Using at least two aspects of your own identity (race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, class, religion, ability, citizenship status, language, etc.), write an essay examining the role that each have played in your life individually, and intersectionally. Please refer to at least three sources from our class (at least one of these sources should be an essay from the Keywords series), and be sure to cite them appropriately including page numbers if applicable.
are historically and culturally constituted. The future privilege. While there may be a need to project and look forward to utopias devoid of such wretched realities, a
Race
queer approach is necessary to maintain a healthy sus-
Junaid Rana
is not a matter of chronology but one of vantage and
picion of political ends. This “suspicious” standpoint
coupled with a fervent aspirational attitude toward such
temporal (im)possibilities is much needed in order to
continue unravelling and exfoliating layers of ideologi-
Race is a key concept in the formation of Asian American
cal obfuscation and intersecting strands of institutional
studies as a political project and an intellectual ?eld.
practices that mask various forms of violent abjections
Throughout U.S. history, Asians have been racially cast
and unjust marginalizations. A relevant queer approach
through the narratives of empire, war, and migration.
is one that strongly maintains its link to “other” mar-
The racial logic of yellow peril, enemy aliens, model
ginal subjects and states of being, empowers an ethical
minority, and now the enemy combatant are part of a
stance that decenters the “America” in “Asian America,”
genealogy that represents Asian Americans as potential
and assumes a humble yet vital way of knowing and be-
threats to the American way of life— a euphemism
ing in the world (Eng, Halberstam, and Muñoz 2005, 15).
for modernity, capitalism, and white supremacy (e.g.,
Okihiro 1994, 118–47). Similarly, race in relationship to
representations of gender and sexuality has historically
been used to demean Asian Americans, rendering them
as inferior. While perpetuating racial inequality, these
portrayals often situate norms of gender and sexuality
that are potential sites of political critique and social
transformation (Eng 2001; Marchetti 1993; Shimizu
2007). Race is a social construction in which biology
and culture are often con?ated as a rhetorical logic and
material practice in a system of domination. Inasmuch
as race is used for subjugation, it is also a productive
category used by subaltern groups in opposition to
racism. Asian American studies was born out of the
struggle to critique and oppose racism. As a politics of
protest organized around social justice and in solidarity
with communities of color, race became a pivotal
organizing tool to foster the Asian American movement.
Alongside the Black, Brown, and Red power movements,
Asian American radicalism grew in the post-1968 era
as part of an antiwar, anti-imperialist, and feminist
202
agenda (Maeda 2009; Pulido 2006; J. Wu 2013). While
century. The word “race” draws its lineage from a his-
Asian American politics was connected to left critiques
tory mired in campaigns of conquest and war that im-
of capitalism and war in this formative period, the
portantly included practices of religious conversion.
Asian American movement would not launch onto the
The ascension of Christianity through colonization
national stage until the 1980s as a panethnic alliance
combined with the ideology of white supremacy devel-
in response to the brutal murder of Vincent Chin and
oped in an epistemological and moral order in which
subsequent antiracist organizing (Y. Espiritu 1992).
race and religion became precepts of social hierarchy.
In the barest scholarly definition, race is a social
With the expansion of scienti?c racism in Europe, race
construct. This fails, however, to describe the extent
was systematized into taxonomies of inferiority and
and power of race. Race is inextricably a concept of the
superiority, argued to be the basis of visible biological
modern episteme, intertwined in systems of imperial-
difference such as skin color and hair type, and justi?ed
ism, colonization, capitalism, and social structure that
by the belief in a divine right ordained to Christian civi-
emerged out of the European Enlightenment (Goldberg
lization and the notions of moral development embed-
1993; Mills 1997; Silva 2007; Winant 2001). Tethered
ded in this worldview. It was not until the latter half of
to race is the ideology of white supremacy that while
the twentieth century that this usage was debunked as a
appearing to be on the wane has transformed into an
conventional belief and standard institutional practice
increasingly complex system of dispossession and vio-
of state racism.
lence. The inequality at the center of racism and white
In parsing this history in the United States, the in-
supremacy is based on the enduring power of race as a
?uential concept of racial formation has provided an
?exible and shifting category. In this essay I draw on
intellectual framework for a theory of race and racism
the terms “racial formation,” “racial capitalism,” “racial
that critiques a range of social relations, structures, and
liberalism,” and “global racial system” to elaborate the
institutions. Michael Omi and Howard Winant de?ne
dynamic range and durability of race.
