Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

When Latinos are not Latinos: The case of Guatemalan Maya in the United States, the Southeast and Georgia

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Latino Studies Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

During recent decades, Maya have fled Guatemala to escape violence and poverty, and currently large numbers of Maya live throughout the United States. Maya bring with them memories of being oppressed by dominant Hispanic groups in their homelands, and sometimes they hide Indian identity. This article is based on my interaction over a 10-year period with several hundred Maya around the United States who had maintained Maya identity and rejected Latinidad. I argue for a more in-depth discussion about the definition of Latinidad as it applies to indigenous groups, in particular as a prerequisite to questioning whether individuals should be categorized as Latino, regardless of their desire to self-define as Maya, rather than Latino.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. Gracia (2008, 19) also asks “How about the descendants of the Maya living in isolation, somewhere in Yucatan?”

  2. See also Oboler, 2008.

  3. Admittedly, this estimate rests upon part data, part hearsay and part speculation; details available from the author.

  4. Maria and Maria in Georgia, Lucia in Colorado and Polly in Florida.

  5. Much has been published on the Maya movement, recent works include Bastos and Camus, 2003; Davis, 2004; Macleod, 2006; Konefal, 2010.

  6. Recent discussions on motives and thoughts of Maya intellectuals and the reactions of others include: Normark, 2004; Montejo, 2005; Hale, 2006; Arias, 2007; MacKenzie, 2010.

  7. Hale, 2006 and Arias, 2007, analyze contemporary complexities of Maya and Ladino relations. See also Little and Smith, 2009.

  8. “Ser maya para mi no tiene palabras.” Quotes compiled from author's notes and recorded transcripts. Conference discussions took place or were translated into Spanish.

  9. Guatemalan immigrants to Georgia in the majority come from one of three highly indigenous regions: Huehuetenango, San Marcos and Quetzaltenango (cf. Survey, 2010).

  10. Foxen (2007, 189) makes note of similar church attitudes in Providence RI. See also Popkin (2005, 696–697).

  11. “Se conviertan en mexicanos.”

  12. Story told in 2010.

  13. Being tricked or manipulated by Ladinos in Guatemala is a common perception; for example, see Foxen (2007, 174).

  14. Inspired by Linda Tuhiwai Smith's book title for Decolonizing Methodologies.

References

  • Adams, R.N . 1976 [1957]. Cultural Surveys of Panama-Nicaragua-Guatemala-El Salvador-Honduras. Detroit, MI: Blaine Ethridge Books Washington: Pan American Sanitary Bureau.

    Google Scholar 

  • Aguirre, B.E. and R. Saenz . 1991. A Futuristic Assessment of Latino Ethnic Identity. Latino Studies Journal 2 (3): 19–32.

    Google Scholar 

  • Appadurai, A . 2004. The Capacity to Aspire: Culture and the Terms of Recognition. In Culture and Public Action, eds. V. Rao and M. Walton, 59–84. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Arias, A . 2006. The Maya Movement, Postcolonialism and Cultural Agency. Journal of Latin American Studies 15 (2): 251–262.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Arias, A . 2007. Taking Their Word: Literature and the Signs of Central America. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bastos, S. and M. Camus . 2003. Entre el mecapal y el cielo: Desarrollo del moviemiento maya en Guatemala. Guatemala: FLACSO.

    Google Scholar 

  • Batz, G . 2010. Expressions of Maya Identity and Culture in Los Angeles: Coloniality of Power, Resistance, and Cultural Memory. Master of Arts thesis, Austin: The University of Texas.

  • Burns, A.F . 1993. Maya in Exile: Guatemalans in Florida. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Burns, A.F . 1999. Identities in Diaspora: Mayan Culture and Community Today. In Identities on the Move: Transnational Processes in North America and the Caribbean Basin, ed. L.R. Goldin, 135–150. New York: Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, University of Albany.

