How do I talk about race?

On 25 July 2013 | Issue 3: Race

Much of my life has been a racial identity crisis. I was born in Mexico and came to this country as an immigrant. I am also mixed race, so my nearly “blond” hair blends in better in the United States than it ever did in Mexico City. I grew up in the Boston area, surrounded by people who accepted my two completely different last names, and perhaps identities, without question. It didn’t matter where I had come from, just that I was there.

I was only vaguely aware of how easy it was for me to walk into almost any place in Boston and feel at home. When my parents were working really late and needed me to find somewhere to entertain myself until they were ready to go home, I could walk into a hotel and sit in the lobby reading for hours without being bothered. “Just walk in and act like you are supposed to be there,” my dad told me once. And it worked — because I blend in easily. This is not a reality for a lot of people.

While my parents encouraged me to speak up in class, be vocal and defend my opinions politically and socially, many other immigrant students lived quietly in limbo with seemingly fewer options as they got older. I was comfortable sharing my story as an immigrant, despite all the layers that came with it. But I never experienced the sting of rejection or judgement. Around my American classmates, they looked at me and saw someone that they recognized as another generic looking “American.”

What does it mean to “blend in?” Sometimes it’s the unspoken but necessary factor in making your case when you meet strangers. Can they connect with you? Can they imagine you being a daughter, a neighbor, a sister or girlfriend or friend?

Sometimes, whether we acknowledge it or not, we stop listening when the story is too far beyond anything that we can imagine happening in our own lives, right?

In the eyes of the public, and even my community, I am white. My race only comes up at certain times: When a friend has had too much to drink and asks me why I still identify as a Mexican even though I haven’t lived there for years and look just like “everyone else here.” It comes up whenever I correct the pronunciation of my name – Dee-ah-nah… not Die-ann or Die-ann-uh.

It came up when I visited friends who look more stereotypically Mexican than I do. Society sees them as Latino, the kind of Latino that politicians flash on the screen during their speeches in Miami Dade, Bridgeport, Connecticut or Texan political rallies.

It came up when I went shopping with a friend and the saleswoman followed him around with her eyes, looking uncomfortable, but let me wander around on my own without more than a nod of her head in acknowledgement.

The definition that society uses for “Diana” is not the same one I would choose. But it is a definition that has fundamentally shaped my experience as a Latina in this country. It is unique to me and cannot be used to generalize the “Latino experience” in the United States. While there were some experiences that I share with other Latinos, I will never completely understand the experience that other students, who look more stereotypically Latino, face on a regular basis.

There are days when people will listen to my story and my reasons for fighting for immigration reform and it will mean something to them. And there are other days I go to other communities who look at me and don’t see themselves in my face and my skin and my story. Race is a factor in our experiences, whether at home or away.

I notice it most when it comes to politics. When I am trying to address a room full of people who all have a different concept of what the “American experience” really feels like. As an activist, I am constantly struggling to find the right language to get my message across. I’m working on finding that balance between my personal experiences and a more inclusive message.

Original copy posted on Interrupt Mag

A few TEDGlobal 2013 talks

This week was absolutely phenomenal.

To give you an idea, the three talks that are up right now are:

from an Amazing Activist

an argument to stop the use of military drones

a pitch to reform European democracy

and, of course, some quadcopters.

oh, and, the Sandra Boynton when Pigs Fly TEDxYale Video that was played during one of the session.

The Space Between What You Think I Do, And What I Think I Do.

Consider this:

Yale students love to keep themselves absurdly busy. You may ask, do you have time for lunch this week? And they'll say... oh... I'm busy then. You both pull out your iphone calendars, scroll through the days listing times and dates until maybe option 12 works for both of you. We dash between meetings, many of which we sit through with our legs and arms crossed, leaning back and watching while two people have a conversation about what to do next. You dont need to be there but you want to be there to know what is going on, because if you're not there, it's as though you have conceded power. We ditch our friends some times to have lunch with people we find boring but helpful or interesting for one reason or another. We carry on the acquaintance web and talk about friend X or Y and how they did something crazy last weekend, when we know well and good that they are not our friends.

What I mean by that, is that we enjoy and employ the smoke screen in many aspects of life. My students will define "friendship" as relationship between people who are kind to each other, talk on a semi-frequent basis and that you spend time with.

I like a lot of people, but acknowledge that they are not my friends. My friends are the people I'm not embarrassed to cry in front of, to admit to failing a problem set or writing a shitty essay last minute while I was finishing a project off campus and didnt have time to write something worth printing out. They are the ones I tell when I'm scared. They've seen me laugh like a lunatic. They've grabbed my hand when I've nearly stumbled off a sidewalk and into on coming traffic. They ask about my projects, my obsessions, Latin America... they speak the little spanish to me they know and send me articles about Mexico with comments that let me know that they've read them. They've told me when I was being a stubborn ass, when I'm being too hard on myself, and when I did something worth noticing. They let you sleep on their floor when you've had a really bad day and it's late and you fall asleep there. They kick your ass at pool and tell you that you'll beat them next time. They hug you when you need one, they slap you when you're in a crazy place in your mind. You love them, and it feels like a safety blanket that you can pull out anytime.