“racial formation as the sociohistorical process by which
As a construct that elaborates a social order, race has
racial categories are created, inhabited, transformed,
varied in meaning and usage over time. As some schol-
and destroyed” (1994, 55). Racial formation theorizes
ars would have it, racism predated the formal concept of
racism and antiracist social movements of opposition
race, which emerged in the contact of Spanish explor-
as an active social process. As a modern construct, race
ers and the New World. For example, in the period of
became a proxy for kinship systems that divide groups
classical antiquity, Greco-Roman prejudice against and
of people according to descent and geographic origin.
social hatred of particular groups is described as “proto-
Using the idioms of blood, skin color, and phenotypic
racism” (B. Isaac 2006). Originating roughly in the six-
difference, scienti?c racism was used to enforce social
teenth century, the concept of race imbued notions of
boundaries and regulations including legal statutes and
difference that encompassed ideas of religious superior-
spatial segregation. The system of race and racializa-
ity and social hierarchy. Subsequently, the idea of race
tion was embedded in social structures and hierarchies
became an explanatory dogma that combined notions
that depended on notions of culture and biology to ?x
of physical difference, culture, and ancestry, leading to
cultural essences as naturalized traits. As a regulatory
the predominance of scienti?c racism in the nineteenth
system, race de?ned acceptable social practices such as
race
junaid rana
203
sexual couplings, marriageability, and the inheritance
of modernity developed according to a racial capitalism
of property. In regard to sexual contact, fears of misce-
that distributed resources along lines of race, class, and
genation resulted in rules for the maintenance of racial
gender that continued in political systems of authority
purity and categories of mixed race. The classi?cation
and legitimated state practices of racism. This system
of mixed race emerged as both defiled and redemp-
enabled a ranking order at a global level, consented to
tive, creating passing zones in which racial privilege
by domestic systems of everyday racism, to provide a
was accorded through the structures of white suprem-
platform for U.S. imperial expansion through war, mili-
acy (Williams-León and Nakashima 2001). To pass as
tarism, and violence. Because the abolitionist move-
white, or as honorary white in the case of the myth of
ment to end slavery emerged as part of the struggle of
the model minority, is also one of the complications of
antiracism and emancipation that opposed the dictates
racial hierarchies and collusion with privileges that are
of white supremacy, abolition continues as a model of
obtained through, for example, economic status and
antiracist struggle in the contemporary moment, partic-
class mobility. Thus, racial performance is an important
ularly as it relates to the prison-industrial complex and
aspect of interpreting structures organized in relation-
the preponderance of black suffering (Michelle Alexan-
ship to whiteness, including social economies based in
der 2010; Gilmore 2007; D. Rodríguez 2006).
notions of beauty, desire, and sexual preference.
