Anyone But Blacks

Abstract Toni Morrison famously argued in Time magazine that immigrants become Americans by disassociating themselves with the black nemesis. Few would have questioned how her “anything but black” observation would occur not just in contrast with African Americans, but also within a burgeoning population (Latin@s) with many Afro-descendant members. In this article, I use the term “El Nuevo Blanqueamiento” (neo-whitening), a re-application of Latin America's infamous colonial-era “whitening” policy, to discuss the extent of “anti-black” assimilation processes occurring amongst and within the racially diverse U.S. Latin@ population. While Latin@s have sometimes been projected as redeemers who bridge racial difference and represent the possibility of transcending race, I illustrate how the elastic privileges of “whiteness” extended to many members of the group only reinforces racial disparities, and underscore how “cultural” arguments have been used to further complicate the necessity of justice-oriented alliances between African Americans and Latin@s. Keywords: African AmericansAfro-LatinosBlack-Brown relationsBlacknessblanqueamientocolorismculture of povertyinter-racial marriageLatinosnegrophobiaRacial Disparitiesskin shade discriminationWhiteness Acknowledgments The author thanks Darrick Hamilton, Stephen Steinberg, E. Wendy Trull, William “Sandy” Darity, Jr., and Antwuan Wallace for feedback on this piece. Notes Psuedonyms were chosen by the author throughout this introduction to protect the identity of students. I invoke the term “Latin@” thanks to the influence of a growing number of scholars and academic departments to make a default sexist term (Latino) into one that is more gender inclusive. I make a concerted attempt to avoid “Hispanic,” only to use it when citing others' use of the term, as I share the view that its overuse represents an elitist, Euro-centric intra-group distancing from the somewhat ambiguous yet more inclusive, grassroots (hence indigenous, Afro-Latin@) application of Latin@). For a good summary on the Hispanic/Latin@ debate, see Mike Davis, Magical Urbanism: Latinos Reinvent the City (London, New York: Verso Press, 2001), 12–13. The phrase “mejorando la raza” literally translates to “improving the race.” Its historical origins, to which this article briefly explores, refers to the blanqueamiento (whitening) campaigns imposed through Spanish colonial administration policies from the 1500s–1800s in Latin America. Its intentions were rooted in structures and prejudices that occurred on the Iberian peninsula during conflicts between dark-skinned, Muslim North Africans (who were deemed religiously impure) and Spaniards (as Christians deemed as “pure-blooded” hence “white”). See the entry “Blanqueamiento” in Miguel De La Torre's edited volume Hispanic American Religious Cultures (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2009), 480. I also recommend Arlene Torres' ““Ej Prieta de Beldå” (The Great Puerto Rican Family is Really, Really Black),” in Arlene Torres and Norman Whitten, eds., Blackness in Latin America & the Caribbean (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1998), 285–305. One of the readings I am referring to is Michael Omi and Howard Winant's Racial Formation in the United States (New York: Routledge, 1994). Also see Enumeration in “1790 Overview,” U.S. Census Bureau, History Main, http://www.census.gov/history/www/through_the_decades/overview/1790.html (accessed September 14, 2011). This discussion took place in an interdisciplinary course at Brooklyn College-City University of New York. It is one of the few courses I teach where a diverse array of African American, Afro-Caribbean, and Latin@ students interact given that it is cross-listed with other major/minor programs where minority students are widely represented. An example “title” includes Nicolas Vaca's The Presumed Alliance: The Unspoken Conflict between Latinos and Blacks and What It Means for America (New York: Harper Collins, 2004). Richard Morin, “Do Black and Hispanics Get Along?” Pew Hispanic Center (January 31, 2008). http://pewresearch.org/pubs/713/blacks-hispanics (accessed September 14, 2011). For example, see John J. Betancur and Douglas C. Gills, eds, The Collaborative City: Opportunities and Struggles for Blacks and Latinos in U.S. Cities (New York: Garland Publications, 2000), 17–40. Also see Vaca, The Presumed Alliance, 85–169. For a good compilation of analysis on African Americans and Latin@ portrayals in various media forms, see Diana I. Rios and A. N. Mohamed, eds., Brown and Black Communication: Latino and African American Conflict and Convergence in Mass Media (Westport, CT and London: Praeger Press, 2003). Also see Tanya K. Hernandez, “Roots of Latino/Black Anger, Longtime Prejudices, Not Economic Rivalry, Fuel Tensions,” Los Angeles Times (January 7, 2007), http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-op-hernandez7jan07,0,7937176.story (accessed September 15, 2011). For an equally applicable “suburban” perspective, see Sarah Garland, Gangs in Garden City (New York: Nation Books, 2010). Morin, “Do Black and Hispanics Get Along?”