{"id":126,"date":"2015-12-09T05:17:00","date_gmt":"2015-12-09T10:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/?page_id=126"},"modified":"2015-12-19T04:44:48","modified_gmt":"2015-12-19T09:44:48","slug":"participant-1","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/participant-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Participant 1 (HIM)"},"content":{"rendered":"<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-126-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/files\/2015\/12\/Regal.m4a?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/files\/2015\/12\/Regal.m4a\">http:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/files\/2015\/12\/Regal.m4a<\/a><\/audio>\n<hr \/>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>What\u2019s your race\/nationality\/ethnicity? (whatever you would like to share)<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">I\u2019m black, I identify as half-Bajan, or from Barbados, and half Dominican. Yeah, that\u2019s about it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>Would you identify as Afro-Latino?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">I feel like for me it depends, I don\u2019t know, some days I feel like I\u2019m <span style=\"color: #ff0000\"><strong>more black than<\/strong><\/span> anything, but I guess like, in my lifetime I\u2019ve identified more with my blackness I guess, rather than my Dominican heritage or whatever. So like, I like the definition of Afro-Latino and I feel like it\u2019s an important distinction, but <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">sometimes I do feel like I am not in that Latino profile<\/span><\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>What sways you towards one side or the other?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">So my dad\u2019s from DR (Dominican Republic) and he is a very pro-Black type, that\u2019s just kind of like how his feelings are. <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">He grew up in the time of Trujillo<\/span><\/strong>, who is the dictator that killed a lot of Haitian Dominicans or dark-skinned Dominicans. My dad is fairly light-skinned so he was okay or whatever, but he also was seeing the terror that happened in the country at the time, as well as what his parents and grandparents talked about. He wasn\u2019t kind of like in support of that. He hated it to the point where like I wasn\u2019t, me and my siblings weren\u2019t allowed to speak Spanish in the house or stuff like that. So he\u2019s very much like, <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">he tried to remove himself from Dominican-ness<\/span><\/strong>, and that has been dropped onto us. I feel like there is some type of acknowledgment for family and not for the country, it\u2019s like your family is from here. And we visited, last time I visited I think I was 12, so we make sure to stay connected with family but less so a connection with the country.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>So you\u2019re saying that you don\u2019t identify with this at all, or when you do is it on your own accord?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">I feel like it\u2019s on my own accord, I feel like it\u2019s kind of. It\u2019s hard to describe for me honestly, because at the same time <span style=\"color: #ff0000\"><strong>I know I have Dominican blood but it\u2019s really tough for me to be okay with it<\/strong><\/span>. There\u2019s so many problematic things with that country as well as like even here in America, my community is pretty much Puerto Rican, Dominican, or Jamaican\u2026 I don\u2019t know it was kind of tough saying you were a black Dominican in that area, because it felt like you had to be tested, your Dominican-ness had to be tested, like do you know blah blah blah? Is your family from blah blah blah? Your family can\u2019t be from Santiago because that\u2019s where all of the light skinned people are from? Technically my dad is light skinned, but there\u2019s this weird problem with <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">colorism<\/span> <\/strong>and saying \u201cI\u2019m more light skin\u201d or \u201cI\u2019m more dark skin\u201d and it\u2019s like we\u2019re all black. If some guy from Spain came to the DR and I looked at us, all of us, he would call us black. And that\u2019s something my dad would teach me about, and tell me about, because when I was younger, my elementary school was pretty much half-Dominican, half-Puerto Rican. I remember talking to my dad about, I forgot, it was some argument with some Puerto Rican kids, and my dad was like you guys are all black, because when someone from Spain blah blah blah\u2026 he was very much like you\u2019re black first and he\u2019s helped me distance the whole Dominican-ness. It\u2019s really confusing, I\u2019ve never really talked about this whole identity thing but it\u2019s just that I know for sure like, with the whole claiming of Afro-Latino&#8211; and I feel like Afro-Latino has only been a thing for me, or a term that I\u2019ve acknowledged until like I\u2019ve reached college. I\u2019ve never really thought of it as something that I could identify with, you know there are checkboxes on your standardized test. I\u2019ve always just chosen black and been like I\u2019m going to go with that, and just do my thing, and do this test or whatever. I feel like\u2026 I\u2019ve taken a couple of Latino studies courses and I\u2019ve been able to learn a little bit more of what it\u2019s like to be Afro-Latino and some of the struggles I can easily identify with so yeah, pretty much just on my own accord. I\u2019m still just trying to like\u2026 not really fit it\u2026 but have it connect with my life. <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">Afro-Latino is pretty like a new term for me, and I\u2019m still learning it I guess<\/span><\/strong>, that\u2019s the best way to say it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>You\u2019re saying that as a black person you usually find yourself dissociating with the Dominican side, and with the example that you told me in elementary school, the Puerto Ricans were the ones dissociating with their black side, why do you think that is? What differs in your case?