Race is thus an epistemological category of white su-
In the context of racism and the struggle against it,
204
premacy that maintains structures of violence and dis-
the story of race in the United States has been histori-
possession, while its permanence is contested through
cally dominated by slavery and the ideology of white
the struggle to change and destroy such systems
supremacy (Roediger 1991; Roediger 2008). Indeed, race
through antiracism and liberation struggles. According
is often coded as black in the American vernacular, com-
to the foundational analysis of Cedric Robinson (1983),
plicating the analysis of race as it affects a broad range
racial capitalism imposed a simultaneous racism and
of communities of color and antiracist struggle. Anti-
antiracism that converged in a system of dominance,
racist analysis is further confounded by a masculinist
accumulation, and violence by mobilizing race in re-
narrative of recovery and a dependence on patriarchal
lationship to other forms of difference such as sexual-
narratives of redemption. Feminist-of-color and queer-
ity, gender, class, religion, and disability, among others
of-color critiques have articulated important alterna-
(R. Ferguson 2012a; Melamed 2012; Reddy 2011). Racial
tive strategies and tactics of antiracist organizing by
capitalism, built upon hierarchy and social structures of
emphasizing the moral structures of race (R. Ferguson
dispossession, is quintessentially a system of accumula-
2012b). Indeed, the genocide of indigenous peoples of
tion that proffers an ethic of individual mobility while
the Americas was made possible by an imperial mo-
drawing on geographies of racial difference. Such divi-
rality that justi?ed the conquest of lands through the
sions, fostered through the foundations of capitalism
practices of settler colonialism and the erasure of Native
and ideas of social and material property, are the terrain
histories. In this system, race ?gured as a way to de?ne
from which gendered forms of racism and immigra-
property in the case of whiteness, and as a system of la-
tion led women-of-color feminist critiques to resist and
bor exploitation that de?ned U.S. modernity and capi-
transform exclusionary laws, labor discrimination, and
talism (Harris 1995; Gilroy 1993). The American model
sexism (L. Lowe 1996; Hong 2006). Despite the gains of
race
junaid rana
civil rights and liberation movements, racism remains
destiny that led to the military conquest of Native
prevalent by virtue of the deeply embedded notion of
Americans and their genocidal extermination expanded
race within U.S. social structures. With the advent of
across the Paci?c as the U.S. consolidated its imperial
multiculturalism, “race” has been supplanted by sup-
legacy in gaining control over Hawai‘i, Samoa, Guam,
posedly neutral terms such as “minority,” “ethnicity,”
and the Philippines, as well as Cuba and Puerto Rico.
and “culture.” Yet the idea of race persists in the prac-
The placement of Japanese and Japanese Americans in
tices, logics, and rationales of racism and white suprem-
internment camps during World War II, justi?ed by the
acy. The continuation of the ideas of race into the pres-
Alien Enemies Act of 1798, drew upon a racialization
ent at times results in a paradoxical colorblind racism, or
process in which the demands of war and militarism
racism without racists, in which the ideology of culture
demonized already racialized domestic populations as
and race are interchangeable (Bonilla-Silva 2010).
enemies of the state.
State systems of classification have often placed
It was not until the mid-twentieth century that
Asian Americans and other people of color in an am-
prohibitions on immigration and naturalization were
biguous status. The categorization of citizens as “free
?nally overturned through the 1952 McCarren-Walter
white people” in the Naturalization Act of 1790 set the
Act. To the present day, the taxonomic rationales of the
course for centuries of legislative struggle for civil rights.
census continue to place Asian Americans in a bipolar
At the heart of the state sanction of racism was the use of
race continuum of either black or white. South Asian
census categories to deem certain groups eligible for full
Americans were once nonwhite, then white, and now
rights of citizenship while others were barred. Through-
through legislative battles are classi?ed as Asian Ameri-
out the nineteenth century Asian immigrants, particu-
can, whereas Arab Americans are classified as white.
larly Chinese and South Asians, were excluded from
Contemporary Asian Americans represent a wide range
citizenship through classi?cations that deemed them
of class and income categories, placing some in wealthy
nonwhite. Racial capitalism as a concept articulated
and prosperous middle-class groups, while others such
through practices of war and migration helps to explain
as Cambodians, Laotians, and Vietnamese face high
the racialization of Asians in the United States. Based in
rates of poverty and limited access to resources (Lui et
the popular racism of the second half of the nineteenth
al. 2006). With these latter groups, poverty and mar-
century, the specter of a yellow peril exempli?ed in the
ginalization is the product of how Asian Americans are
legal control of Chinese migrants was the result of labor
racialized as model minorities that are high achieving
unrest that was sanctioned by state racism and immigra-
while histories of war and displacement as refugees cre-
tion policy. The U.S. government established a range of
ated systematic forms of disenfranchisement.
