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Yes, as my wife is from Guyana (I am from St. Thomas), I was shocked when I was in Guyana hearing about and seeing Dominicans. While I can find some fleeting Dominican connections to the northeastern Caribbean, Why are dark skinned Dominicans in a place like Guyana which is supposedly the second poorest nation in the Caribbean community?
In fact Dominicans have been deported from Guyana in recent times.
I don't think that life is that grand for darker Dominicans, as they are the ones who seem to be roaming the Caribbean. Not the lighter ones.
Don't know any Dominicans, but a family member has a Dominican friend...I notice on other boards, when they argue
with AAs they say we are brainwashed by the one-drop rule imposed by racist whites and should stop identifying as black
.
Haiti is, and has always been two countries since independence. One black, and the other mulatto. Mulattos economically dominate that nation though even though blacks are the majority.
Haitians and Dominicans lambasting AAs about how they self identify is as silly as AAs who tell a Haitians who looks like Alicia Keyes that they ought to self identify as black.
Every society has their own history, and their own ways that they are socially structured, and identities are impacted. Even within the Anglo Caribbean there might be different definitions of black.
In an island like Antigua, where almost every one is black, a "mixed" person might self identify as black because racial identity doesn't matter.
In Trinidad, a highly diverse society, there is possibly more interest in diverse ancestry, so the same person might self identify as mixed.
In the USA there is no real value in a light skinned black person, with distant non African ancestry, to identify as anything other than black. The community which will accept that person will be the African American community. This might differ where some one has a non black parent, and therefore closer ties to non blacks.
So for a Haitian mulatto to accuse a light skinned AA of being brainwashed is irrelevant, and likely motivated by the intense desire of that Haitian to not be seen as being black.
So yes the WWIII doesn't surprise me. Jamaica was like that until very recently, and even now there are underlying black vs. brown tensions.
Now, to their defense, as you pointed out, in parts of Latin America, things are sometimes reversed. You can have a black ancestor, but if you look like, say, Ronda Rousey (who found out that she had a Trinidadian ancestor), you get away with being "white" or Mulatto and NOT black. Over here, you have "one drop," you're "black."
Latin America is as racist and as hostile to blacks, as is the USA. This despite the denials of this fact.
To be "black" is to be an awful stigmatized creature, so no one wants to be black, so they find the most minute non African ancestry to proclaim that they are not black.
So a Dominican looking like Will Smith (which many of them do) will scream that he isn't black, merely because he doesn't look like Wesley Snipes.
That would be fine if they applied the same criteria to defining who is white. But they don't. Does any one seriously believe that 75% of the people living in Puerto Rico are "white"? Yet this is what so many select, rather than the "one or more races" category which the US census allows.
Latin Americans think that they are less racist because they are more "generous" in allowing people to escape the black stigma, and to embrace the glories of being white.
Ah, Antonio; I remember you now from DR1. You are much tamer here than you are/were over there. :-)
Could it be because you are confusing me with someone else?
Quote:
Originally Posted by InsaneInDaMembrane
As I watch you and CaribNY go back and forth, I have to admit, each of you have your points. Up front, I do not exactly agree with CaribNY that the events of 150 years ago has no current bearing on the issues between the two countries (if that is what I am gathering). After all, it stands to reason that Trujillo bridges that gap and took from the past to build his propaganda to influence his times and the current Dominican mindset in terms of how they view the Haitians and race in general, no?
Not quite. The anti-Haitian propaganda lasted only a year when political tensions between both countries was at its greatest. All visitors to the country in the 19th century and in the 20th century before Trujillo rose to power mention the evident dislike of Haitians in the DR.
Quote:
Originally Posted by InsaneInDaMembrane
I am not quite sure how things would have unfolded had there not been these early developments of "invasion" and "atrocities" from the Haitian side that have been used to keep up the tensions between the two nations. I've also always wondered what would our (observers) opinions have been had this been 1840 instead of 2016? Where would our empathies lie?
I think that's evident in their lack of disgust in writing of the harmonial race relations in the DR, especially from those eye witnesses that were from the USA.
Quote:
Originally Posted by InsaneInDaMembrane
Now THAT being said and possible reasons given, CaribNY makes mention of the glaring color issue in the D.R. There it might not be that big of a deal because "it is the way that it is" and accepted, but when Dominicans go abroad, especially to the eastern United States, it seems they are often shocked when the matter is looked at differently in places like NY. Like, "wait, what do you mean you're not BLACK, you're Dominican?" Granted, this whole race thing can be a mess, especially here in the states where you can be bleach white, but as long as you have an ounce of "black" in you and this is known, you're black and you have to own it even more than your "white" side.
