MiCISAN

Jiménez Andreu, María Teresa

Velasco Montante, Astrid

MiCISAN (Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico)

The Splendor of Mexico

Martínez Peniche, Íñigo G.

Primera parte: políticas interior y exterior

Dávila Figueroa, Ruth A.

Reviews

Peláez Padilla, Jorge

Primera parte. Confiando en los derechos humanos: un uso político con objetivos de transformación social

Gutiérrez, Gerónimo

Convirtiéndose en una herramienta útil para los gobiernos: la evolución del Banco de Desarrollo de América del Norte

Vargas Evaristo, Susana

100
Voices of Mexico •  104
*  cisan fellow in the Postdoctoral Fellows Program, unam; susana 
.vargas.e@gmail.com.
Colonial Remnants
And “Indigenous” Specificity in Migration
Susana Vargas Evaristo*
introduction
When discussing indigenous migration and young indige-
nous migrants, the question invariably arises of why we make 
the distinction underlining “indigenous” and not simply talk 
about Mexican migration to the United States in general. 
Why do we need to point out the specificity of this kind of 
migration and the social subjects involved? The reason is 
that they are a population segment that has been profoundly 
affected by the historic process of colonialism.1 During this 
period, diverse ethnic-racial categories were created in order 
to fix the borders of identities to ensure domination.2
In the collective —and then nationalist— imaginary, the 
mestizo-indigenous dichotomy was determined to manage 
and create the bases for the power relations rooted in racist and 
ethnic classifications. Thus, the so-called “indigenous” are all 
those who belong (or recognize themselves as belonging) to 
an ancestral First People that existed prior to the Spanish 
Conquest; mestizos, on the other hand, would be all those 
social groups that have resulted from a racial mix; and “whites” 
are those who consider themselves the descendants of the 
Spaniards.
This mestizo-indigenous dichotomy undoubtedly creates 
limitations, considering the transformations and resignifica-
tions that social actors experience as they move to new regions 
to settle.3 However, we can ask ourselves what consequen ces 
this ethnic and racial differentiation has had on society and 
how it affects the different social groupings.
I should point out that all times and spaces are different, 
and the ways of naming things have their own dynamic. In 
this sense, it is not a matter of thinking that the indigenous 
population has been passive and simply taken on the domi-
nant forms of social classification without filtering them. 
However, the indigenist integration policies imposed from the 
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101
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mid-twentieth century focused on transforming the First 
People’s cultures. Proof of this was the imposition of the Span-
ish language to integrate the population by homogenizing 
ethnic diversity, in accordance with the Mexican nation-state’s 
directives. 
Other forms of cultural dispossession can be linked to 
territorial displacement and the destruction of sacred lands, 
the exploitation of natural resources, or the abandonment of the 
countryside as part of a national economic strategy aimed at 
creating a work force for industry. All of this produced social 
conflicts that emerged out of processes of discrimination, as 
mechanisms of racial and ethnic legitimacy that ensured the 
dominant power of certain social groups over those that had 
traditionally existed throughout Mexico.
Outstanding in this exercise of handling ethnic and cul-
tural complexity is the historic post-colonial process of sub-
ordinating certain social groups through concepts like social 
class, the ethnic group, and race, three central items on which 
the relations of exploitation/domination/conflict are based.4 
The use of language has been one of the most effective dis-
criminatory devices due to its level of interiorization in the 
historic memory of Mexico’s indigenous population.
This is where I return to the initial question posed in this 
article: Why is it necessary to specify in ethnic and racial 
terms the kind of migration we are talking about? The case 
of Mexican indigenous migration to the United States makes 
it possible to broaden out the discussion on this issue. In the 
nation-state, this population group has been considered sub-
national and therefore their cultural and civil rights are not 
fully recognized.5 This has meant that they have not had reg-
ular access to a classroom education to the same extent as the 
mestizo population or that their incorporation into the labor 
market has been precarious, among other examples. That is, 
the Mexican nation-state’s national integration policies have 
generated mechanisms that have put these social groups 
at a disadvantage vis-à-vis what has been called the mestizo 
society, represented by the state.6
historic memory and the incorporation 
of young people in the united states
The next question is how this background affects the process 
of incorporating young descendants of indigenous migrants 
into the United States. I will look at the case of the children 
of Zapotec-, Mixtec-, and Triquí-speaking agricultural work-
ers’ children whose parents came from different towns in the 
southern state of Oaxaca. Together with Chiapas and Gue-
rrero, Oaxaca has the highest poverty rates in Mexico, and the 
three states concentrate the largest indigenous populations 
in the country.7
Indigenous migration from Oaxaca has been one of the 
country’s most vigorous since the mid-twentieth century. They 
have settled both in rural and urban areas, staying perma-
nently in different places in Mexico and the United States.
I am centering my attention on young Oaxacans living in 
Madera County and Fresno in California. Both places have 
