Russell Simmons Quotes

'Authentic' is one of my least favourite words because in such a diverse country, whose authenticity are you talking about?

I sang a song in Hindi; nobody even knew what that was. Singing about Native American issues, nobody did that... I had no reason to want to copy anybody else... All I had was my originality.

All I try to do is portray Indians as we are, in creative ways. With imagination and poetry. I think a lot of Native American literature is stuck in one idea: sort of spiritual, environmentalist Indians. And I want to portray everyday lives. I think by doing that, by portraying the ordinary lives of Indians, perhaps people learn something new.

The way to write American music is simple. All you have to do is be an American and then write any kind of music you wish.

A culture is made — or destroyed — by its articulate voices.

I don't think culture is something you can describe.

I live in Australia, and I am Australian, and because I grew up in an era where we didn't have a film industry, and now we do, it's just really exciting for me to be able to say that I work in my own culture in a medium that I find fascinating.

I think there's the apparent lack of subtlety and sort of make-believe anti-sensibility connected with American art. I think this is a style, and it does relate to our culture, and I think it would be anachronistic maybe to pretend to be involved with subtle changes and modulations and things like that, because it's really not part of America.

I didn't emphasize my Jewishness because I wanted to. I just happen to have been raised in a family where everybody happened to talk like this, so why would I talk like somebody else?

The thing a writer has to avoid is being the 'voice' of his people and pretending he can speak for them.

I never thought fashion was the job for me, because I'm Japanese. Clothes! That was a European, society thing.

Part of my mission as an actor has been to define what an American is.

If you want to retain your identity and culture, we're a really great mothership. If you want to sell out... there are definitely other companies to talk to.

There is an imagined thing called black culture. But culture is a construction. It is learned behavior, not innate. The black American experience is the American experience.

I'm American; I was born and raised in America, and I don't want to fake who I am to fit a stereotype.

I wish Wales was more represented on the British stage, and I have missed that being in London.

You can't just look like one culture and expect to inspire a multitude of people. That doesn't work over time. Everybody wants somebody to look up to that looks like them so they can truly believe in that reality for themselves.

I think only a real Indian can defeat a fake Indian.

Yoga is not Indian; it does not belong to India.

You cannot act a color. Do not tell me I'm acting black, because I'm not. I'm acting whatever you want to call it - urban. I don't even have a name for it. I just call it 'me.'

The one thing I won't do is sacrifice my Indian identity in my music, my clothing choices. It's something I tried to hide growing up, and I would never do that again because it's such a big part of me and I'm very proud of it.

I think of Westernized culture as a good visual for my music.

We have to preserve folk in its authenticity. Else folk will become fake.

I grew up in an environment with virtually no Hispanics where you see only people in your culture in custodial jobs. I had a messed up image of what we bring to this nation. My father was known as a pioneering figure in Cuban music, but I still associated him with everything that was negative in my neighborhood. I could not have been more mistaken.

Living in Los Angeles is pretty cool.