Have the descendents of African slaves in different parts of the Americas seen similar levels of marginalisation/discrimination as African Americans?

by BIG_BANK_THEORY
tjcase10

The simple answer is yes but I'm saying this with a lot of caution. One thing you must understand about anti-black racism was it permeated throughout the Americas no matter the colony or empire. There was no place where this kind of racism did not exist, however, it could be said that the effects of this discrimination and the degree of marginalization could change from colony to colony and country to country.

For example, in many of the islands of the British Caribbean, the owners of the plantations on these islands were absentee and never resided on the island. This meant that the white population of these islands was never very very small. After emancipation, whites continued to govern and control the islands. As decolonization began to occur, the African-descendant majority was enfranchised and discrimination became less and less due to the black majority gaining power politically and using this power to nationalize many industries that were previously controlled either by their colonial masters or whites from the metropolis.

The Spanish and French speaking Caribbean followed distinctly different paths. Haiti followed its own path via slave revolt and the massacre of much of the white population. Since there was no white population left, the marginalization that the black population experienced was in more of a global context.

On the Spanish islands of the Dominican Republic and Cuba the situation has been much different. The DR has a history of conflict with Haiti, which was the only country controlled by blacks in the hemisphere. Haiti even invaded and ruled the DR from 1822-1844. This has ingrained an anti-black bias even deeper into the social consciousness of the DR due to the fact that blackness has become associated with Haiti and the suppression of Dominican culture that occurred during the period of Haitian rule.

Cuba was a little bit different. After the American Civil War, many Americans fled to Cuba with their slaves because slavery was still legal there. Americans continued to flock to Cuba for business opportunities. They brought with them their views on race and began to alter the Cuban racial landscape. After the American occupation of Cuba following the Spanish American War, American style segregation began to be enforced in many places. This type of segregation was ended by Fidel Castro during the Cuban Revolution. While Fidel claims to have eliminated discrimination, there is clear evidence despite his best efforts, the revolution has failed in this regard.

In many places in main land Latin America, the African population faced discrimination that was similar to American discrimination post emancipation. The difference was that many blacks blended in with lower class mestizos (white and Amerindian mixes) especially in places like Mexico and Argentina. This meant that the discrimination against blacks disappeared but the blacks themselves disappeared.

In other places like Nicaragua and to some extent Peru, African populations were geographically cut off from the main mestizo and white populations and enjoyed a great deal of autonomy. While they were segregated and seen by whites as inferior, since they did not regularly interact with whites, they did not experience discrimination as a black person in Georgia for instance.

In other places such as Colombia, discrimination and marginalization were much worse. Even today, black Colombians face discrimination and death threats when they advocate for their civil rights.

Finally I will end with Brazil which was the last country to make slavery illegal in the Western Hemisphere. Brazil was unique in its social mobility that was possible for many freed slaves, the classic example being Chica da Silva who rose to acquire the title of Dona. However, Brazilians have over 60 classifications in which to identify their skin color. While discrimination still exists, with this many skin colors, there is more of a grey area. However the poor still tend to be darker and the elite is still white. Brazil is very complicated to say the least.

In summary, blacks across the hemisphere have experienced different levels of discrimination due to the specific historical circumstances surrounding where they lived.

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