. See “US Census: Hispanics Outnumber Blacks in Metro Areas,” BBC News (April 14, 2011), http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13089128 (accessed April 25, 2011). Also see Robert Suro and Audrey Singer, “Latino Growth in Metropolitan America: Changing Patterns, New Locations,” The Brookings Institute, Survey Series, Census 2000 (July 2007). See Mark Murray, “On Immigration, Racial Divide Runs Deep,” NBC News (April 26, 2010). http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37344303/ns/us_news-immigration_a_nation_divided/ (accessed April 27, 2010). Elizabeth Grieco, “Race and Hispanic Origin of the Foreign-Born Population in the United States, 2007.” American Community Survey Reports, (January 2010).http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/facts_for_features_special_editions/cb10-ff17.html (accessed February 13, 2010). Mike Davis. Magical Urbanism: Latinos Reinvent the U.S. City (London, New York: Verso 2001), 11–33. Also see Alejandro Portes and Ruben Rumbaut, Immigrant America: A Portrait (Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 2006 edition), 12–33. Carol Doherty, “Attitudes Toward Immigration: In Black and White,” Pew Research Center Publications (April 26, 2006), http://pewresearch.org/pubs/21/attitudes-toward-immigration-in-black-and-white (accessed September 15, 2011). “Civil Rights Coalition Responds to Gov. Brewer's Announcement in SB 1070 Lawsuit,” American Civil Liberties Union, Press Office (February 10, 2011), http://www.aclu.org/immigrants-rights-racial-justice/civil-rights-coalition-responds-gov-brewer-s-announcement-sb-1070-l (accessed February 12, 2011). “National NAACP Joins its Arizona State Conference in Outrage over Racial Profiling Impact on Arizona,” NAACP, Washington, DC (April 30, 2010), http://www.naacp.org/press/entry/national-naacp-joins-its-arizona-state-conference-in-outrage-over-raci/ (accessed May 1, 2010). Suzanne Oboler and Anani Dzidienyo, Neither Enemies nor Friends: Latinos, Blacks, Afro-Latinos (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005); Carolyn Roman and Juan Flores, The Afro-Latino Reader: History and Culture in the United States (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010). Hernandez, “Roots of Latino/Black Anger.” See “Overview of Race and Hispanic Origin: 2010,” U.S. Census Bureau (March 2011), http://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-02.pdf (accessed September 15, 2011). Rakesh Kochhar, Robert Suro, and Sonya Tafoya, “The New Latino South, Context and Consequences of Rapid Population Growth,” Pew Hispanic Center (July 26, 2005), http://www.pewhispanic.org/2005/07/26/the-new-latino-south/ (accessed September 15, 2011). I also recommend Helen Marrow's New Destination Dreaming: Immigration, Race, and Legal Status in Rural American South (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011). For a critical, succinct piece on coalition building in urban contexts, as well as the need for cross-group “Diaspora-consciousness” to take on everyday institutional challenges, see Mark Sawyer in Roman and Flores, The Afro-Latino Reader, 527–539. Mark Hugo Lopez, “How Hispanics Voted in the 2008 Election,” Pew Research Center, November 5, 2008, http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1024/exit-poll-analysis-hispanics (accessed November 8, 2008). See “Wealth Gaps Rise to Record Highs Between Whites, Blacks and Hispanics,” Pew Research Center, Social & Demographic Trends (July 26, 2011), http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-to-record-highs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics/ (accessed September 15, 2011). See scholar Melissa Harris-Perry's editorial “Is this the Birth of a Nation?,” The Nation, The Notion Blog, (March 22, 2010), http://www.thenation.com/blog/birth-nation (accessed March 27, 2010). The intersections between racial profiling, xenophobia, and the post-9-11 War on Terror is a profound source of