Hated wearing green on St.PatrickDay mom.
Daniel Luis Soto New York, NY I consider myself Puerto Rican. Grandparents from PR My great grandfather on mom’s side is from Ireland. Going further...
Puerto Rico’s Identity Crisis Defines Me.
Isabel Nicole Otero Hernandez, Silver Spring, MD. I was born in Puerto Rico to a Cuban Mother and a Puerto Rican Father. The summer I...
Colorblindness means you can’t see me.
Ashley Diaz Mejias, Richmond, VA. I write this as 34 year seminarian and old mom of two girls; my husband is haitian and puerto rican,...
You can’t be mixed your dark
Myla Ledesma, Westbloomfield, MI. My mother is African American and my father is Puerto Rican. Me and all my siblings are biracial, we all look...
But you don’t look Puerto Rican
Natalia de Cuba Romero. Massapequa Park, NY. IN my heart and in my head I have always thought of myself as Puerto Rican, Born in...
Hispanic and I only speak English
Marlo Torres, Riverside, CA. I am Puerto Rican and I have always grown up with the question of; You’re Hispanic, why don’t you speak Spanish?...
Identity is fluid; context is everything.
Zoë McLaughlin, USA. Waiting in line for the Chinatown bus in New York City, a man approached me and began speaking Spanish. I squinted at...
My heart will forever be grateful
Randy-Michael, Long Island, NY. No matter the struggles I go through as a Puerto Rican adult in this world, I will forever be grateful of...
Little brown girl, white man’s world
Beatriz Mallory Newfoundland, PA My father was one of the first black men to work at IBM in the late 50’s; my mother a Puerto...
Not who you think I am
Ana Canino-Fluit, Penfield, NY. I am Puerto Rican, I lived in Puerto Rico till I left for college at 17. Till I was 16 I...
Puerto Rican. Mexican. Caucasian. That’s me.
Carissa Renee Chacon, Wayne State, Detroit, MI Born with the curliest, thickest dark brown hair (well now it’s auburn). Hazel eyes that have green and...
Never belonging. Puerto Rican or American?
Lorna Hagen, Brooklyn, NY. I am Puerto Rico born New Yorker that moved to the US when I was 12. Somewhere in the plane ride...
For Me, Racism Started at Home
Sarah S., Washington, DC. My Puerto Rican grandmother used to call me “muchacha fea,” while calling my dark-haired, dark-eyed, darker-skinned, curly-haired sisters, “muchacha linda.” That...
Yes, that is his daughter, too.
Dania Abreu-Torres San Antonio, TX My husband and I are Puerto Ricans. I am more “white” than he is -He usually was mistaken as a...
Racial Construct that won’t stop me
Leonard McReynolds, Atlanta, GA. I’m a black Puerto Rican who lives in the United States. At Times, it makes navigating race relations difficult, for everyone...
Russian? You’re improving the race Amiga!
Mayra Velez Buffalo, NY Picture of us, a Belarussian and Puerto Rican, soon-to-be-married, couple. When we started dating, every time I said he is belarussian...
Not white enough and too white.
Maritza Aviles de Garcia, Dallas, TX. My entire life has been spent walking between two worlds, the predominantly white world outside of my home, and...
Finally I learned to accept myself
Katherine Porter, San Leandro, CA. I grew up disowned by my racial cultures…too different from White, too different from Chinese. Talked about by cousins, wondered...
