I know I come across as very unforgiving of Europeans who claim to want to “help” Latin America and who argue that they “know” the realities of the region.
The truth is, unless they speak Spanish like a native they don’t know a thing. Because, here’s the main problem: when they go to any place in Latin America and they interact with locals in English, they are interacting with a very specific group of people: members of the dominant culture. Speaking English in Latin America, with the degree of fluency required to talk to Europeans is a privilege. Moreover, it’s a rare privilege. And as such, it is afforded in the vast majority of cases to members of a dominant class. When the members of this dominant class/ culture relay their views to Europeans, it is only going to be a partial view, a view that is going to be heavily influenced and colored by their experiences as privileged people. It is partial and even in the most progressive circles, it’s a view that, more often than not, contains a lot of unexamined privilege.
If a European wanted to get a more inclusive picture, they need to speak Spanish with a high degree of fluency. Not only Spanish, but the kind of Spanish that can navigate the dozens of dialects and particular regional slangs we utilize in the region. A two year course in the Instituto Cervantes (an international language academy that focuses in Spanish from Spain) is going to amount to zero because it’s what we call “Royal Academy Spanish”, the equivalent of the Queen’s English. Our regional slangs are so unique that it is sometimes even difficult to communicate amongst ourselves when we travel around. And that is without taking into account the hundreds of First Nation, Indigenous languages spoken across the continent. That a European who doesn’t even speak Spanish will be able to grasp the complex realities involved, realities that even us locals to the region have troubles understanding, the many vectors of oppression and how they interact is, sorry to be so blunt, just laughable.
For the past decade and a half I have been making all my content available for free (and never behind a paywall) as an ongoing practice of ephemeral publishing. This site is no exception. If you wish to help offset my labor costs, you can donate on Paypal or you can subscribe to Patreon where I will not be putting my posts behind a lock but you'd be helping me continue making this work available for everyone. Thank you. Follow me on Twitter for new post updates.