A Journey We Didn't Choose: Afro-Latinx Education Beyond Colonization

• In Event: From Colonized to Woke: Reframing Afro-Latinidad in Educational Spaces

Abstract

Comparative analyses of Puerto Rican and Dominican racial identity development have emerged as a subfield of Afro-latino studies (Sanchez, 2013; Roth, 2016; Duany, 1998). The Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico share a complex history of relationships with the United States (Atkins & Wilson, 1998; Perez, 1998; Caban, 2001). This paper serves to argue for a more historically reflective and inclusive approach to the education of Dominican and Puerto Rican Afro-descended students in the mainland United States. Along with their shared imperialistic relationship with the United States, they also share an imposed legacy of subjugation of their people, and a complex racial hierarchy informed by colonization.
Conflict theory serves to prove that society is in a state of perpetual conflict, maintaining social order by domination and power, due to competition for limited resources. This study utilizes that framework to analyze the discourse occurring between and among the Puerto Rican and Dominican Afro-Latinx communities on Twitter, interview people who grew up in these communities in New York City, and synthesize case studies on Puerto Rican and Dominican racial identity development (Roth, 2016; Duany, 1998; Landale, 2002). This analysis informs the theory that a more inclusive and reflective pedagogical approach in K-12 classrooms will lead to better outcomes for members of these communities.
In using conflict theory as a theoretical framework, this paper contends that diasporic racial identity development is responsive to a demand for limited resources (Wright-Mills, 1958). Wright-Mills argues that members of the elite maintain power through three linked institutions: politics, the economy, and the military. Dominican and Puerto Rican racial identity development, thus, are responsive to the boundaries set by these institutions. Critical discourse analysis of the social media platforms of various self-identified Afro-Boricua and Afro-Dominican individuals further maintain this concept by illustrating how these social media personalities perform their Afrolatinidad (Albert et al., 2013). Through interviews, Puerto Ricans and Dominicans who grew up in New York City speak of a racial construct informed by the neighborhoods in which they were raised.
Through participation in these interviews, the interviewed adults (ages 25-45) developed an understanding of racial identity development separate from the nationalistic paradigms with which they were raised. Participants’ increased understanding of their islands’ histories, review of Twitter discourse, and increased knowledge of history of mainland U.S.-island relationships, informed racial identity development. This project helps us better understand the racial development trajectories of diasporic adult Dominicans and Puerto Ricans in New York City, which has serious implications at the classroom and political levels. Through increased understanding of their histories, and an understanding that Blackness is also part of the Dominican and Puerto Rican identities, teachers and community leaders can better prepare Afro-latino students to be successful post-schooling.

Author

• Maria Roberta Diaz, Central Queens Academy