The experience of Mexican Americans during segregation (state, Spain, historical)
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He served in WW2 and told us that he would get promoted because most of the Anglo service members in his unit could not read, write or do math. He was shocked. Coming from a poor deep south Texas town - he could do all of that and figured that those living up north should be able to also.
The lawsuits (Delgado, Lemon Grove, Mendez etc) were about what I described. Some Mexican children were being forced into "Mexican School" even if they could speak English. They had to prove that the children were being arbitrarily segregated, and ruled that that was wrong because Mexican children are white. Every case was essentially the same. It had nothing to do with Jim Crow segregation.
Mexicans normally went to white schools, but some districts were forcing them into special education arbitrarily.
I suspect that everyone replying in this thread is "correct" in one way or another.
The three men below: Yaisel Puig, Canelo Alvarez and George Lopez...would all be considered Latino. If they were all 70 years old and grew up in Jim Crow America, we'd have to assume their experiences would differ considerably. As we all know, Latinos can be of any race and there's no singular "look" that all Latinos have. Of the three individuals, only Lopez is American born. A man that looks like him in 1955 might face indifference, acceptance or hardcore discrimination depending on where he is and the context of the situation he is facing. Alvarez would almost always be considered "white" but ethnic the way an Italian or Irish person would be. Puig is getting the full Jim Crow treatment no matter how thick his Spanish accent is....perhaps he earns a few brownie points for being a different kind of black.
I'd say that white-looking Latinos were mostly considered "white" if only because of TV. I Love Lucy featured Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. His Cuban sensibilities were on full display in every episode but I don't think his relationship with Lucy was viewed as particularly risque for the time. If Lucy was on TV and her husband looked like Sidney Poitier......well......we all know that would never air. I'm not 100% how people would have reacted to a Latino with a more Native American look.
I have heard stories that different kids in the same Hispanic family might go to different schools depending on skin lightness. That seems very weird and peculiarly arbitrary even in a peculiar practice.
I wonder if that had to do with the traditional Sistem de Casta (hierachical caste system employed by the colonial Spanish empire) that ruled in New Mexico from its inception as a Spanish territory.
There was definitely a social distinction made between the (mostly) European-blooded Hispanos and the dark skinned Genizaros descended from Hispanified Native Americans.
In these oral histories, the interviewer is always trying to ask Mexican-Americans some loaded question - in the hopes of getting them to tell their experience of segregation. But then the interviewee proceeds to tell a story about black people being segregated.
This Mexican-American woman describes her experience learning about segregation when she was a child and wondering why black children were not allowed to go to school with her and her Anglo-American friends in Texas.
I wonder if that had to do with the traditional Sistem de Casta (hierachical caste system employed by the colonial Spanish empire) that ruled in New Mexico from its inception as a Spanish territory.
There was definitely a social distinction made between the (mostly) European-blooded Hispanos and the dark skinned Genizaros descended from Hispanified Native Americans.
That is part of the state's history. Plus, there were Indian Schools as a separate layer and forced participation. The local schools had different rules and practices based on the local dynamics. Populations were sparce, attendance was sporadic, and sometimes there might not be a teacher. There might be only a few non-Hispanic families.
I researched a town in Sandoval County (NM), no longer existing, and there were some years beginning in 1870 where there was no teacher and no school and there never was a resident Priest or actual religious workers. I suspect Los Hermanos Penitentes had a Morada somewhere. The only "Anglos" that showed up were cowboys from Oklahoma in the Dust Bowl years and a Scottish rancher in the census district. Everyone else was Hispano with family ties in NM going to the 1600s and a few "adopted" Indian servants, sometimes listed as "wards". English was probably not generally spoken. There was a postmistress as late as the 1950s.
Hispanics and other dark skinned people may have been considered "white" in legal matters but they weren't considered "white" in social matters.
The older generation of Americans really believed that Mexicans were white. It wasn't just on paper.
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