legal regulations and policies derived from conjectures
After World War II, the policy of containment known
about nationality, gender, and race that circulated in
as the Truman Doctrine that solidi?ed the Cold War
popular culture—first in the Page Act of 1875, which
with the Soviet Union came at a moment of shifting
speci?cally banned Chinese women from immigration
domestic race relations and the rise of racial liberalism.
ostensibly to control prostitution, and more broadly in
As Truman began a process of limited endorsement of
the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 that targeted laborers.
a civil rights agenda to placate African Americans, the
By 1898, the legacy of a frontier mentality and manifest
dictates of Cold War ideology de?ned a large part of
race
junaid rana
205
the world as potential enemies, including domestic
206
liberation were subsumed within multiracial and pan-
populations. Asian Americans, predominantly Japa-
ethnic solidarity movements which resolved to forge an
nese Americans who had just been subjected to a state
alternative system to that of racial capitalism and global
policy of internment, were deemed foreign and outside
white supremacy (Y. Espiritu 1992; Pulido 2007; J. Wu
of U.S. nationalism, and pitted against other commu-
2013).
nities of color. Following the Truman presidency, the
Drawing on the patterns and legacies of war, migra-
use of covert actions to implement U.S. imperial goals
tion, and the formation of diaspora communities, Asian
without direct military involvement expanded under
Americans have been collapsed into the U.S. racial for-
the Eisenhower administration. In 1953, a U.S.-backed
mation through a mixture of racial policy and foreign
coup in Iran reversed a national project to control oil
policy. Racializing Asian Americans followed a pattern
reserves, and the strategy rapidly spread to other parts of
of connecting frames of war to domestic enemies be-
the world, notably Asia and Latin America (Abrahamian
ginning in World War II with the Japanese, and later in
2013). As this program of covert international interven-
the Korean and Vietnam wars. Southeast Asians were
tion expanded in the following years, the civil rights
cast through representations of war and colonialism
struggle reached fruition in a shift of race relations. Pat-
that circulated through the racialization of refugee and
terns of immigration also began to change dramatically
mixed-race populations in the United States (Chong
through state selection after 1965, creating new Asian
2011). Similarly, a history of crisis developed around U.S.
immigrant populations throughout the United States.
involvement in the Arab and Muslim world, with diplo-
Such demographic changes were the devices of a racial
matic and military entanglements in, for example, Iran,
liberalism that offered limited civil rights to some racial-
Egypt and the Suez Canal, Lebanon, and the Israeli oc-
ized groups while antagonizing others, and, notably, at
cupation of Palestine. The contemporary global War on
the cusp of new waves of immigration that fundamen-
Terror, de?ned by the twenty-?rst-century wars in Iraq
tally changed the social and economic makeup of the
and Afghanistan, extends this history, which links for-
country. By the late 1960s, Asian Americans were my-
eign policy to domestic immigrant communities. After
thologized as a model minority by the media, scholars,
9/11, South Asians, Arabs, and Muslims were targeted
and a state apparatus that used the language of social
for surveillance, detention, and deportation (Cainkar
mobility and work ethic as a racial wedge while ignor-
2009; Maira 2009). An array of Asian Americans were
ing the histories of racial oppression and differential
affected by those policies, particularly Cambodian
patterns of migration created by U.S. policies and stat-
Americans, who faced deportations based on selective
utes. Racial liberalism emerged as a direct response to
enforcement (Hing 2006). The construction of enemy
the black freedom movement that refuted white su-
terrorists con?gured Arabs, South Asians, and Muslims
premacy as a normative and public practice expressed
alongside other Asian Americans and communities of
in Jim Crow segregation (Singh 2004; Singh 2012). Al-
color as racialized ?gures through the broad mandates
ternatively, black radicalism linked to the internation-
of the Patriot Act and the U.S. War on Terror campaign.
alism of decolonizing social movements called for the
Although the history of race in the United States is
end of global white supremacy beyond the United States
largely dependent on skin color and phenotypic dif-
(R. Bush 2009; Daulatzai 2012). Radical ideologies of
ference, the twenty-?rst century has brought forth the
race
junaid rana
often hidden relationship of religion to racism, par-
category from which to justify and achieve colonial
ticularly in terms of the figure of the Muslim in the
conquest.
