The ongoing need in Puerto Rico, as well as the plight of Latino immigrant children in cages, briefly made headlines again this week. Not because of the continuing earthquakes on the island, or for activism on the border, but because of Super Bowl halftime hip shakes from Shakira and a Puerto Rican flag display from Jennifer Lopez. In the wake of the extravaganza, controversy between (and among) both supporters and detractors of the event has cropped up, revolving around issues of race and white privilege. Some supporters of the artists saw the outcry as racist, while others took great pride in seeing two Latinas dominate the stage.
Don’t assume that all the critics came from the bigot gallery, as a chunk of the negative pushback came from non-MAGA sources. Latina academics not only brought up issues of hyper-sexualization, but also homed in on issues of race, racial hierarchies, and skin color. These critics saw Jennifer Lopez, known to the world as J-Lo, and Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll, known simply as Shakira, as symbols of “light-skinned latinidad,” or as “white-passing Latinas.” One Twitterati proclaimed portentously, “This is a Latin minstrel show meant to destroy solidarity with Afro-Latinos and the Black diaspora,” and went on to excoriate the artists for not boycotting the Super Bowl stage. Frequently, Cardi B’s name came up as a courageous boycotter. However, she was seen dancing in the stands.
Petra Rivera-Rideau wrote a piece for The Washington Post titled “What J-Lo and Shakira missed in their Super Bowl halftime show.” The subhead read: “Their performance perpetuated the marginalization of Afro-Latinos and other people of African descent.” This critique placed ridiculous expectations on the shoulders of these two women, who are somehow obligated to solve centuries-long issues of racism by not performing, and fix the Colin Kaepernick-NFL battle by doing the same. Please tell me: Which black football players have stopped playing?
I don’t buy this take, even though I have spent decades railing against colorism and anti-black racism in the Latinx world.
Anti-blackness is a harsh reality when viewed through the lens of some contemporary Afro-Latina artists. No matter where you are born, if you are black, you face structural racism. However, many of the critiques targeting J-Lo and Shakira are wrong-headed, and a new form of victim blaming. Neither J-Lo nor Shakira chose their skin color or hair or ancestry. Should we now only feature performing artists based on a skin-tone sliding scale? It’s bad enough that MAGA types were screaming bloody murder that their Super Bowl half-time had *gasp* some songs sung in Spanish—in Miami! To make matters worse, now some wingnut evangelical is suing the NFL because he thinks J-Lo and Shakira have endangered his immortal soul. You can’t make this shit up.
Other complaints noted the absence of Afro-Latinx acts on the bill. Yet when I went back and watched the entire show several times, what I saw were the many colors of the Latino diaspora—the strong presence of Afro-Latinx performers onstage is hard to miss.
Few, if any, critics bothered to mention Swing Latino.
Musician and activist Willie Colon did notice. He congratulated Swing Latino and their founder, Luis Eduardo Hernández, who is known by the nickname “El Mulato.”
Shakira and J-Lo paid tribute to both Héctor Lavoe and Colón by dancing to their Afro-salsa classic Aguanile.
“Aguanile” is one of the most important songs in the history of Nuyorican salsa, and the genre as a whole for that matter. It was most significant as it incorporated traditional Boricuan Salsa with an Afro-Cuban influence, including chants from the Nigerian language Yoruba, where the roots of the Santería religion were established.
After seeing the energy-packed dance to Aguanile, one Twitterer even announced that they were going to return to salsa dance classes.
Many Super Bowl viewers were first introduced to Swing Latino during halftime.
Swing Latino began as a foundation for underprivileged kids in the city of Cali in the late 90's and its dance troupe has already won several important dance competitions in Las Vegas and Philadelphia.
In 2017 they landed third place in NBC’s World of Dance show where they had the opportunity to (meet) with Jennifer Lopez and even toured with her during last Summer’s “It’s My Party Tour.”
Though I don’t watch World of Dance on a regular basis, I did tune in to episodes with Swing Latino, since dancing to salsa is my favorite exercise. I am what is known in New York as “an old school salsera.”
Perhaps, had journalists and critics spent a little time informing viewers about Colombia and the African roots in Colombian culture, it would have helped expand understanding of a country that is usually in our headlines as the home of drug lords and drug cartels. I doubt most non-Latinos in the U.S. realize that Colombia has the second-largest African descendant population in Latin America, after Brazil.
Many viewers may not have even realized that those black people dancing on stage were Latinos.
Maybe I’m too old school, but I cannot imagine music without Afro-Latinos. The existence and success of J-Lo and Shakira does nothing to diminish the contributions of Afro-Latino musicians. In fact, they could lead younger generations to explore the richness of the black musical legacy.
I grew up with the music of Afro-Latinas like Celia Cruz, La Lupe, Graciela, Toña La Negra, Lucecita, and Merceditas Valdés. There is also a very long list of stellar Afro-Latino men who found global fame, especially in the area of Latin-jazz. Having lived through a political phase of black cultural nationalism, which found me facing down the barrel of a gun for not being “dark enough” in Harlem (thankfully, I was rescued by Malcolm X, which is a story for a different day), I am currently watching the rise of anti-immigrant, right-wing black groups like ADOS, who reject all black folks if they weren’t born on U.S soil to ancestors who were enslaved here. I hope we can find ways to educate others, instead of trashing J-Lo and Shakira.