    Google Scholar 

  • Camposeco, J . 2000. A Maya Voice: The Refugees in Indiantown, Florida. In The Maya Diaspora: Guatemala Roots, New American Lives, eds. J. Loucky and M.M. Moors, 172–174. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Camus, M . 2008. La sorpresita del Norte: Migración internacional y comunidad en Huehuetenango. Antigua, Guatemala: INCEDES-CEDFOG.

    Google Scholar 

  • Castañeda, Q.E . 2004. “We Are Not Indigenous!” An Introduction to the Maya Identity of Yucatan. The Journal of Latin American Anthropology 9 (1): 36–63.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Castañeda, X., B. Manz and A. Davenport . 2002. Mexicanization: A Survival Strategy for Guatemalan Mayans in the San Francisco Bay Area. Migraciones Internacionales 1 (3): 103–123.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cojtí Cuxil, D . 1994. Políticas para la reivindicación de los mayas de hoy: Fundamento de los derechos específicos del pueblo Maya. Guatemala: Cholsamaj/SPEM.

    Google Scholar 

  • Colby, B.N. and P.L. Van Den Berghe . 1969. Ixil Country: A Plural Society in Highland Guatemala. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cruz, L . 2009. Cruz: Mayan Voices of the Past Still Heard Today. Indian Country Today 12 February, http://www.indiancountrytoday.com/opinion/39520722.html.

  • Davis, S.H . 2004. The Mayan Movement and National Culture. In Culture and Public Action, eds. V. Rao and M. Walton, 328–358. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Davis, S.H . 2007. Migration, Remittances, and Ethnic Identity: The Experience of Guatemalan Maya in the United States. In Moving Out of Poverty: Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives on Mobility, eds. D. Narayan and P. Petesch, 333–354. Washington DC: Palgrave Macmillan and The World Bank.

    Google Scholar 

  • Delugan, R.M . 2010. Indigeneity Across Borders: Hemispheric Migrations and Cosmopolitan Encounters. American Ethnologist 37 (1): 83–97.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Esquit Choy, A. and V. Gálvez Borrell . 1997. The Mayan Movement Today: Issues of Indigenous Culture and Development in Guatemala. Guatemala: FLASCO.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fabri, A . 2000. Space and Identity in Testimonies of Displacement: Maya Migration to Guatemala City in the 1980s. In The Maya Diaspora: Guatemalan Roots, New American Lives, eds. J. Loucky and M.M. Moors, 56–73. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fischer, E.F . 2001. Cultural Logics and Global Connections: Maya Identity in Thought and Practice. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Flores, W.V. and R. Benmayor, eds. 1997. Latino Cultural Citizenship: Claiming Identity, Space, and Rights. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foxen, P . 2007. In Search of Providence: Transnational Mayan Identities. Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gracia, J.J.E . 2008. Latinos in America: Philosophy and Social Identity. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Hagan, J.M . 1994. Deciding to Be Legal: A Maya Community in Houston. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hale, C.R . 2006. Más Que Un Indio: Racial Ambivilence and Neoliberal Multiculturalim in Gutemala. Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jackson, J . 1989. Is There a Way to Talk about Making Culture without Making Enemies? Dialectical Anthropology 14 (2): 127–143.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Juárez Muñoz, J.F . 1931. El indio guatemalteco: ensayo de sociología nacionalista. Guatemala: National Park.

    Google Scholar 

  • King, A . 1967. Urbanization and Industrialization. In Handbook of Middle American Indians, ed. M. Nash, Vol. 6, 512–536. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Konefal, B . 2010. For Every Indio Who Falls: A History of Maya Activism in Guatemala, 1960–1990. Albuquerque, NM: The University of New Mexico Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • LaFarge, O . 1947. Santa Eulalia: The Religion of a Cuchumatán Indian Town. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Little, W.E. and T.J. Smith, eds. 2009. Mayas in Postwar Guatemala: Harvest of Violence Revisited. Tuscaloosa, AL: The University of Alabama Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • MacKenzie, C.J . 2010. Of Networks and Hierarchies: Pan-Mayanism and Ethnic Ambivalence in Guatemala. Latin American and Caribbean Ethnic Studies 5 (1): 27–52.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Macleod, M . 2006. De brechas a puentes: las reivindicaciones de identidad y cultura en el movimiento maya de Guatemala. In Dialogando alternedades: identidades y poder en Guatemala, ed. J. Alejos Garcia, 39–82. Mexico: Universidad Autónoma de México.