U.S. racial formation and the role of the War on Ter-
The ?gure of the racialized Muslim is at the forefront
ror in this racialization. The threat of terrorism and
of some important interventions of critical and inter-
the racialized Muslim are the latest entrants in a long
sectional analysis. From gender and sexuality critiques
genealogy of how race and religion have been imag-
(Naber 2012; Razack 2007; Reddy 2011; Puar 2007) to
ined in Asian American populations. For example, the
labor and political formations (Daulatzai 2012; Rana
mid-nineteenth-century idea of the heathen Chinese
2011), the ?gure of the Muslim represents important
migrant, which mobilized the racialization of a yellow
challenges in terms of the ?exibility of the race concept,
peril in opposition to an American nationalism de-
and in how race is collapsed into the categories of reli-
scribed as white and Christian, in the latter half of the
gion, gender and sexuality, violence, imperialism, and
twentieth century translated into godless-communist
white supremacy. Islam and the ?gure of the Muslim
threats from across Asia. Other stereotypes of race and
have emerged as the new global racial system of the
racialization based on presumptions about religion and
twenty-?rst century. And yet this system is not new in
geographic origin include the so-called Hindoo, encom-
the theory of racism, in which egalitarian principles of
passing Muslims, Hindus, and Sikhs, and the misnomer
democracy are wedded to imperial morals of apartheid
of Mohammedan, applied to people from South Asia to
based in an older system of racism (Winant 2002, 18).
West Asia and North Africa. United States foreign policy
Empire and white supremacy are at the heart of U.S.
and military involvement across the globe, particularly
histories of race. With the expansion of technologies
in Asia, the Paci?c, and the Middle East, has historically
of war and militarism, race is a concept in which state
been framed through notions of the Orient and what
violence and conquest are justi?ed. Perhaps the greatest
Edward Said refers to as Orientalism as a way of know-
challenge of race is imagining the struggle against white
ing and dominating parts of the world to further a U.S.
supremacy. As race continues to confound, and racism
imperial agenda (Said 1978; Said 1994). The deployment
proliferates, opposing global apartheid and the con-
of race in relationship to the spread of globalization
sequences of the global color line depend not only on
is part of a centuries-old global racial system (Winant
a black and white opposition, but a vast array of com-
2001; Winant 2002; Clarke and Thomas 2006; Mullings
munities of color to take part in the world struggle for
2005; Mullings 2008). When racial capitalism is imag-
an alternative that goes beyond racism, war, capitalism,
ined beyond the con?nes of the U.S. nation-state, race
and white supremacy.
must also be understood as circulating at global levels
alongside racism and white supremacy. The global racial
system frames histories of domination and exploitation
such that slavery, genocide, war, and labor migration
can be analyzed through the rhetoric and mobilization
of racial discourse at the regional, hemispheric, and
even planetary level. In other words, if war is the means
of achieving imperial interests, race is the historical
race
junaid rana
207
can be seen in a recent study of those who qualified for
hood Arrivals (DACA), which allows those who were
47
brought as children to the United States to apply for
Race
work authorization and other benefits such as drivers’
Silvio Torres-Saillant and Nancy Kang
the 2012 Executive Order on Deferred Action for Child-
licenses. On average, DACA recipients experienced a 150
percent increase in wages after they were able to secure
better jobs (Hinojosa and Wynn 2014).
