The Borderlands

   My Freshman English class this year has a theme that relates to transgressors and the idea of 'normalcy' in today's increasingly multi-cultural society. During our class we talked about how it's main focus would be to examine how afro-latinos and afro-native americans are affected by America's view of what it mean to be 'normal.' As someone who is not from America, it would be very interesting to find out more about the culture and tradition of these people. 

   The way that the 'transgressors have been oppressed and made to feel like outcasts was exemplified in Gloria Anzaldua's Borderland/La Frontera, a book from which we read an excerpt in class. It detailed how the people who live on the US-Mexico borders are viewed as transgressors or aliens by the 'normal' whites who live on the border. Their lives are in constant flux because of their ambiguous nationality. They are neither American nor Mexican. This is similar to another idea presented in W.E.B DuBois's  The Soul of Black Folk, a book in which he writes, "The history of the American Negro is the history of this strife,—this longing to attain self-conscious manhood, to merge his double self into a better and truer self."

Both these passages look at the idea of this double consciousness and the feeling of being in between two cultures. This is a feeling that many celebrities such as Christina Milian and Kat Deluna must have felt, especially since they spend so much time in the public eye. 

   Thankfully, this situation can be analyzed from both a historical and psychological perspective, allowing  us to see how these 'transgressors' came to exist. Hopefully, by understanding how the afro-latino and native american's have been misunderstood and ostracized we can work on removing the borders that the 'normal' people have put between the 'transgressors' and the rest of the world.