The other day I ran across this article.
Reading the many opinions put forth in the article itself, as well as in the comments section, I felt a familiar feeling of unease arise in me. The question of being “authentically” Hispanic or Latinx is all too familiar to me as a Mexican American and Puerto Rican American young woman.
I was actually forced to confront this issue head on in a cultural anthropology methods course for majors this past semester. Facing the prospect of a semester-long project in which I was to try to integrate myself into an unfamiliar community with the goal of “doing” anthropology, my stomach was a bundle of nerves. Of course, some of this anxiety stemmed from the fact that this was my first attempt at sustained ethnographic research. However, the other half was related to practical concerns regarding how linguistic miscommunications could negatively affect my work with the community of Spanish-speaking immigrant Hispanic service workers who agreed to participate in my project. Embedded in these concerns was an idea that I have consciously been carrying for years now, but have rarely verbalized. More specifically, my anxiety was not just connected to the possibility that I would be less efficient in gathering ethnographic data as a result of linguistic barriers, but rather spoke to something deeper. It was this “something” that I kept hidden because it brought me shame just to speak of it, as if acknowledging its existence would make my deeply rooted fears of illegitimacy come true. However, I realized over the course of the semester that I would be a sham if I did not recognize its impact on my ethnography and how I approach cultural anthropology in general. I am talking about my insecurity over being Latina myself, but not having yet mastered fluency in the language or culture of my heritage.
I can’t tell you how many times other Hispanic, even some of my relatives, approached me as a child, speaking Spanish because they assumed that I understood. To their surprise, no, I was not raised bilingual… No, I had never actually been to Mexico… and No, I was not going to have a quinceañera to celebrate my passage into womanhood. These common markers of Mexican American identity did not apply to me, and I slowly became conscious of–and then embarrassed and ashamed–about that fact. Upon coming to Duke, my self-doubts grew, and I was able to name them for what they were, as I realized that my shortcomings were visible to other people as well. I remember overhearing a Hispanic member of Mi Gente (one of the Latin American cultural groups on Duke’s campus) mention to another member that she did not get why some of her Hispanic peers were trying to be involved in the organization “now” when they “do not even speak Spanish.” I felt uneasy upon hearing this even though I have never seriously sought to be involved with Mi Gente. Obviously, I am not saying this anecdote is in any way indicative of how most people in that organization (or similar ones) think, but it is something that I heard. The girl seemed to be accusing ‘those’ Hispanic Duke students: “Why weren’t they more involved in their culture growing up?” (whether the language or other norms and practices). Her words and tone of annoyance seemed to imply that because I was not a native Spanish-speaker, I was not as authentically Hispanic, and thus was not as worthy of participating in the activities of such an organization that celebrated my heritage.
Moments like this are what fed my insecurity and kept me from actively processing it or confronting it. That is, until I wrote my first ethnography in the anthropology methods course.
The personal and cultural journey I went through this past semester taught me a lot of things. More specifically, the people from “my” community taught me a lot of things. Listening to the experiences of many immigrant Hispanics, I heard echoes not only of the lives of my parents and grandparents, but also of my own life. I, too, live in a low-income, predominantly Hispanic and African-American neighborhood. I, too, developed as a young girl a passion and skill for dancing that I will probably carry with me my entire life. My family also has a history of struggles with alcoholism and domestic violence, partly due to the cultural manifestation of the patriarchy known as machismo. I, too, love the Spanish language and can smell a fake (i.e. factory-made/processed) tortilla from a mile away. My informants for this project who were open and trusting enough to share their lives with me not only allowed me these kinds of identifications with their stories, but appreciated them.
Furthermore, in learning more about my informants’ lives, I was encouraged to ask more questions about my own family’s background. My parents’ childhood anecdotes made me think that maybe I wasn’t raised bilingual because of the stigmatization of Spanish-speaking that was much more prevalent during their generation. In our conversations sparked by this project, my parents also confirmed that I didn’t have a quinceañera because we could not afford it. Come to find out, my parents had never taken me to Mexico before because if we went, we would not have gone to the tourist-y beaches of Cancún, Cozumel, or Puerto Vallarta. We would’ve gone to the areas in which our relatives lived that my parents (accurately or not) thought were too dangerous at the time.
It was largely these enlightening experiences of my first real ethnographic endeavor that enabled me to begin to make sense of my insecurity and start to overcome it. A huge part of that was my decision to make my final written ethnography auto-biographical.
I am proud to say that now I am a lot more certain of my thoughts on this topic. No matter what people say, my life has been colored and shaped by my Hispanic heritage. I resent the notion contained in the article above and in the Duke girl’s comment that people can deny that fact due to some outwardly obvious aspect(s) they assume about my identity. In fact, I don’t just resent it–I reject it. I can’t do anything about what parts of my culture I was or was not raised with, but like some voices in the article mention, I can seek to embrace some of the things I missed out on now that I am becoming my own person. The fact is that I care a lot about my Hispanic heritage and strive to learn more about it everyday, from constantly enhancing my Spanish-speaking abilities to asking my grandparents questions about how they grew up.
Extremely importantly in this on-going process of self-confidence and self-discovery in my ethnic/racial identity was an event that occurred less than a month ago: my first time ever traveling to Mexico. Incredibly, as the product of happy coincidence and my own persistence, I was able to spend a weekend in Monterrey, Mexico with my dad’s cousin and her family. While it was only for a weekend, I was extremely comforted by the ease with which my dad, my Abuelita, and I were able to integrate into the lifestyle of our Mexican relatives. They were perfectly generous and loving hosts, and the experience was everything I had ever hoped for and more. As soon as my relatives told me they did not realize that I was not a native Spanish-speaker, I knew the trip was going to further dismantle my self-doubts. My three cousins who were around my age were my eager guides into the culture and country that my family had left behind at least 2 generations ago, and there was a lot I did not know, but also a lot I was familiar with. While I was so excited to practice my Spanish, comically, my cousins wanted to practice their English, so we ended up using Spanglish, just like my dad does at home. I should not have been surprised by this, but it just further confirmed the idea I am trying to internalize… Cultures are defined by the people within them, not some pre-set and unchanging standards created out of the realm of “objective rationality.” Besides, I claim to be Mexican American and Puerto Rican American, not “purely” Mexican or Puerto Rican. That’s the beauty of cultures, they never have definite boundaries.
Así Es la Escuela de la Vida 