Scholars working in poverty studies increasingly find
The term “race” as used in contemporary discourse,
those living in poverty demonstrate remarkable flexibil-
whether academic or demotic, purportedly refers
ity, creativity, and resiliency (Edin and Lein 1997; Ibarra
to the distinct ancestry of a differentiated human
2000, 2002, 2003; Edin and Kefalas 2005; López 2007;
population. Exactly what specific collection of features
Marchevsky and Theoharis 2006; Stephen 2007; Zavella
in a person’s ancestry determines his or her race seems
2011; Holmes 2013). The poor seek better employment,
less easy to discern from current usage. Nor can we
housing, and/or privately funded resources such as food
always tell whether the elements involved in assigning
banks, often migrating in the process and constructing
a racial label to one group will correspond identically
households with multiple wage earners. The poor ar-
to the characteristics used in classifying another
ticulate their dignity and contest blaming discourses,
group under a different racial category. For instance,
sometimes joining public demonstrations in favor of re-
on May 12, 1977, the Office of Budget Statistics issued
forms related to immigration, health care access, wage
“Directive 15: Race and Ethnicity Standards for Federal
increases, or other policies that would benefit their lives
Statistics and Administrative Reporting,” which
and advance social justice.
classifies the U.S. population into five segments
according to origins. Unlike the Asian, Black, Native
American, and White subdivisions, when it came to
the “Hispanic” segment, which encompassed people
of “Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Central or South
American or other Spanish culture or origin,” the
classification brought together various subgroups
“regardless of race” (“Background: Development of
Directive 15,” 1994). U.S. Hispanics thus became an
“ethnicity” as opposed to the other four subdivisions
that consisted of “races” in the official taxonomy that
the U.S. Census Bureau would recognize. Yet, one
wonders how Asian Americans can constitute a single
“race” given that the configuration of ancestries and
phenotypes in their midst appears at least equally
diverse.
175
176
While speakers in general, from specialists to laypeo-
As a field that tackles the histories, cultures, politics,
ple, tend to proceed as if a consensus exists as to what
arts, social developments, and overall experience of peo-
race is, the extent to which they share a common frame
ple of Hispanic descent, Latina/o studies connects inex-
of reference seems unclear (Hannaford 1996, 3). Based
orably with racial matters. This branch of ethnic stud-
on the state of scientific knowledge at the time, in 1951
ies owes its birth to the racialized rendition of the U.S.
UNESCO issued a statement disavowing race as a reliable
experience, which, until the 1960s, had largely omitted
marker of biological differences among branches of the
the words and deeds of the non-white sectors of the
human population. Over half a century ago, biological
country’s population from the conventional founding
anthropologist Frank B. Livingstone argued persuasively
narratives of the nation. Additionally, those in the de-
that the concept of race had been “overworked” as a mea-
mography that Latina/o studies encompasses—namely,
sure of “human variability,” noting that “many charac-
people ancestrally linked to Latin America, the Carib-
teristics which were thought to be racial have been found
bean, and the Iberian Peninsula—hail precisely from
in many widely separated populations” (1962, 279–81).
the regions of the world where race first acquired its so-
With the spread of information prompted by geneticists
cial significance. People of Hispanic descent inherit, as
like Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza (2000) about the migration
victims and perpetrators, equally virulent Spanish and
of genes as our species populated the globe starting from
English traditions of racial aggression. In view of this
a common point of departure in Africa, the biological
composite heritage, Latina/o studies offers a suitable
commonality of humans has become uncontroversial—
platform for undertaking the sort of meditation that
hence the currency of the mantra “Race is socially
might one day help us transcend the cul-de-sac that ra-
constructed.” Oddly, even while repeating this man-
cial conversations have reached in the United States at a
tra, learned observers may still be found to reproach
prematurely announced “post-racial” moment. For in-
particular individuals or groups for failing to identify
stance, 2014, a year characterized by much lethal police
themselves racially in a manner that is supposedly more
brutality against unarmed minority males, closed with
accurate or authentic. Dominicans, for instance, may
the killing of two New York City police officers, Asian
find themselves admonished by other “people of color”
American Wenjian Liu and Latino Rafael Ramos, at the
for insufficiently stressing blackness as part of their
hands of a vengeful African American civilian angered
identity. The simultaneous tendency to deny and yet
by the prior police killings of Michael Brown and Eric
affirm the existence of race corresponds to the peculiar
Garner, black males from Missouri and New York, re-
developments that brought the word into the lexicons
spectively. Former New York City mayor Rudolph Gi-
of modern European languages less than five centuries
uliani and other right-wing militants used the occasion
ago. A nebulous term for a set of discursive practices as
to blame concerned citizens who had protested unjusti-
well as lived experiences, “race” remains ubiquitous and
fied lethal force by law-enforcement officers for presum-
contentious. In the contemporary United States, for in-
ably creating the “anti-police” environment that led to
stance, it crops up in discussions of national politics, law
the deaths of the two officers.
