making a decision about what language to use, a child of immigrants goes through a mental list of questions.

• This invisible cognitive load, which I say is hidden in plain sight, can be:

  • frustrating and exhausting

  • noticeable by some but ignored by others

References

Zerubavel, Eviatar. “Noticing and Ignoring.” in Hidden in Plain Sight: The Social Structure of Irrelevance. New York. Oxford University Press. 2015