Mexico: Traveling as a Black Latina
The first time I visited the motherland (my mother’s literal homeland) - Mexico, without her or my family, I had so many expectations.
I think as second generation immigrants, we idealize the country our parent(s) come from. We may think of it as a place of milk and honey, or even a constant ‘what if’? What if I had been born there too, who would I be? What if I decided to return permanently? At least, that’s been my experience.
I remember feeling elated at the thought of seeing the great pyramids, of experiencing the source of my grandmother’s culture, and her mother, and as far back as it goes. However, growing up in the bubble city of El Paso, Texas, my family hadn’t prepared me for the outside world, not even our home country. Race and ethnicity, basic factors that create the fabric of society, were never explained to me or how it would affect me. I had to learn that through personal experience, once I left the bubble.
Many of these experiences happened during my travels to Mexico, in a place I had assigned as another home. But I did not receive a homecoming.
What stood out the most were the stares. Endless staring by folx as I walked through their villages, as I sat in the markets, as I danced... “I guess it’s pretty obvious I’m a foreigner”, I thought. It must be my clothes, or maybe I just come off Americanized in some way. I didn’t think much beyond that. And yet once I spoke, those staring faces turned to confusion, followed by either curiosity or distrust.
“Hablas muy bien español, ¿cómo lo aprendiste?” (You speak Spanish well, how did you learn?”)
I spend the majority of my time in Mexico explaining my heritage to people and how I come to speak Spanish fluently. I was constantly repeating that my family on my mother’s side is from Mexico. It reminds of me Sojourner Truth’s famous speech -”Ain’t I woman?”, because similarly “Ain’t I Latina?” Were these same people interrogating White-appearing people the same way? Not that I could see.
After experiencing this numerous times, I started to play around with my answers, sometimes stating I learned it in school, then saying I was from Mexico myself. That last response garnered confusion, one man even tried to explain back to me that it was impossible to be Black AND Mexican. Their elation and confusion of seeing a black person talk their language made me want to see if this was indeed a unique combination.
Spoilers: it is not
In the US Alone, over 6 million people identify as Afro-Latino, living in NYC, there are numerous Black Dominicans, Cubans, Puerto Ricans, etc. Outside of the US, 1 in every 4 Latinos in Latin America identify as Afro-Latinos, with Spanish as a primary language. There are also swathes of Black Hispanics along the Caribbean and Pacific coasts of Central & South America, like Puerto Viejo in Costa Rica, or Choco, Colombia.
Why Spanish speaking peoples seem to forget this, White and Indigenous Latinos, is interesting to me. When it comes to Mexico particularly, Afro-Mexicanos have been reclaiming their identity on the political stage.
Afro-Mexicanos have been in the country as long as the Spaniards, descendants from both enslaved and free Africans during the colonial era. It wasn’t until 2015, that the Mexican government decided to finally include an option in the national census for Afro-indigenous/African descendant. That means about 130 years worth of census data has been omitted because of the prevailing, racist notion that one cannot be African and Mexican. Similar to how Black Americans experience structural racism in the US, so do Afro-Mexicanos. Because of the lack of visibility, I cannot imagine how much more difficult it is to demand rights to a government and respect from citizens that question your very existence.
My travels in Central & Latin America showed me that the social and economic cost of being black seems to cut across all nationalities. Even in places like Costa Rica, and Colombia, I experienced a feeling of not belonging, such as when an indigenous (Mayan) gardener questioned if I was truly a guest at a fancy hotel in Yucatan, Mexico. Always having to speak Spanish and prove my legitimacy (heritage) seemed to be a trend.
This leads me to the next point - how race, ethnicity and nationalism are conflated or confused with each other. Let’s get one thing clear - race is not based in reality. According to genetics, humans across all cultures and regions have 99% DNA match; there is just one homo sapien race. In fact, you find more genetic similarities between populations than within a population. Race is socially constructed, meaning it is a system that groups people together based on appearances that was more firmly established during the transatlantic slave trade. How you look is what race you are in the US, nothing else matters.
I may be Mexican by culture, which would be my ethnicity, but when you look at me, it is not the first identity that comes to mind for folx. My ethnicity is in fact eclipsed, overshadowed by the color of my skin, and that is what I am immediately categorized by people and the government. This applies to White Latinos, as well. Yes, they may be from Venezuela, Argentina, Mexico, etc., but in the US they will fall into the White category and reap all the social benefits that come with it, if they look the part.
What has traveling as a Black mixed person taught me?
1) How deeply embedded anti-blackness is in Latino identity & culture
2) To not internalize people’s learned biases (aka racism & prejudice) towards me. It TRULY has nothing to do with who I am.
3) Solidarity between Black and Brown folx needs to confront this internalized anti-blackness that actually keeps Brown folx from progressing
3) It’s time to break down these check boxes of who we’re supposed to be because of our skin color. Are you going to let others determine who you and what you can do in this life?