enforcement, educational standards, immigration, em-
In light of this conceptually and emotionally mud-
ployment, popular culture, and entertainment, among
dled climate, with influential voices venting antipa-
other areas of prevailing social concern.
thies instead of aiming for clarity, National Institute
rACe
SilVio TorreS-SaillanT and nanCy KanG
for Latino Policy (NiLP) president Angelo Falcón (2014)
Christians insisted on representing their violent plun-
decried the “broken discourse, the loss of a language
dering of foreign societies as charitable, often depicting
adequate enough to connect racially discordant voices.”
the injured parties as heathens rescued from the evil of
He noted how, in the absence of a meaningful racial
their ancestral beliefs and customs. This new domina-
vocabulary, we “desperately try to connect via the sim-
tion required conquerors to dehumanize the subject
plicity of the hashtag.” Falcón appealed to sobriety and
peoples so as to render them ineligible for Christian
reason, urging observers on all sides to find a way of
piety, thereby ennobling or, at the very least, justify-
speaking that might “bring us to a better understand-
ing, the aggression perpetrated against them. The con-
ing of the bigger picture within which we will all thrive
querors waged psychological warfare daily against the
or, ultimately, destroy ourselves.” Perhaps it behooves
vanquished, while the apologists of the new economy
Latina/o studies scholars more than colleagues in any
assembled a colonial epistemology that construed the
other field to act upon Falcón’s appeal with the hope of
conquered as debased beings deserving of their plight
formulating and securing a salutary, inclusive language
due to moral, mental, spiritual, aesthetic, and physical
that enlightens rather than obscures. This language
inferiorities. Construing the vanquished as specimens
ought to overcome the temptation to refry the clichés
of a lesser form of humanity persisted even after many
that inevitably arise when speaking from the midst of
adopted the religion of their masters and relinquished
the social pathologies that racial matters generate with-
the presumed heathenism of their forebears. For in-
out attempting to unearth the cause of the pathologies
stance, African-descended San Martín de Porres (1579–
in the first place.
1639), a lay brother of the Dominican Order in the Vice-
A dogma begotten by the colonial transaction nearly
royalty of Peru, occupied a second tier in his religious
five centuries ago, racism emerged to address the moral
order. His race barred him from full membership. This
transgressions that Christian nations incurred when
reason was also the impediment that stymied the ascent
they claimed leadership roles in imperial domination.
of many Indigenous servants of the Lord, regardless of
The conquest and colonization of the Americas in-
the strength of their faith or holiness of their actions.
volved depriving overseas populations of their lands,
In more recent times, when trying to express the
destroying their societies, reducing Indigenous peoples
indignation and malaise produced by the racially mo-
to backbreaking, coerced toil in labor camps, inclem-
tivated murder of nine black parishioners at Mother
ently punishing whoever did not satisfy the production
Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Caro-
quota expected of the captives, and perpetrating geno-
lina, during a Bible study session on June 17, 2015, then
cide against any group that opposed the colonial order.
U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch called the killings
In other words, the colonial transaction put conquering
a “barbaric