Angelica Gorodischer

[vass]

There was some debate here before about whether Angelica Gorodischer counts for the purposes of this challenge. I did some Googling. She was born in Buenos Aires, and is the daughter of Spanish and French immigrants. She married a Jewish man, which I'm guessing is where the surname came from. (reference) It's possible to be Spanish and POC, but I can't tell from the photos on Google Images if she is. Thoughts?

Comments

[cadetsandkings.livejournal.com]

You can't really judge whether someone is POC by a photograph.

[vass]

Well, you can't decide that someone isn't, but sometimes you can tell that someone is.

[cadetsandkings.livejournal.com]

OK, but for the purposes of this discussion, there is a definite 'policing of color' concern that crops up, which was the point I was speaking to. :)

[sophinisba]

The impression I get from that interview and this one is that she identifies as the descendant of European immigrants. The term person of color isn't really used in Argentina, but mestizo and indigenous and Afro-Argentine are, and she doesn't use them when asked directly where her ancestors came from, so I'd be reluctant to count her as part of the challenge. It's a tricky thing though, with race being understood and talked about differently in different cultures and all.

[whereweather.livejournal.com]

You asked for comments, so...

Obviously, this is a tricky issue, at least for some readers (including myself, a white U.S. resident), where "this" is trying to understand/determine how terms of race and color are applied and self-applied by Latin American authors and authors from Latin America.

This is complicated by the fact that many white Americans are taught to view "Hispanics" or "Latinos" as a monolithic group, and to associate a PoC/minority ethnicity to that group. This of course fails to take into account that race and ethnicity are complicated in Latin America, as they are in North America, and that the simple fact of nationality or of a Spanish-sounding surname doesn't tell you what race or ethnicity a person is, any more than the simple fact of U.S. or Canadian nationality does.

The approach I'm taking to Latin American authors is to do some research, as you have done, and if nothing suggests that they self-identify as a PoC, then assume that they aren't. Thus, for example, Jorge Luis Borges or Julio Cortázar, two Argentinian writers who have been on my to-read list for some time, are not writers I will "count" for purposes of this project, due to the simple fact that they were descended mainly or entirely from Europeans, benefited from white color privilege in their country of origin -- that they were white, basically. This doesn't mean, of course, they they weren't "Hispanic." But "Hispanic" is an ethnic and cultural descriptor, not a racial one.

It looks as if Goródischer's case is similar: she appears to be a white, European-descended Argentinian. I would, therefore, not myself suggest considering her to be a "writer of color." (Though she is, of course, a Latin American writer and a Hispanic writer.)

BTW, here are a couple of links on this extremely nuanced and complicated topic, from Wikipedia. (Not that Wikipedia is the definitive voice on pretty much anything, but it's sometimes a good place to start!)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Latin_American (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Latin_American)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Hispanic_and_Latino_Americans (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Hispanic_and_Latino_Americans)

(One interesting line from the second of these articles:

"In terms of percentage of the total population, Argentina has by far the largest white population, with 97% of the country identified as 'white'." )

[roadrunnertwice]

Thank you, that was helpful for me. I'm backing my count off by one.

[loligo.livejournal.com]

Yes, thank you for bringing this up -- it's kind of been bugging me.