I think its more than that.
First there is the socialization process in the Spanish world which has always been diametrically different from those of other European countries. Remember that in Europe itself the Spaniards were often, and still today many people especially in Northern Europe hold these views, not considered white. The widespread tendency towards mixtures, unlike the attitude adopted by most other Europeans except perhaps the Portuguese, left the impression among other Europeans that you can never be too sure if a Spaniard is truly of pure European origin, especially with the large number of Spanirads that went back to Spain after spending years in Spanish America.
The other situation to take into account is that despite the one-drop-rule tendency in the USA, which is mostly imposed on Dominicans by some African Americans; Dominicans are more often lumped with the rest of the Spanish American peoples. You see this in the census options:
And in various other demographic studies (Dominicans dominate the northern panhandle of the island of Manhattan, NY):
Latino identity in the USA in general is inclusive of Dominicans, and this is also apparent in the socialization tendencies as Dominicans tend to socialize more with other Latinos, especially with Puerto Ricans, than they do with other groups.
The US itself is going through a change in racial identity as well, perhaps as an influence of the increasing Spanish American minority. Even among Americans this tendency towards recognizing the mixtures as oppose to the tradition of pretending it wasn't there is gaining momentum and this probably is and will continue to impact the way Dominicans see themselves in the USA and also identity among other groups.
Quote:
Originally Posted by InsaneInDaMembrane
As for the Cocolos, you are right that SOME (not all) of the Dominicans flocking to the Eastern Caribbean Islands are merely descendants of Eastern Caribbean migrants (some are my own relatives), but while that may true of the northeastern Caribbean, I am not sure if explains the other darker skinned Dominicans showing up in places like Trinidad and even Guyana who have NO ancestral ties to other Caribbean islands. Oddly enough, on those other islands/countries, they are just "black people" and there are no racial distinctions made like what they know back home.
Migration chains are often formed by a group of people migrating and then they visit their home country and tell their friends of how great they are doing in the new country, this entices more people to go there. That's the reason why the average Dominican that moves to say Puerto Rico is considerably darker than the average Dominican that moves to NY. The NY migration flow initiated in the Cibao Valley and in the 1960's and 1970's was composed mainly by people that are very light skin or white. That migration flow even impacted the way New Yorkers imagine Dominicans to be, and only with the more recent increase of emigration from other regions that happens to be sugar cane producing areas the average skin color flow to NY has been darkening.
The English Caribbean's connection to the Spanish Caribbean is essentially via the Cocolo immigration of the late 1800s and early 1900's. Even though it wained since then, the immigration flow never truly ended. Ironically, in both Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic these people and their descendants are known as Cocolos, I'm not sure if its the same way in Cuba although over there it consisted mostly of Jamaicans whereas in the PR and DR it was mostly from the Lesser Antilles. The Cocolos migrated in search of jobs in the sugar cane plantations, for the most part.
No studies have been done about the migration flow from the DR to the English Caribbean, but its safe to say that its mostly a phenomenon from sugar producing areas such as San Pedro de Macoris and La Romana.
How do the Haitian and Dominican communities get a long in the US? I lived in Montreal where there is a lot of Haitians. Not as many Dominicanos, but there are some and I can't say I ever really noticed any bad blood between the two. A few rude comments here and there but that's about it. In fact most negative comments I heard about Haitians were from Jamaican and Trinidadians. I am central American and my interactions with Haitians has been mostly positive, I got along very well with my Haitian neighbors and coworkers.
They live in two different worlds with very little contact between the two. Relations with African Americans are stronger, but the people with whom Dominicans socialize the most is with Puerto Ricans and with a few other Spanish American groups.
Many things lead towards this socialization process including communion of language and history.
The media as Dominicans consume Spanish language television/print/radio/internet media and are included in all of them (a large percentage of the Spanish music played in Spanish radio stations in the USA is actually of Dominican/Puerto Rican/Cuban origin). Mexican and Colombian singers are also given preference, singers from everywhere else in Spanish America not so much.
Dominicans more often than not tend to work along other Dominicans or other Hispanics, again due to a language issue.
Dominicans often belong to Hispanic Catholic parishes and attend masses among other Hispanic groups, creating more opportunities for intra-Hispanic socialization.
By contrast, Haitians tend to socialize more with other Haitians. When they socialize outside of their group, its usually with African Americans. Haitians are stigmitized within many groups in the USA, especially after the 1980's and the Aids epidemic when US media basically blamed Haitians for its existence. The long turbulent history, the very sharp differences in culture such as different languages and ways of seeing and interpreting the world; poses a bar that keeps Dominicans and Haitians apart. Despite that, there are many Dominicans and Haitians that get along, just not as many as some would like.