And yet, we all keep up with the smoke screen of friendships. The people we selectively ignore because we met them once in a dark room at an event and both remember each other but pretend we dont for the sake of not embarrassing ourselves. We play the TELL ME ABOUT YOUR LIFE game when you know the other person really isnt interested in what you are saying. We hug like we havent seen each other in years due to forced separation... when really it's been a few weeks because the other person forgot to text back.

Appearances. So sexy, arent they?

Consider this: Your job. Your Resume. Your Accomplishments. Like your friendships, how many of them are real?

I've spent more time this month wondering about this than I have with any previous period in my life. Wondering about what I do and how I spend my time versus what is actually produced in that time. The value add I offer to various things I am working on, my previous partners in work spaces, and what I want to give back to the world.

I realized this morning how much of what I say and communicate successfully depends on the listeners. When I tell you that I community organize, a specific idea of what I do pops into your mind. You base it others you know who do something related to this. You determine the weight of my words.

Often this has bothered me. Because I feel like people give me credit for things I dont deserve. Yes, I did start and run two conferences during my time at yale. My personal value system tells me these did not accomplish something within my system of weighing the things that I give back. I look back on these events as fun learning experiences, but also as semi-selfish uses of my time. My gain was surely greater than anything I gave to other people.

And therein lies the problem.

I realized that your interpretation of what I do is off, but so is my own interpretation of what I do. No one can accurately measure the value add of what I have given unless they were fully part of it. I cannot because I cannot separate myself from it and consider my work objectively. You cannot because without being part of it, you must rely on my account and the accounts of others working with me along with your own biases and knowledge of a topic.

Can we ever fully isolate that space of truth in describing who we are and what we have done with our lives? How do we measure the value of our work? And in seeking an answer, is this the best way to figure out what we should be doing with our lives?

Grateful.

I'm feeling very grateful for many things today. It's pretty nice, actually. You realizing how lucky you are and savoring in it. As one of my best friends would put it, "Diana, I can see your cat smile right now."

And yes. I am smiling like a cat. I feel so indulgent today. We were sitting in a room discussing state formation, violence condoned by the state, and comparing historical cases. Me with (mostly) Mexico but also some Brazil, Argentina, and Colombia thrown in there. Others with India, and a little France thrown in for contrast too. It was the pleasure of discussing abstract theories. Things brilliant people have come up with over the years. And knowing that right now, at this point in my life I have the luxury of knowing that I can screw up and I'm just here to learn. It's delicious and worthy of a cat smile.

I guess in some ways this is also what pisses me off about academia. I dont want to sit in a room and chat all the time (a good deal of time, yes. I'm a HUGE nerd.). I WANT TO BE OUT THERE AND LEARN WITH MY HANDS!

But it comes with that responsibility of future promises. I know that I can do this now, but I always keep in my mind the next end that it needs to serve. My option to be here comes at a cost to others. If being here has taught me nothing else, I am aware of this. And I will make sure that I am aware of it always.

I enjoyed sitting in an internet cafe reading everything I could find on Dharavi in an hour. And I have that option. I cant help but fear the degree to which I am romanticizing this place. After all, if given the option I know I would not give up the comforts of my home in the States to live there. I am giving up my time I could be sitting in air conditioning in my very clean room in the hostel I live in to sit in public spaces and try to blend into the walls as much as possible when people act like you glow in the dark (I'm seriously considering going running everyday before I go, letting the dirt stick to me, and covering any other exposed inch of skin with clothing to appear less... white and therefore foreign) because I feel better there. I am really looking forward to wandering around there all day on Sunday. SUNDAY. COME SOONER!

But I'm getting the hang of Bombay. And even in that statement I know how wrong I am. I just mean, I feel more comfortable and able to locate things and not jump roughly 45 feet into the air whenever a car skims my ass.

But today when I was walking home, we ran into one of the guys who works at the internet cafe that I have been frequenting while the internet situation was in question. And he smiled and said hello and stopped me on the street. Maybe we are building our own space within the community. It's hard not to like that. He smiles at us with kindness, rather than the usually creepy man thing that happens or else the GIVE ME GIVE ME GIVE ME face we get most of the time in Colaba.

And that, is comfortable. 

Help!

So... I really like Ayn Rand. It's a not-so-secret thing, but its surprising because I consider myself to be more on the leftist liberal side of things. I think she is an interesting thinker because some of her work is pretty unique. Disclaimer: totally not into the super conservative tomes. nope. I just really enjoyed the characters and the issues and the dark twisted-ness of the Fountainhead and some parts of Atlas Shrugged.