I looked for non-academic responses to Shakira’s performance, and found an elated writer from the singer’s hometown of Barranquilla, Colombia. Jeniffer Paola Varela Rodríguez wrote, “I Am Colombian, and This Is Why Shakira's Halftime Show Performance Was So Meaningful”:
"I was born in Barranquilla, Colombia. And ever since I started traveling, I realized how joyful it is when people say "Shakira!" as an immediate reaction to the place I was born, so I think you can imagine my excitement knowing she was performing for the Super Bowl's halftime show along with Jennifer Lopez. ...I'm happy to report - and explain to you all - that there were a lot of special homages and hidden messages that only us Colombians could understand and that made us proud of our heritage.
Barranquilla is famous for Shakira, Sofía Vergara, and its Carnival - the second biggest one in the world. And Shak knows that, which is why she put the icing on the cake by honoring the roots of our biggest festivity. If you noticed the masks of the people who carried her when she dove into the crowd as she sang "Hips Don't Lie," I'm here to tell you they are traditional Barranquilla carnival masks, which she commissioned from an expert community of craftsmen in Colombia.
I do not want to diminish the very real impact of colorism in Latinx communities, or its traumatic impact, particularly on dark-skinned women. I taught a class called “Women in the Caribbean” for many years. My white students rarely had any inkling of the existence of colorism, while my African-American and Latinx students all had stories to tell.
Last year, Giselle Castro wrote “Why Understanding Colorism Within the Latino Community Is So important.”
City College Professor of Latin American and Latino studies Iris Lopez explains, “Latinos are very color conscious and use a color classification system which includes categories such as blanco, negro, trigueno, Indio, Jabao, Moreno, Mulatta, etc,” she says. Because Latinos don’t identify with a race, Lopez says they tend to use labels tied to their hair type, skin color, and facial features instead. The labels have different meanings depending on what island or country you’re in, because they can vary regionally. Lopez adds that the concept of what category you fall under depends on the percentage of black blood an individual has. “The Latin American and Spanish Caribbean racial classification system is similar to the old racial classification system used by blacks in the U.S. and the West Indies,” She elaborates.
As Lopez mentioned, race is a social construct invented by Europeans intended to divide people and holds no scientific merit. Through the illusion of race, Europeans were able to manipulate blacks and other natives into believing that whites were superior in order to justify their conquests. Lopez points out if it weren’t for race, colorism wouldn’t even exist. “The phrase colorism may have developed because it is incorrect to say that people of color are racist because they are part of an oppressed group,” she explains. “If racism did not exist in the Latino community, they would not be so color conscious, and colorism would not exist,” Lopez concludes. Whether we want to admit it or not, colorism affects ALL Latinos. It’s no surprise that if you ask most Latinos about their experiences with colorism, everyone has a story.
For starters, even using U.S. Census data, Puerto Rico has a “black” population roughly equivalent to the black population on the mainland, and if you include “mixed or other” it is far higher.
As of the 2010 Census, 75.8% of Puerto Ricans identify as white, 12.4% identify as black, 0.5% as Amerindian, 0.2% as Asian, and 11.1% as "mixed or other." Although estimates vary, most sources estimate that about 60% of Puerto Ricans have significant African ancestry
The demographic “whitening” of Puerto Ricans is also important to consider. Uncle Sam’s portrayal has always been a white father dictating to his little colored colonial children.
In “How Puerto Rico became white,” a study by sociologists Mara Loveman and Jeronimo Muniz, we see how people once classified as “black” or “mulatto” became “white”—in the span of 10 years.
Puerto Rico underwent a "whitening" process while under U.S. rule. There was a dramatic change in the numbers of people who were classified as "black" and "white" Puerto Ricans in the 1920 census, as compared to that in 1910. The numbers classified as "Black" declined sharply from one census to another (within 10 years' time). Historians suggest that more Puerto Ricans classified others as white because it was advantageous to do so at that time. In those years, census takers were generally the ones to enter the racial classification. Due to the power of Southern white Democrats, the US Census dropped the category of mulatto or mixed race in the 1930 census, enforcing the artificial binary classification of black and white. Census respondents were not allowed to choose their own classifications until the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
I had the opportunity to correspond with Loveman and Muniz as they were developing this research, while I was digging into my husband’s black Puerto Rican roots. The mainland U.S. uses “hypodescent,” often referred to as “the one-drop rule,” to delineate race, while Puerto Rico reverses it.