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Um.. both Puerto Ricans and Dominicans distance themselves from the African or black side for sure, because I know in Dominican culture it\u2019s an insult if someone called you Haitian. Like if someone was dark enough and they\u2019re like \u201cOh like you\u2019re Haitian\u201d and that\u2019s literally the worst [insult], that\u2019s literally like saying you wish [their] mom drank bleach or something. And it\u2019s such a terrible thing, you know? I remember like even when I was younger and I was pretty ignorant, and someone would be like \u201cis your family from Haiti?\u201d and I was like \u201cwho are you talking to? That\u2019s not true? My family isn\u2019t from Haiti.\u201d Yeah, so I feel like both Puerto Ricans and Dominicans distance themselves from blackness in general, and I feel like it was a lot more on the Dominican side because we share an island with Haiti and there has been so much conflict on the island of Hispaniola, and I think there was a point in time when Haiti occupied DR for a little bit. So there are a lot of negative feelings that DR has towards Haiti and Haitians, especially\u2026 Haitian-Dominicans are Dominicans of Haitian ancestry on the borderlands, so a big thing is if someone calls you Haitian and you\u2019re of Dominican ancestry, that causes fights like real fast. I forgot the second part of your question.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>How does your case differ from that? Your case is the exact opposite. In most cases people who are Latino or Afro-Latino aren\u2019t acknowledging that they\u2019re black but in your case, you\u2019re not acknowledging the fact that you\u2019re Latino? I guess that all goes back to your dad?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah that\u2019s like mostly\u2026 my dad was very strict and I know one time my sister got in a lot of trouble for speaking Spanish in the house and he was just not for it. When I was younger, I was just like she\u2019s just studying for a Spanish test, but for my dad it came with a lot of<strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\"> baggage<\/span><\/strong> and a lot of <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">historical stuff<\/span><\/strong> because he lived through some of it, what happened then. He wasn\u2019t really old at that time but he knew some of it from his parents and like whatever. So it was very easy for me to distance myself from the Latino side, and I have more family from the Barbados where I\u2019m from, so it was very easy for me to connect with that side of the family because there were so many of us [there], and my grandparents from my dad\u2019s side are both in the DR and I only saw them every once in awhile. It got to the point where we stopped visiting, not really stopped on purpose but it\u2019s been awhile since we\u2019ve visited. Last time I did was maybe 9 years ago. My case is pretty interesting, and I feel like me and my siblings have a very unique case where yeah, we have Dominican in our family, we have a number of Dominicans in our family, but like we don\u2019t identify as closely with it as other people, it\u2019ll be switched around for others. Actually, no, I\u2019ve seen it with some of my other friends, like I have some friends from Honduras, but I guess they\u2019re also mixed because I know one of my friends, her dad is from Jamaica&#8211; her mom is from Honduras, her dad is from Jamaica, so it\u2019s like kind of the same way actually. But not negative where she wasn\u2019t allowed to speak Spanish, it was just like\u2026 it just happened that way where she was more associated with her blackness. As well as like, I feel like people I\u2019ve met from the Honduras, there\u2019s not that kind of internalized racism where it\u2019s like\u2026 I mean DR is also predominantly black regardless but&#8211; I guess when Dominicans see themselves as Dominican, they don\u2019t consider themselves as black. It\u2019s not really a race, I don\u2019t know how to describe\u2026 They\u2019re Dominican first and I don\u2019t think they\u2019ll ever acknowledge being black. It\u2019s very similar\u2026 like Boston has a huge Cape Verdean population as well, and like a lot of Cape Verdeans that I know don\u2019t associate themselves as being black, they say no I\u2019m not black, I\u2019m Cape Verdean. It\u2019s kind of like the same way Dominicans identify themselves, like \u201cOh, I\u2019m not black, I\u2019m Dominican. What are you talking about?\u201d That\u2019s been my experience, I don\u2019t know if it\u2019s different from other neighborhoods in, I don\u2019t know, say New York or whatever. But, that\u2019s what I\u2019ve experienced or witnessed.I don\u2019t know, I guess I\u2019m pretty unique, my family situation is very unique about that, but if you look at other Central American countries that have just a high black population, it\u2019s drastically different. I have a good number of friends from Honduras and Panama and they consider themselves black before\u2026 I feel like that\u2019s kind of a thing where they know the history of the Panama Canal and how some of their ancestors traveled from some Caribbean country to work on the canal. Um, yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>I feel like a lot of the people that you are describing can identify as Afro-Latino, I just feel like the word isn\u2019t widespread enough for people to start using it\u2026 and if it was, I\u2019m not sure if people would use it because everyone is so set in their ways\u2026 Do you think that there is a difference between being mixed, Black and Latino, and being Afro-Latino, in the eyes of certain people? Like how you were saying some of your friends are mixed and you\u2019re mixed. So do you think that the fact that you\u2019re mixed kind of detracts from you wanting to identify with that as well?