6 Trailblazing Afro Latinas You and Your Kids Should Know
Society tells those of us who are more than one race and have more than one ethnicity and culture to pick one. That is the experience of so many Afro Latino people, and that is my experience, too. I was never Black enough. I was never Central American enough, Latina enough.
White supremacy has taught us that the lighter our complexion is, the more successful, the softer, the more beautiful and feminine we are. The erasure of the Afro Latino community, particularly of Afro Latinas, spans centuries, and the colorism in and out of the community is alive and real.
Our community has endured attempts at erasure, but we are still standing. We must reflect on the women who have paved the way for generations of other women to feel empowered and reclaim our existence and who have fought — and are still fighting — for our right to be seen.
There is no one way to be Black.
There is no one way to be Latina.
There is no one way to be Afro Latina.
As we observe Black History Month, let us not forget that the Afro Latino diaspora is here, in history, time, and the future. Let's teach our daughters, sons, nieces and nephews about the activists, creatives, and educators that represent the Afro Latina community.
Let's celebrate some of those trailblazing Afro Latina women by meeting a few of them.
Juana Briones (1802-1889)
Briones' family, who descended from enslaved people brought to Mexico during the 1500s, came to California from northern Mexico with the 1775-1776 Anza colonizing expedition. Born in what is now Santa Cruz, Briones, also known as Doña Juana Briones de Miranda, eventually became an entrepreneur, landowner and, with the help of Native Americans who taught her about herbal medicine, a respected healer.
Celia Cruz (1925-2003)
Known as the "Queen of Salsa" the acclaimed singer of "La Vida Es Un Carnaval," was born Úrsula Hilaria Celia de la Caridad Cruz Alfonso in Havana, Cuba. Cruz loved to sing ever since she was a little girl, even though her father wanted her to be a teacher. After winning a radio competition and became famous in the 1950s after she became the lead singer in a popular Cuban orchestra. Even though she was forbidden to return to Cuba after she left in the 1960s, she always wore her heritage proudly and would often shout "Azúcar!" before her shows, referring to the sugar in sweet Cuban coffee. Her career spanned 60 years, won her five Grammys and made her an icon.
Miriam Jiménez Román (1951-2020)
An influential educator, Miriam Jiménez Román, conducted workshops, created safe spaces and wrote books about the disconnect between being Black and Latina. As a Black Puerto Rican, she used her platform and voice to bridge the gap between the two cultures, which are usually seen as one or the other, rarely intersecting. She wrote vigorously about her experience as a Black Puerto Rican and how history has segregated African Americans and Blackness. Alongside her co-editor, Juan Flores, she educated school age children on the often-untaught history of Afro Latinos.
Jiménez Román once said:
"Everything that's worthwhile in this country has come about because African Americans have pushed it. We all benefit every day, white people as well as people of color, from the struggles of African Americans."
- It's never too early to read portions of "The Afro-Latin@ Reader: History and Culture in the United States" by Miriam Jiménez Román and her co-editor Juan Flores to your children. The book focuses on the invisible communities in the United States composed of people of African descent from Latin America and the Caribbean. The book dives into the history of the societal divide, deep-rooted racism in the Latinx culture and colorism in the African American community.
- An extension of her popular book is the afrolatin@ forum, which offers resources for parents and caregivers to learn more about Afro Latinos and help increase the recognition and visibility of the community.
Sonia Pierre (1963-2011)
Solange Pierre, known as Sonia Pierre, was a tireless human and civil rights activist for Haitian immigrants and Haitian-descended children in the Dominican Republic. At 20 years old, she founded the Movement of Dominican Women of Haitian Descent (MUDHA), which focused on anti-Haitian prejudice, women's health, sexism and educational opportunities. In the more than two decades she spent as an activist, she fought for the citizenship rights of Haitian migrants and their children living in the Dominican Republic.
As Pierre once said, “Para mí la patria es que todos podamos vivir en ella, que nuestros derechos sean cumplidos,”which translates to:
“For me, the homeland is that everyone can live in it and that the rights of all are respected.”
- Introduce your children to Pierre with "Latinitas: Celebrating 40 Big Dreamers"/"Latinitas: Una celebración de 40 soñadoras audaces" (Ages 8-12), a picture book by Guatemalan American author and illustrator Juliet Menéndez, that talks about Pierre and her influence as an Afro Latina.
- To introduce the history of Haitian discrimination and erasure in an age-appropriate way, read "Freedom Soup" (Ages 5-9), written by Tami Charles and illustrated by Jacqueline Alcántara, to learn about Haitian traditions that involve soup, a celebration and a revolution.
- Ask your child to draw pictures of Sonia Pierre and other influential Afro Latina women, encouraging them to see the beauty in all skin colors.
Janel Martinez (Present)
Janel Martinez is a Honduran American who works as a multimedia journalist and digital content producer. She is the founder of Ain't I Latina?, a website that advocates for Afro Latinas who are rarely represented in mainstream media. Her work was recently included in "Wild Tongues Can't Be Tamed: 15 Voices from the Latinx Diaspora," a collection of works by writers in the Latinx community. The book explores the Latinx diaspora and how stereotypes, music, language and immigration can incite conversation in and out of the community.
For Martinez, telling those stories is important. As she wrote on Instagram in 2020:
"Storytelling is a powerful tool. As Afro-Diasporic folk, it's carried our history, our ancestral knowledge, our healing, our various truths and essence. Media can either uplift or erase, and for far too long the agenda has been the latter as it pertains to multilayered Black stories."
- To support young children in their understanding of Afrolatinidad, or what it means to be Afro Latino, explore different music from Latinx artists in countries with large Afro Latino communities like Honduras (Aurelio Martinez), Nicaragua (Carlos Mejía Godoy), Puerto Rico (Daddy Yakee, Ozuna and Don Omar) and Panama (Sech).
- Practice kid-friendlySpanish lessons with your children to connect them with their roots and improve their bilingual learning,
- Check out this book list from Unidos US with suggestions for books to talk about Afro Latinos in literature, performing arts, media and more with poetry books, picture books, spoken word books and history books, to name a few. The list also includes kid-friendly titles like Junot Diaz's "Islandborn"/"Lola" (Ages 5-8).
Elizabeth Acevedo (1988-Present)
Elizabeth Acevedo is a Dominican American poet and author. She is the New York Times best-selling author of "The Poet X" and has won multiple awards for "With the Fire on High" and "Clap When You Land." Her books tell different stories of characters in the Afro Latino community, discussing struggles of motherhood, death and family. As described in her work, she is an outspoken advocate for Afro Latino issues, violence against women and sexuality.
Extend the Learning
- Celebrate Black History with a Page-Turner from The Morning Bell
- Celebrate Afro-Latinos in Spanish Class from The Comprehensible Classroom
- Spanish Lessons for Kids from TakeLessons
- Afro-Latinidad: The celebration of a multifaceted identity from Unidos US
- Watch "Alma's Way," a PBS KIDS series created by Sonia Manzano that follows Alma, a little Puerto Rican girl from the Bronx