present inter-group struggle, well-argued by Kevin Johnson in Oboler and Dzidienyo, Neither Enemies nor Friends, 247–264. The “irreversible” comment was circulated via syndicate throughout the country in Latino-based news sites. See Miguel Perez, “The Latino Clock is Irreversible,” North County Times (September 2, 2011), http://www.nctimes.com/news/opinion/columnists/perez/article_7d6b79ad-c27c-5339-87ae-e463315f4826.html (accessed September 15, 2011). This position is asserted (among other stipulations that suggest Latin@s are not responsible for African American struggles) in Vaca, The Presumed Alliance. See 189–193. In use of this term, I purposely place “Nuevo” (New) before “Blanqueamiento,” contrary to rules of Spanish grammatical code (they technically should be reversed). My intent is to underscore the historically Anglo-based impositions of the dominant culture while using a Spanish-language term to symbolize the complex placement of Latin@s within the historical and present socio-political framework of the United States. See Paula McClain, Naimbi M. Carter, Victoria M. DeFrancesco Soto, Monique L. Lyle, Jeffrey D. Grynaviski, Shayla C. Nunnally, Thomas J. Scotto, J. Alan Kendrick, Gerald F. Lackey, and Kendra Davenport Cotton, “Racial Distancing in a Southern City: Latino Immigrants' Views of Black Americans,” The Journal of Politics 68, no. 3 (2006): 571–586. Ibid., 572. Also see Howard Schuman, Charlotte Steeh, Lawrence Bobo, and Maria Krysan, Racial Attitudes in America: Trends and Interpretations (rev. ed.) (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997); Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, Racism Without Racists (Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, 2003). Kochhar, Suro, and Tafoya, “The New Latino South, The Context and Consequences of Rapid Population Growth.” William W. Falk, Larry L. Hunt, and Matthew O. Hunt, “Return Migrations of African-Americans to the South: Reclaiming a Land of Promise, Going Home, or Both?” Rural Sociology 69, no. 4 (2004): 490–509. Also see Lisa Hoppenjans and Ted Richardson in Roman and Flores, The Afro-Latino Reader, 512–519. See the classic read by Leslie Rout Jr., The African Experience in Spanish America (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976), 27–98. Also see Peter Wade, Race and Ethnicity in Latin America (London: Pluto Press, 1997), 27–28. The “racial democracy” myth in contemporary mode is well framed in Ariel E. Dulitzky's, “A Region in Denial: Racial Discrimination and Racism in Latin America,” in Dzidzienyo and Oboler's Neither Friends Nor Enemies, 39–59. These issues are substantively covered in Torres and Whitten's Blackness in Latin America and the Caribbean, 3–53. Also see Rout, The African Experience in Spanish America, 180–184, 313–322. Dulitzky in Dzidzienyo and Oboler, Neither Enemies nor Friends, 46–50. Also, for case studies to statistical debates on intra-Latin@ racism yesterday and today, see Roman and Flores, The Afro-Latino Reader, 471–540. Arlene Davila, Latino Spin: Public Image and the Whitewashing of Race (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008). For Thesis 1 scholars, see Stephen Steinberg, Race Relations: A Critique (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 2007); George Yancey, Who is White? (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Press, 2003); Frances Windance Twine and Jonathan Warren, “White Americans, the New Minority?: Non-Blacks and the Ever-Expanding Boundaries of Whiteness,” Journal of Black Studies 28, no. 2 (1997), 200–218. For example of Thesis 2, see Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, “From Bi-Racial to Tri-Racial: Towards a New System of Racial Stratification in the United States,” Ethnic and Racial Studies 27, no. 6 (2004), 931–950. For Thesis 3 examples, see Laura Gómez, Manifest Destinies: The Making of the Mexican-American Race (New York and London: New York University Press, 2007); Amitai Etzioni, “Leaving Race Behind,” The American Scholar (Spring 2006), http://theamericanscholar.org/leaving-race-behind/ (accessed September 15, 2011); Ian Hanley Lopez, “Race on the 2010 Census: Hispanics and the Shrinking White Majority,” Daedalus 134, no. 1 (Winter 2005). Dávila, Latino Spin, 13. Hernandez, “Roots of Latino/Black Anger, Longtime Prejudices, Not Economic Rivalry, Fuel Tensions.” William Darity, Jr., Jason Dietrich, and Darrick Hamilton, “Bleach in the Rainbow: Latin Ethnicity and Preference for Whiteness,” Transforming Anthropology 13, no. 2 (October 2005): 103–109. For example, see