Before college, I was not fully aware of Latin American history. During elementary school, middle school and high school, I only learned about the history of the United States (the beautiful parts, we never learned about the damage that has been done), and the teachers and the education system did not bother teaching us the in-between. At UC Santa Cruz, I decided to take a class titled LALS 1 (Intro. to Latin America and Latino Studies). It was in that class that I learned that the United States had affected and is still continuing to affect Latin America (which I already knew somewhat but not in detail).
It was that class in which Professor Leiva one day showed us a picture of the United States and it had words on it (kind of like the one I show as my cover). The words said, "This is not America" and lots of people were shocked, others confused and others were trying to argue with Professor Leiva. Essentially, he told us that a couple years ago, the image was displayed in New York, and it was controversial. A Chilean artist had the image displayed back in 1987, so people can realize that they should stop referring to the United States as America.
America is a continent. There is North America and South America, and in both of those continents, there are countries. These countries are always referred to by their names, but somehow, the United States is always called America. We even see this today; for example, Donald Trump's slogan is "Make America Great Again" and in the news or articles I see things, such as "When does America say enough is enough?" or there are some events that say "Made in America" but what they show or what they are referring to is the United States. They do not mean Latin America or Central America or all the other countries in North and South America. They just mean one single nation, and that is the United States. This needs to stop.
Both continents contain many Americans whose identity is intersectional and whose skin colors differ. In Latin America, we are aware that America is a broad term and we do not refer to the United States as America. We call the United States what it is and that is the United States. We also know that we are also Americans. Even though we do not use the term, we know that we can because being and living in the United States does not make you American. You are American if you were born in the continents of America (North or South, it does not matter). There is a song in Spanish sung by Los Tigres Del Norte and it goes like this:
" Porque yo no he de ser Americano , Porque América es todo el continente,Y el que nace aquí, es Americano,El color podrá ser diferente,Más como hijos de Dios, somos hermanos En Argentina y Colombia, Ecuador y Paraguay Brasil, Chile y Costa Rica, Salvador y el Uruguay Venezuela y Guatemala, México, Cuba y Bahamas, Todos son Americanos, sin importar el color" which means " Why can I not be American, If America is all the continent, And if you were born here, you are American, the color might be different, just like we are sons of God, we are brothers and sisters. In Argentina, Colombia, Paraguay, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Salvador, Uruguay, Venezuela, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, and the Bahamas, we are all Americans, no matter the color."
So, next time remember, do not call the United States America because it is not America. Remember that America is also the Latin American countries.