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is like another thing with <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">the whole \u201cblackness\u201d thing<\/span><\/strong>, but like I\u2019ve never considered myself as mixed, I\u2019ll be like\u2026 my mom\u2019s darker skinned and my dad\u2019s lighter skinned but we\u2019re all black so it\u2019s like whatever. And that\u2019s kind of how I\u2019ve viewed it, I\u2019ve actually never thought of myself as mixed before. I just knew that my parents\u2019 families came from different islands. I don\u2019t know\u2026 Damn, I\u2019ve never thought about being mixed. *laughing* Having an identity crisis. What was the other part of the question? You were saying like\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>Well I don\u2019t think it\u2019s applicable if you don\u2019t identify yourself as mixed\u2026 I mean based on the definition that I know of \u201cmixed,\u201d you\u2019re mixed with two different races from two different islands. Even if you consider them to be the same\u2026<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I\u2019ve always considered them to be the same. I always thought mixed was like White\/Asian or like Black\/White but I\u2019ve never thought of it like\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>Like two similar countries?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, I don\u2019t know. I guess that\u2019s easy to do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>Yeah, I\u2019ve always thought that Barbados and the DR were very different\u2026?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, they are very different. They speak different languages. Barbados doesn\u2019t have that whole <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">internalized<\/span><\/strong> issue or anything like that. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>That\u2019s very interesting, I\u2019m sorry for popping that up on you. I have one last question, if you could give a concrete, or not so concrete, definition of what being Afro-Latino is, what would it be?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Okay. I would say like being of, or like\u2026 damn. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>For me it\u2019s hard to describe Afro-Latino without it sounding like mixed.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">That\u2019s exactly what I\u2019m having trouble with, because it\u2019s like damn that sounds like it\u2019s mixed as opposed to people of African descent that live in\u2026 that\u2019s where it becomes weird. I don\u2019t know\u2026 because I feel like Afro-Latinos are entitled to the Latino label and I feel like if you just say like there\u2019s a separation of Afro-Latinos\u2026 it just seems like they are<strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\"> not granted the same<\/span><\/strong> like\u2026 damn. Damn, I\u2019ve never like thought\u2026 Okay, so by saying that they\u2019re of African descent and that they just so happen to be living in Latino countries is like\u2026 it just seems like they\u2019re occupying the space that they don\u2019t belong to\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #003366\"><b>Kind of displacing them and stripping the culture away from them basically?<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, exactly. So there\u2019s like some danger in saying that. Yeah, so there\u2019s some danger in like separating the two and making it seem like a lot of Afro-Latinos are just occupying the space and that\u2019s not true, you know? Because they have large contributions to\u2026 I mean if you look at most of the dances in both the DR or Puerto Rico and the drums that they use is like based off of West African traditions. They have a huge influence on those Latino countries and it\u2019s not fair to say \u201cOh, they\u2019re just slaves that have so happened to come off on my island.\u201d So, to define it would be tough&#8230;but the problem is the definition that many people have on the outside is that they are just of African descent and live in these Latino countries. It should be more of\u2026 something that\u2019s <span style=\"color: #ff0000\"><strong>more encompassing and includes both Latino and African cultures<\/strong><\/span>. So even with that definition, I would say that Dominicans are Afro-Latino\u2026 That\u2019s just me being idealistic. Instead of them saying, I\u2019m mixed with this and this and this\u2026 it sounds mad ignorant. I don\u2019t know. I\u2019m going down a weird path. I just feel like there\u2019s like a large element of like Africanism in Dominican culture and society and it sucks that it\u2019s being repressed, and also oppressed where because of the shade of your skin, it could put you in trouble or cause you to lose your citizenship. Stuff like that. I\u2019ve never really created a formal definition for Afro-Latino but I will say it\u2019s <strong><span style=\"color: #ff0000\">dangerous to separate the two<\/span><\/strong> or have it seem like it\u2019s only people of African descent who occupy Latino lands when it\u2019s\u2026 there\u2019s more of an intertwined relationship.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; What\u2019s your race\/nationality\/ethnicity? (whatever you would like to share) I\u2019m black, I identify as&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1152,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-126","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1152"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/126\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":186,"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/126\/revisions\/186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.williams.edu\/sac3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}