Who is really Latin?
For millions of Americans, the issues surrounding racial, cultural and ethnic identity are complicated. There are wide-ranging debates about how best to describe Spanish-speaking Americans, descendants of Latin Americans (is it Hispanic? Latino?), And infinite choices reflect self-identification preferences.
Claiming a Hispanic, Latin or Latinx identity is a matter of personal choice. As the Pew Research Center said in a 2020 report: “Who is Hispanic? Anyone who says he is.”
But a recent controversy illustrates the tension between identifying as part of a group and being accused of appropriating an ethnic or racial community.
Until January, Natasha Lycia Ora Bannan was known as a prominent Latin civil rights attorney in New York City. She was active in social justice organizations and received prestigious honors. She was a senior lawyer in a leading Latino advocacy group, LatinoJustice PRLDEF, and president of the National Lawyers Guild.
She contributed to anthologies of Latin writers and published articles on a Latin website, and in 2017, she appeared in a video for Voice Latina, saying she was a “cultural mix of Puerto Rican, Colombian, Italian and a few others.” Previously, in a 2015 video, she mentioned dancing salsa while visiting a family in Colombia.
Then, the online news site Prism Reports claimed that Bannan was not Latin.
According to Tina Vásquez, a senior reporter at Prism Reports, historical records show that Bannan grew up in Georgia and was of Italian, Irish and Russian descent. Vásquez’s story soon went viral. “We are a tiny website, but the part numbers were impressive,” said Vásquez. “That was in the wake of Hilaria Baldwin being on the news” – around the controversy that she presented herself as being from Spain – “but this story was different, because it generated a lot of anger.”
‘I genuinely knew it was part of my story’
In a January 10 statement on his Facebook page – that page is no longer available – Bannan wrote: “I was exposed and raised in Latin culture since I was five years old, when my Colombian stepfather came into my life …. . From that point on, my family and culture shaped my identity. “
Bannan wrote that he identified himself as a Latin “for decades” because “he genuinely knew it was part of my history, although I do not trace ancestral roots in Latin America”.
“I offer my sincere apologies and apologies to those who feel harmed,” wrote Bannan, saying that it was never his intention to deceive or take advantage of “communities that were part of my most intimate life”.
Since the charges became public, she has resigned from the LatinoJustice PRLDEF. In a statement on January 9, the organization’s president and general counsel, Juan Cartagena, said: “We cannot accept actions that displace Latinos and Latinas, even within our own movement. … Ms. Bannan’s actions, regardless of intention, caused harm not only to those who were displaced for their role in the movement, but also to those who were their allies and collaborators. “
In a separate comment, Cartagena said that LatinoJustice PRLDEF had already transferred the work that Bannan was doing to other lawyers on the team and that he had begun contact with organizations with which Bannan worked to assure them that his work remains unshakable.
The National Lawyers Guild issued a statement on January 13, saying, in part: “We recognize that Natasha’s ability to assume leadership positions using a false identity as a Latinx woman and to co-opt a space for colored Latin leaders are symptoms of a bigger problem of white supremacy that exists within many institutions and spaces of movement besides the NLG. “
Bannan’s membership of the guild is suspended pending an accountability process. The guild declined a request for a representative to be available to discuss the matter.
Bannan resigned from his duties at the Center for Constitutional Rights and the social justice group MADRE.
Efforts to contact Bannan have not been successful.
‘Passing’ with privileges?
In recent years, there have been several cases of people who have false ethnic or racial identities. In 2015, Rachel Dolezal drew national attention after it was revealed that she had posed for years as an African American woman. In 2020, academic Jessica Krug resigned from George Washington University after confessing that she had falsely pretended to be black. In the same year, novelist HG Carrillo, whose fiction explored Cuban-American identity, was posthumously revealed (by family members) as an African-American named Herman Carroll. An assistant professor at Furman University in South Carolina resigned after allegations surfaced that she pretended to be Chicana.
Recently, Baldwin, who is married to Alec Baldwin, said on Instagram that she “should have been clearer” about her past. Although his family visited Spain frequently when Baldwin was a child and his parents and brother lived there, the family is not Spanish.
In Bannan’s case, “her advocacy need not be questioned,” said Tanya Hernández, professor at Fordham University School of Law. “What needs to be questioned is her understanding of racial dynamics and the way she exercised her privilege.”
In Hernandez’s opinion, Bannan’s actions hurt Latinas because she accepted opportunities that were aimed at people of color. This is compounded by the fact that Latinos are underrepresented in the legal field.
Journalist and cultural critic Susanne Ramírez de Arellano said: “Did she remove the voices of the real Puerto Ricans who had the right to sit at the main tables, to be heard, and say that she cares about us?”
Ramírez de Arellano said that Bannan did a terrible job for the community “she professes to love – especially since today’s Latinas have to prove themselves constantly in the professional world”.
Alliances versus appropriation
There is a historical context for people of color to “pass” as white, said Jacqueline Lazú, associate professor of modern languages and criminology at DePaul University. “However, when whites enter communities of color, they enter structures of power and privilege. [passing] it’s a different exercise for them. It is an infiltration exercise. “
Lazú said that Bannan’s actions call her work into question, because “she has diverted the assets and resources that were destined for members of our community”.
Part of the blame for situations like Bannan’s, said Lazú, lies with organizations that distribute rewards and resources to Latinas in such a limited way.
The revelations about Bannan bother anyone who wants to ensure that there is room for alliances with communities of color.
“Defending Latin civil rights is not something that we should take a litmus test for,” said Fordham Law’s Hernández. “Anyone who wants to be part of the fight can be an ally and is welcome.
“But it is one thing to say that you were raised in a certain way,” said Hernández. “But another thing is to occupy that space while presenting yourself as a Latina, treating identity as a fantasy that you can wear.”
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