Loveman and Muniz also describe Puerto Rico has having an inverted one-drop rule. While in the United States a drop of non-white blood is (sometimes) sufficient for an individual to not be considered white, in Puerto Rico the opposite occurred. One drop of white ancestry was all that was needed for one to be considered white:
…the specific terms used to describe this one drop rule shifted slightly from 1910 to 1920. Instead of alerting census-takers to be on the lookout for mulattos as “impure blacks” with any trace of black blood (i.e. individuals who were not “really white”), the instructions for Puerto Rican census-takers in 1920 cued census-takers to be on the lookout for mulattos as “impure blacks” with any trace of white blood (i.e. individuals who were not “really black”). The shift in the 1920 enumerator instructions in Puerto Rico, subtle as it was, created more wiggle room in the application of the one drop rule than was possible in the previous census. In both cases, race was construed to be determined by “blood.” But whereas in 1910, any trace of “black blood” was sufficient to keep an individual from being categorized as “white”, in 1920, any trace of “white blood” was sufficient to keep an individual from being categorized as “black.”
There is one final, and quite interesting note, about all this. In the 2010 Census the percentage of Puerto Ricans identifying as white dropped for the first time in more than a century. Whites decreased from 80.5% of the population to 75.8%. Whether this is due to actual demographic shifts (i.e. mostly white emigrants leaving to the United States), or a change in culture, is difficult to discern. It will be quite interesting to examine, in the future 2020 Census, whether this trend continues
For me, no matter how “whitened” Puerto Ricans and other Latinos are in terms of phenotype, no matter the skin tone, no matter the internalized and racialized conflicts, what dominates culturally comes directly from the island’s heavily African-influenced culture.
We also need to be very careful when attributing darker skin to enlightened racial and politically aware consciousness. Just as we have black mainland cultural and political figures who work against us (think Kanye and Ben Carson), one of the most reactionary politicians in Puerto Rico is Nayda Venegas Brown, one of the few “black” Puerto Ricans in the territory’s legislature. She is a fierce supporter of anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ legislation, even calling those accusing Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault “liars.”
I’ve explored aspects of Afro-Puerto Rican history and culture during Black History Month before, in “Celebrating the Afro-Puerto Rican 'Father of Black History' Arturo Schomburg”; “Loiza—the African heart of Puerto Rico and the arts that portray it”; “The vejigante masks and bomba music of Puerto Rico”; and “Afro-Latina Pura Belpré gave children the precious love of books and stories.”
No one can possibly question Africa’s presence in Puerto Rico if they listen to and watch traditional bomba.
Bomba es tanto una danza tradicional como un estilo musical de Puerto Rico. Sus orígenes están arraigados en la historia de la isla de la esclavitud africana, pero hoy se ha convertido en una expresión comunitaria de la cultura afro-puertorriqueña en la celebración de nuestra ascendencia africana. Bomba es realmente una relación creativa e interactiva entre bailarines, percusionistas y cantantes. Hoy en día se practica como una actividad comunitaria en sus centros de origen en Loíza, Santurce, Mayagüez y Ponce. Además, los migrantes puertorriqueños han llevado la tradición a algunas partes de los Estados Unidos. ¡Disfruta de mi cultura!
Translation:
Bomba is both a traditional dance and a Puerto Rican musical style. Its origins are rooted in the history of the island of African slavery, but today it has become a community expression of Afro-Puerto Rican culture in the celebration of our African descent. Bomba is really a creative and interactive relationship between dancers, percussionists and singers. Nowadays it is practiced as a community activity in its centers of origin in Loíza, Santurce, Mayagüez and Ponce. In addition, Puerto Rican migrants have taken the tradition to some parts of the United States. Enjoy my culture!
The place in Puerto Rico where I have always felt most comfortable, as a black woman, is Loíza.
It’s the Afro-Caribbean heart of Puerto Rico.
The Loíza municipality is a place of narrow streets and pastel corners, each of which lead inevitably to the ocean. The city is filled with palm trees and "chinchorros," traditional, unassuming bars or shops where residents, called Loiceños, drink together and sell fried local food and natural coconut water. The Loiceños are noble people, fighters who descend from enslaved Africans brought to this Spanish colony from the early 1500s. Most were located in towns on the coasts, such as Loíza, to work the sugarcane fields. Rare amid Puerto Rico’s “jibaro” culture, which imagines a white, Puerto Rican countryman ideal, the Loiceños defend fiercely their African heritage.
As opposed to 11% of all Puerto Ricans, 38% of Loíza residents identify as black, a conservative figure, according to several community leaders.
No one should be questioning what J-Lo and Shakira accomplished with a performance watched by 103 million viewers. What we should be doing is amplifying the message, and using it as a base to educate. Racism and ignorance go hand in hand. It’s our job to correct that.
When I was a member of the Young Lords Party we held community education classes, where we addressed the issue of racism in the community along with teaching about radical black boricuas and other black Caribbean historical figures. We were the first radical predominantly Latino political mainland group to have members who wore afros, and to define Puerto Rican culture as “Afro-Taino.”
The last line of our poetic anthem, Puerto Rican Obituary, by renowned Nuyorican Poet Laureate Pedro Pietri was:
“Aqui to be called negrito
means to be called LOVE”
That was 50 years ago, and it seems like there is a lot of work still undone. Thank you, J-Lo and Shakira, for sparking the conversation again. It needs to continue.
Next Sunday, I’ll be exploring the history and present-day experiences of Haitian-Americans.