Assimilation has always been regarded as a pivotal achievement in an immigrant’s move to a new country. However innocent the fundamental process may appear, assimilation is synonymous with erasure. To “become American,” means leaving cultures, traditions, and languages in the past, and adopted the “American lifestyle.” First comes removal of identity, thus follows an erasure of rights (see Dakota Access Pipeline, countless immigrants’ rights violations, etc.).
As people immigrate from across the globe, the more people want to generalize and categorize these communities. My culture’s history has always been with groups of the “others.” Being a Mexican-American in New York City has been a great shift from my hometown in southern California where Mexicans dominate the “Hispanic” category. Now, it is almost natural to group myself with Salvadorans, Colombians, Puerto Ricans and other Hispanic cultures. The fact of the matter is that these communities are vastly different and we, in our respective cultures, can acknowledge this very easily. This group identity explanation contributes to the erasure of our own cultures in order to make it easier for us to lose it through the progression of generations. It forces communities with immigrant ancestors to co-opt a system of classification. The authors of “Towards the ‘tangible unknown” from the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education argue, “‘Ethnicity’ is often a residual of colonialism; it remains a measuring stick that exists as part of the state’s vocabulary to measure, contain and control colonized peoples, and it remains a dehistoricized stand-in for Indigeneity.“ And even indigenous people here are forced to conform to not only these binary-enforcing ethnic groups, but are required to categorize themselves into a division.
What follows is an attempt by white Americans to adopt a strategy of “colorblindness.” Perhaps at its height during President Obama’s terms, colorblindness is an ignorant attempt to erase an identity through the justification of “promoting equality.” In actuality, it contributes to the erasure of the indigenous and immigrant experience. Instead of respecting and valuing each culture and experience an individual possesses, colorblindness acts as a veil. Latino and black people are thus grouped in the same category as indigenous Native Americans under the term of “minority.”
At the same time, this practice of erasure of cultures and rights is only one-sided. We impose (force) the US identity while simultaneously reminding these groups that they will never hold a true American identity. The detention of green card holders, Arizona’s SB 1070 or trying to fly while being Muslim-American shows that even those that consider themselves to be American and follow the correct legal procedures, will still be held in suspicion for their ethnic and racial lineage. As the racial makeup of the US changes, the US still groups all brown people that sort of look-alike in a couple derogatory categories and treat them all as such. Policing and oppressive law are other methods of displacement and dispossession by an authoritative body. We need to decolonize the narrative of what it means to look, act, and be an American.
Remarkably, while asking indigenous groups of Native Americans to accept American citizenship and “join” the country that has imposed on their land, we still refuse to remove our statues of Christopher Columbus and Confederate war generals. And then justify it with a quick: “but it’s our history and we cannot erase our past.” It is only natural that erasure emerge out of settler colonialism. The mindset that the colonist had to “fix” the indigenous people here shows the history of the dissatisfaction with “the other.”
The dichotomy of colonization forces the people being colonized into a corner. The constant referral back to a categorization of an “us” vs. “them” mindset still rings true today.
Today’s decolonization movement means something different for every group of people. Decolonizing is not a linear and clear procedure. The very act of defining who is indigenous and what actions result from colonization is different across the globe.
But what measures the success of the indigenous movement? Policy recognition?
The Ontario Institute for Studies in Education cite Glen Coulthard and his “belief that when we seek to be made visible through the acceptance of colonial institutions, we reinscribe the colonial as arbiter and validator, and recognize its authority to regulate and dictate Indigenous life (Coulthard, 2007).” For some, the mark of success is not defined by institutional recognition.
Colonization runs deep in institutional practices, and some of us might not even know how exactly the system was based on oppressive practices to oppress indigenous communities. It is an exercise of discovery.
Now we must join as conscious allies of the indigenous and decolonization movement. We have the power to recognize our settler tendencies and our benefits from colonialism, and change the dialogue so that we respect the movement and the individuality of these cultures.
Migration, Refugees & the Politics of Sanctuary 