Out of all the keywords, I found Ata, Ashley, Jeremiah and Claire’s “Mestisaje” the most relatable to me. When I saw this was going to be one of the keywords, I was excited to see what people defined it as. I grew up in Central America, and ever since I was a little girl, I knew I was mestiza. To me, being mestiza simply means I am half European, half Indigenous. Since the great majority of people around me were mestizo, mestisaje was normal, and like described in the definition, it was a unifying term- it was what we all shared in common. The history surrounding colonization by the Spanish and mestisaje was taught to all of us in school. Although I can’t trace my ancestry all the way back to when the Spanish colonized Central America, I know my Indigenous ancestors most likely suffered at the hands of the Spanish. The same can be said about the other 7 million people in my country and the rest of Central America. Is that sad? Of course. However, with time we have healed. We do not dwell in the past.
Surprisingly, I had never heard of the idea of decolonization before enrolling in this course. This has been a prominent theme in our class readings and discussions. Decolonization is not something that is the vocabulary of most Central Americans. How can decolonization take place if half my ancestry is European and the other half Indigenous? I am also proud of both.