The Mexican Ponders Skin Tone and the Reconquista to Figure Out Where Everyone Comes From Gustavo Arellano - CVIndependent
go to original January 7, 2016

Dear Mexican: How come all the Mexicans who came here two or three generations ago look like “almost-white” people, while the ones coming now look like those little guys who live naked in the Amazon and kill things with blowguns?

- No Indios Need Apply (NINA)

Chalk the phenomenon up to the natural unfolding that is the American immigrant experience. Countries tend to dump their upwardly mobile, lighter-skinned natives on the United States before the shoddier, darker folks show up in the steerage of rusting freighters - remember that northern Italians arrived at Ellis Island before their swarthy Sicilian paisanes. That's what's happening with Mexico.

In his 1983 study, historian Ricardo Romo cites a 1922 demographic survey that showed almost two-thirds of the Mexican community of Los Angeles at the time originated from just four states: Chihuahua, Durango, Jalisco and Zacatecas. These states are in north-central Mexico, where the conquistadors spread their seed farthest and most vigorously.

As the 20th century progressed, however, Mexico's poorer, more indigenous states in the south tumbled like dominoes as they sent their populations to, subsequently ratcheting up the brownie mixture in the Mexican-American pot. Michoacán and Puebla (next to Mexico City) didn't start sending their residents en masse to the U.S. until around the mid-20th century; Guerrero and Oaxaca followed around the 1970s; our Central American colony, Guatemala, now follows.

The push continues even in Mexico - in a 2004 piece, staffer Valeria Godines described the tensions between the Arandas, Jalisco and Chiapan immigrants, showing Mexicans can be as race-obsessed as their oppressors.

Read more ¡Ask A Mexican! at CVIndependent

Related: Learning to Love My Brown Skin: As a Child, I Often Asked Myself, Did the World Think I Was Ugly? (Racked)

Ask the Mexican at themexican@askamexican.net; be his fan on Facebook; follow him on Twitter @gustavoarellano; or follow him on Instagram @gustavo_arellano

We invite you to add your charity or supporting organizations' news stories and coming events to PVAngels so we can share them with the world. Do it now!