Mostly, I'm interested in the questions about integrity that she mentions. It was a long time interest of mine, made only better by the recent work I've been doing with the fascinating and very clever Tiffany Ho (I mean, who doesnt love it. I have an excuse to read a lot of people's work on what leadership means now, what ideal leaders look like and do... and them come up with my own theories. It's a seriously nerdy use of my time. Which makes it perfect.). I think I've always been drawn to books with very strong characters who know who they are, what they value, and what they want to do with their lives. I relate to that much better than things like Catcher in the Rye, which, for those of you know have known me for a long time maybe remember this, drove me absolutely insane. It was the epitome of the sad whiney rich kid wasting what he had. Fountainhead has unforgiving and, frankly, crazy characters, but they knew what they needed to do and didnt compromise themselves in the process. Cheers to that, who doesnt want to see more of these people in the world?

Unfortunately... a rather close friend of mine just finished Atlas Shrugged and drank the kool-aid. I'm putting together a leftist and moderate reading list for him before he forgets where he came from.

When I explained it to my parents as being a problem, they only completely understood me when I added this rather extreme statement:

If we dont crush the desire to hurt other people out of them at this age, when will we be able to do it?

Help me? Send me any ideas you have, though I definitely have a few of my own. I have some Saul Alinsky in here, a few awesome short memoirs from community organizers, "The New Jim Crow," a few articles on Arizona's SB1070 tragedies, accounts of Texas loop-holes for essentially indentured servant undocumented farm workers... So maybe I need some more moderate stuff. Ideas? Anything?

This was another one of those moments where I realized that Ayn Rand would hate me. Oh well.

Thanks guys! 

For More Inclusive Activism (Originally printed in the YDN)

I found myself by the end...

ENRIQUEZ: For more inclusive activism

BY DIANA ENRIQUEZ

Monday, April 2, 2012

I like to think I'm making a difference. Many of us activists do. We get up every morning, scan the headlines for topics that interest us, read articles that people send us and talk to people who have the same interests. Friends outside our interest groups also notice things for us, and for me, this means several copies of the same articles on immigration, Mexican cartels and Latin America when I get up each morning.

I am an activist because I am frustrated. There are things I love about my communities and things that I would change about them. But unfortunately, the language that each of our social justice groups use often prevent us from engaging with our communities at large.

Simply put, we are self-selecting, and we prefer to spend time with like-minded people. We find and surround ourselves with people who agree with us, who appreciate and understand our passions and interests. We don't need to worry about being defensive or explaining our entire background that way. It's more comfortable. For me, immigration is a really sensitive topic. I came here as an immigrant and I study here with the perspective of someone who doesn't fit well into either of my worlds.

It is easier for me to spend time with people from La Casa Cultural when I discuss immigration issues because they just get it. I don't have to dredge out painful details from my past and lay them out for the world to scrutinize. But it also means that it took me a lot longer to present my mission in a way that was broadly understandable and brought more people into the conversations I was having every day.

In the smaller circles of the Social Justice Network, a branch of Dwight Hall, activists at Yale learn how to talk to each other about these issues. I may read something in the morning, send it to the rest of my group and fume about it for the rest of the day while others from the same group agree with me. In this context, I don't have to defend myself. I can express myself through art and imagery of the violence in my home country, and I can use rhetoric that pulls Spanish and English phrases together, but I lose sight of my target audience in these ways. We lose sight of the people who do not hear these stories in their daily routines.

Activists, we need to go beyond talking to our groups if we want to get anywhere. We need to learn to communicate in a language that goes beyond our experiences and makes a point. The presentation of our missions isn't effective if we only see the same faces at every event, discussion and march. We need to bring in the rest of the community if we want to see change.

And we are lucky, because the resources are all around us. As many of us were told before we came to Yale, we are our own teachers. The best part of our time at Yale would be the community of students and the people that we would meet along the way.

So go! Leave your groups and have conversations that make you uncomfortable, defend your views and consider them from someone else's point of view. If you won't reach out and do it yourself, who will?

I have lost friends by compromising, but I've also made many others who teach me and challenge me in ways that I had never been before. In those moments, when I have realized that I'm having a conversation about immigration with someone who doesn't feel connected to the topic in any way, I learn to see myself and others like me through the eyes of someone else. And they leave the conversation knowing a little more about why I get up every morning.

I have learned the most from holding my convictions up for other people to scrutinize. I've learned to defend them and explain them in different ways. I've learned to compromise in ways that meant bringing others into the conversation without sacrificing the heart of what I want to do.

We can't hide behind our art and symbols and prose. For the change we seek to occur, understanding needs to be widespread, and we can't do that from within our own carefully guarded communities.

Diana Enriquez is a junior in Saybrook College. Contact her at diana.enriquez@yale.edu .

http://www.yaledailynews.com/news/2012/apr/02/enriquez-for-more-inclusive-activism/