Was recently in an area with a large Haitian community on business, it was related to me that an AA had 2 Haitian friends
one was light and the other was dark, so he thought that since they were both in the U.S. and were from Haiti he thought
they should meet. Well, he called himself being social and had both of them over. It was reported to me that World War
III broke out in his living room and the guys almost got to fist fighting. Is the antipathy and color ism in Haiti THAT BAD?
Haiti is the country in this hemisphere that has the most massacres due to skin color, mostly massacres of the lighter skin mulattoes. The most recent massacre of this nature took place in the 1960's in some town in southern Haiti, I think it was Jeremie or Jeremia.
The whites were almost completely exterminated during the general massacres during the Haitian Revolution. Through the remaining 19th century and all the way up to the 20th century, the mulatto presence in Haiti has been on a steady decline due to the hostility and massacres that periodically were committed by regimes based on the notion of nourisme, which is basically black supremacy. Most Haitian mulattoes actually fled the country and ended up in places such as Canada (especially in Quebec), various parts of the USA, and in France itself. A small number of them settled in Dominican Republic and Cuba too. The southern part of Haiti has traditionally been a mulatto society, from my understanding.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Agbor
Don't know any Dominicans, but a family member has a Dominican friend...I notice on other boards, when they argue with AAs they say we are brainwashed by the one-drop rule imposed by racist whites and should stop identifying as black and say we are mixed. On the surface, that makes logical sense, in the U.S. where whites are used as a reference point.
But they don't mention the anti-black-ism in the culture. I wonder if the majority of Haitians were NOT black, would there be LESS anti-black ism in the culture?
There isn't much 'anti-blackism' as you call it, some people simply like to confuse the anti-Haitian feels with anti-black and ignore that Haitians are the only blacks that face a sort of resistence even by other blacks not just in the DR, but also in the rest of the Caribbean. In the Bahamas they tend to be much more strict with the Haitians and no one says or notice anything. Even the Bahamian Minister of Immigration was whining to the international community about the Haitian problem they are facing:
This is how the Bahamas gathers the illegal Haitians before they deport them:
They simply don't want them. Anti-blackism in the Bahamas? Of course not. They are just overwhelmed with illegal Haitian migrants and fear this will impact their identity and their nation if nothing is done. Add to this that the Bahamas has zero negative history with Haiti, their only issue is the massive migration problem.
Could it be because you are confusing me with someone else?
My bad...that's Airgordo, well unless he is you under that alias over there.
I appreciate the rest of the information you have been providing. I am finding it quite informative. Might not agree with all of your conclusions along the way, but I appreciate all of the effort in the information and visuals you have been providing.
The English Caribbean's connection to the Spanish Caribbean is essentially via the Cocolo immigration of the late 1800s and early 1900's. Even though it wained since then, the immigration flow never truly ended. .
The migration to the DR was induced, not by Dominicans, who hated the Cocolos with a passion as part of their hatred of blacks, and harassed them. Trujillo mounted his usual racist bigotry against them.
They were recruited by the US owners of sugar plantations in the DR. Just as US employers hired them in Cuba, Costa Rica, and Panama. No one went to the DR to work for a Dominican employer. So when the US employers switched to Haitians that ended the cocolo migration.
The migration ended with the Great Depression. Given that wages in the DR are abysmal when compared with those in Antigua, no Antiguan to is going to migrate there. In fact when a new Dominican airline began service to Antigua, the Antiguan gov't begged the locals to give them a chance. Antiguans reserve for Dominicans all the scorn that Dominicans have towards Haitians.
To many in the north east Caribbean the DR is a huge country filled with impoverished people who they feel will overwhelm these small islands. And yes there are burdens when Dominican kids arrive, poorly educated, and unable to speak English.
The image that the average NYer has of Dominicans is that some one looking like Leonel Fernandez, and in the eyes of most he is a light skinned black man.
Interesting enough, despite the fact that a large % of Dominicans look like him how many presidents looking like him have been democratically elected, and how many government ministers look like him. How many captains of industry in the DR look like him? How often are people who look like him in media images and adverts, other than those which target poor people? And there are significant numbers of Dominicans who are even darker than he is.
Race relations might be good in a country where the discriminated against group accept their fate, so I am not impressed with such claims. We have all heard of dark skinned people who were barred from high end clubs. In fact the US Embassy in Sto Domingo even used to have an advisory warning people of this when some of their own staff suffered.
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