Richard Rodriguez, Brown: The Last Discovery of America (New York: Viking Press, 2002). “The New Face of America: How Immigrants are Shaping the World's First Multicultural Society,” Special Issue, Time (November 18, 1993). Bonilla-Silva, “From Bi-Racial to Tri-Racial.” Bonilla-Silva's “collective black” includes Afro-Latinos, African Americans, Afro-Caribbean groups, African immigrants, dark-skinned, racialized Asians, and reservation-isolated Native Americans. See Margaret L. Hunter, “If You're Light You're Alright”: Light Skin Color as Social Capital for Women of Color,” Gender and Society 16 (2002): 175–193. Verna M. Keith and Cedric Herring, “Skin Tone and Stratification in the Black Community,” American Journal of Sociology 97 (1991): 760–778. For a compilation of essays and articles that allow for cross-hemispheric comparisons on “whitening” and the significance of skin shade, see Evelyn Nakano Glenn, Shades of Difference: Why Skin Color Matters (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 2009). Here I am using a synthesized definition of negrophobia via various scholarly sources. For instance, see Manning Marable, Beyond Black and White, Rethinking Race in American Politics and Society (Brooklyn, NY: Verso Press, 1995); Jody David Armor, Negrophobia and the Hidden Costs of Racism (New York and London: New York University Press, 1997); also see Silvio Torres-Saillant, An Intellectual History of the Caribbean (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave MacMillan, 2007). Blanqueamiento, De La Torre, 2008. Also see more in-depth deconstructions of the policy's historical context in Miguel De La Torre, La Lucha for Cuba: Religion and Politics on the Streets of Miami (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003) and Whitten and Torres, eds., Blackness in Latin America and the Caribbean, 296–297. Bonilla-Silva, “From Bi-Racial to Tri-Racial,” 931–950. For an excellent review of the literature on “phenotype's” influence on life chances, see Darity Jr., Dietrich and Hamilton, “Bleach in the Rainbow,” 491–492. Scholar Stephen Steinberg frames these “eviction” processes within a critical race-policy context in “The Role of Race in the Devolution of the Left,” Logos: A Journal of Modern Society & Culture 10, no. 4 (2011): http://logosjournal.com/2011/the-role-of-race-in-the-devolution-of-the-left/ (accessed November 16, 2011). William Julius Wilson's The Declining Significance of Race in the United States (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980). For a critical view of globalization (and excellent teaching tool), see Sarah Anderson, John Cavanagh, and Thea Lee, The Field Guide to the Global Economy (New York: The New Press, May 2005). Peter Brimelow, Alien Nation: Common Sense about America's Immigration Disaster (New York: Harper Perennial, May 10, 1996); Samuel Huntington, Who are We?: The Challenges to America's Destiny (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004); Pat Buchanan, Suicide of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025? (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2010). Eugene Robinson, Disintegration: The Splintering of Black America (New York: Random House, 2010). By “contexts of reception,” I am intermeshing Alejandro Portes and Ruben Rumbaut's use of the term in Immigrant America: A Portrait, with Nina Glich Shiller and Ayse Gaglar's equal utilization in examining the intersections of locality, space, and culture and their impact on the general receptivity of newcomers. See Shiller and Gaglar, “Towards a Comparative Theory of Locality in Migration Studies, Migrant Incorporation and City Scale,” Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 35 (2009), 177–202. Juan Gonzalez, Harvest of Empire (New York: Penguin Books, 2000); Rodolfo Acuña, Occupied America: A History of Chicanos, 7th edition (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2010). William A. Darity and Darrick Hamilton, “Bernanke Ignores History of Black and White Wealth Rift,” The Grio (October 30, 2009): http://www.MSNBC.com (accessed October 31, 2008). Darrick Hamilton, “Testimony to Budget Deficit and National Debt Commission,” Congressional Black Caucus, Washington, DC (January 28, 2011). Also see Gregory D. Squires, “Racial Profiling, Insurance Style: Insurance Redlining and the Uneven Development of Metropolitan America,” Journal of Urban Affairs 25, no. 4 (2003), 391–410. For a good “critical race” discussion from a legal framework, see George Martinez, “Mexican Americans and