    Google Scholar 

  • Marcos, P . 2006. Speech at the National Pastoral Maya Conference, May 1, 2004. In Maya Pastoral: National Conferences and Essays on the Maya Immigrants, 2004–2005, ed. A. LeBaron. Kennesaw, GA: Kennesaw State University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Matthew, L . 2006. Mexicanos and the Meaning of Ladino in Colonial Guatemala. Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History 7 (1): 1–26.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McCreery, D . 1994. Rural Guatemala 1760–1940. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Montejo, V.D . 1999. Tied to the Land: Maya Migration, Exile, and Transnationalism. In Identities on the Move: Transnational Processes in North America and the Caribbean Basin, ed. L.R. Goldin, 185–202. New York: Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, University of Albany.

    Google Scholar 

  • Montejo, V.D . 2005. Maya Intellectual Renaissance: Identity, Representation, and Leadership. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Normark, J . 2004. Discontinuos Maya Identities: Culture and Ethnicity in Mayanist Discourse. In Material Culture and Other Things: Post-disciplinary Studies in the 21st Century, eds. F. Fahlander and T. Oestigaard, 109–160. Göteborg, Sweden: Göteborg University.

    Google Scholar 

  • Oboler, S . 1995. Ethnic Labels, Latino Lives: Identity and the Politics of (Re) Presentation in the United States. Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Oboler, S . 2008. La identidad latina de ayer y hoy. In La migración y los latinos en Estados Unidos: Visiones y conexiones, ed. E. Levine, 427–445. México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México.

    Google Scholar 

  • Odem, M . 2007. Inmigración transnacional y organización Maya en el sur de Estados Unidos. In Comunidades en movimento:la migración internacional en el norte de Huehuetanango, ed. M. Camus, 205–223. Guatemala: INCEDES-CEDFOG.

    Google Scholar 

  • Otzoy, I. and E. Sam . 1990. Identidad étnica y modernización entre los mayas de Guatemala. Mesoamérica 19 (June): 97–100.

    Google Scholar 

  • Popkin, E . 2005. The Emergence of Pan-Mayan Ethnicity in the Guatemalan Transnational Community Linking Santa Eulalia and Los Angeles. Current Sociology 53 (4): 675–706.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Reeves, R . 2006. Ladinos with Ladinos, Indians with Indians: Land, Labor, and Regional Ethnic Conflict in the Making of Guatemala. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Sapper, K . 1905. Der Charakter der mittelamerikanischen Indianer. Globus LXXXVII (7): 128–131.

    Google Scholar 

  • Survey. 2010. Survey of 1,447 Immigrants. The Consulate General of Guatemala in Atlanta and Kennesaw State University, Unpublished data.

  • Tay Coyoy, A . 1992. El Aporte de los mayas al desarollo de Guatemala. In Foro del Pueblo Maya, 19–30. Guatemala, CEDIM.

  • Trueba, E. (Henry) T . 1999. Latinos Unidos: From Cultural Diversity to the Politics of Solidarity. Lanham, MD: Rowman @ Littlefield Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Williams, P.J., T.J. Steigenga and M.A. Vásquez, eds. 2009. A Place to Be: Brazilian, Guatemalan, and Mexican Immigrants in Florida's New Destinations. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw

    Alan LeBaron

Authors
  1. Alan LeBaron
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

LeBaron, A. When Latinos are not Latinos: The case of Guatemalan Maya in the United States, the Southeast and Georgia. Lat Stud 10, 179–195 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1057/lst.2012.8

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/lst.2012.8

Keywords

Search

Navigation