Whiteness,” in Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic, eds., Critical Race Theory, 2nd edition (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2000). Israel Zangwill, The Melting-Pot: Drama in Four Acts (New York: Arno Press, 1975; originally published 1909). See Joseph R. McElrath, Jr., Robert C. Leitz, III, and Jesse S. Crisler, eds., Charles W. Chesnutt, Essays and Speeches (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999), 134. María Pérez y González, Puerto Ricans in the United States (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2000). Desmond King, Making Americans (Cambridge: First Harvard University Press, 2002). This point was well illustrated in the compelling documentary by Ana María García, “La Operación,” Latin American Film Project (1982). La Operacion's impacts were carried onto the mainland, as Puerto Rican women hold among the highest rates of sterilization in New York and the United States in See Lopez, and and Puerto Rican in New York Urban Anthropology and Studies of and Economic Development 22, no. and Gonzalez, Harvest of See piece for further on the of the on sterilization in Puerto in Puerto The (March 28, 2011), (accessed September 15, 2011). Also see N. and Development in Puerto in E. and eds., Women in the Latin American Development (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, “The Community in of History 7, no. 4 in University Press of 2002). Vaca, The Presumed Alliance, Ibid., See “The Impact of in the for Immigration Center (March 25, 2010), (accessed September 15, 2011). George A. Martinez, “The Legal of Americans and Whiteness,” Latino Studies Series, State (October 2000). Critical scholars also that for a in Census to as a on example of from African Americans. See over Legal and in and History no. 1 (Spring Also see and Politics of Whiteness,” in Rodolfo am These Streets (New York: Random House, the historical of as a of in institutional of the view that it is one See Race Matters (New York: Books, Brown of & the of Racial (New York: University Press, 2003); and also see J. is (New and London: University Press, 2004). See M. critical analysis of the in and the Making of Modern America NJ: University Press, 2004). For a good discussion on the intersections between U.S. and see Immigration in and its Essays on the New of and (New York: The New Press, Portes and Rumbaut, Immigrant America, Press U.S. Census Bureau, (September 2011), (accessed November 10, 2011). and Immigrants and the U.S. Racial How and American no. 3 2010), Ibid., See John in Roman and Flores, The Afro-Latino Reader, See Portes and Rumbaut, Immigrant America, Also see to (New CT and New York: University Press, 2000), See Alejandro Portes and “The New and its The of the American of and Social no. 1 (November Also see Alejandro and William on the The New in Ethnic & Racial Studies 28, no. 6 (November 2005): See National Urban State of Black America 2010 to the (March 25, (accessed November 10, 2011). is a of literature on in the of and For example, see John and in C. E. as and NJ: See Charles M. War on New York Times 2, 2011), (accessed 2, 2011). Stephen Steinberg, The Ethnic Press, 2005). William A. Darity and Darrick Hamilton, “Bernanke Ignores History of Black and White Wealth Rift,” The Grio (October 30, Also see L. and Thomas M. Black White A New on Racial (New York and London: Routledge, I am purposely For example, see and Darrick Hamilton, and in Michael in the American and Public (Oxford: University Press, 2005), Stephen Steinberg, Culture (January 13, 2011), (accessed 14, 2011). an point that more from its its See her piece Blackness and in Roman and Flores, The Afro-Latino Reader, Steinberg, William Darity Jr., Darrick Hamilton, and Jason Dietrich, on Latinos, Race and in the Economic no. (2002): Juan Flores, to and Hispanics in the United National for Latino Notes (November 2010), (accessed 2010). See William on or in William Darity, Jr., The Role of Journal of and no. 2 2005): Here I am also referring to the myth that as a black African Americans, (and African Americans, Latin@s in have but to their as to their Also see William Darity, Jr., Jason Dietrich, and David or American Journal of and Sociology White? Americans of the The New York Times (January 2011). analysis for the piece was by La The New CA: Books, Also see scholar application of term in the context of urban and in Cities in the (London: 2003). Darrick Hamilton, and William Darity, Jr., Light on the of Skin on for Black Journal of Economic & no. 1 2009): The of

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