communities living near the farms that offer jobs to docu-
mented and undocumented workers alike. California’s Cen-
tral Valley agribusiness has been the source of employment par 
excellence for Mexican migrants in general, and specifically 
for the Oaxacan community.
Research into the agricultural labor market in Mexico 
and the United States has shown the importance of segment-
ing the work force by gender, ethnicity, social class, and im-
migration status as part of a strategy for subduing it.8 These 
conditions are ripe for creating a vicious circle in which Mex-
ican immigrants of indigenous origin are susceptible to being 
subjected to exhausting workdays under the sun.
Carlos,9 the young son of Mixtec agricultural workers, born 
in Fresno, California, says,
I’m not going back into the fields, and thanks to this job [his 
current job], I’m hardly ever out in the heat, except on Tuesdays 
and Thursdays when I’m in charge of the carts outside the store; 
but it’s not hard; I’m just bagging. I prefer this to working in the 
field; that’s no life, that’s not a job; it’s something lower than a 
job. It’s like misery; it’s for the ones who don’t know how to read 
or stuff like that; it’s not a decent job. (Carlos, September 10, 
2010, Fresno, California)
The literature specialized in Oaxacan indigenous migrants 
and their incorporation into agricultural work underlines the 
contradictions inherent in the following duality: agri-indus-
try anchored in the global economy, using cutting-edge tech-
The use of language has been one of 
the most effective discriminatory devices due 
to its level of interiorization in the historic
memory of Mexico’s indigenous population.
102
Voices of Mexico •  104
nology, versus the low wages of agricultural workers that 
favor the growth of these companies. The social categories of 
class, immigration status, ethnicity, and gender act vigorously 
in these sorts of contexts, in which employers in a given labor 
market resort to precarious pay for workers in order to balance 
production costs and technological creation. 
We can see that the incorporation of young migrants of 
indigenous origins into their destination societies takes place 
on two levels: one is the institutional-governmental level, 
linked to immigration policies, institutional absorption, and 
three fundamental aspects: education, access to housing, and 
employment. Another level is the ethnic-racial relations that 
segment the population and that we can characterize as sub-
jective, while inter-ethnic relations produce scenarios of con-
flict that can manifest in different spheres of social life —the 
United States has been very prolific and stimulating in its 
inter-racial debate.
Even when a young Oaxacan, whether he/she be Mixtec, 
Zapotec, or Triqui, has been born in the United States, the 
issue of belonging to a specific people and the manifestation 
of his/her ancestry in different ways, like community and po-
litical organization, continuing to celebrate patron-saint fiestas, 
using his/her language, or transmitting values from the home, 
all act as negotiating mechanisms about cultural identity in 
the process of integration into the receiving societies. That is, 
this is a group of migrants whose profound historic, cultural, 
and social baggage has been transmitted over generations. This 
can be explained taking into account oral transmission, the use 
of the mother tongue, attachment to their hometowns, and 
the value placed on ancestors.
In this scenario, we must consider incorporation into re-
ceiving societies as a process that will not necessarily take 
a specific route. In any case, it will deepen when young Oaxa-
cans begin to see their own culture as a guarantee of recogni-
tion when they feel deprived of rights in the United States. 
Even if they have immigration documents, they do not always 
feel they belong to that country’s society given their being 
categorized as sub-nationals in their places of origin, which 
is then reinforced in their destination countries.
The indigenous nature of migrations shows signs of in-
ternalized post-colonialism among the population.10 This is 
therefore transmitted generationally, the effect of which is the 
subordination-domination of certain social groups. All this 
ideological production about otherness continues to exist 
among descendants of indigenous people and is manifested 
in different scenarios. Let us look at what Sara says about it:
I’ve seen lots of young people who were brought [to the United 
States] very young, like I was. Their parents might have spoken 
Spanish or not, but I feel like I was discriminated against, not 
only here, but also in Mexico, because I’m darker-skinned, I’m 
short, and I speak another language. So they [young people] 
suffer from the same conflict, right? Who am I? . . . I feel like 
the schools here [California] don’t do their job. They don’t in 
Mexico either. They don’t explain why we are how we are, that 
it’s more than just the color of your skin, right? It’s something 
more than a culture that you aren’t even familiar with because 
they don’t teach you. So, I think that, like, that’s what’s needed, 
you know? We need talks to be able to understand the history 
of culture, more than anything, the history of why we’re like we 
are, why we’re here, and that it’s nothing we should be ashamed 
of; the exact opposite: we should be proud of what we are. And 
I think that that’s what young people need, that kind of identi-
fication and awareness of knowing. (Sara, September, 2010, 
Fresno, California)
For young Mixtecs, Zapotecs, and Triquis, the integration 
process implies developing sociability strategies to be accept-
ed because several aspects of their lives make them vulner-
able, like their physical attributes (they are dark-skinned and 
short), their culture (the use of their native language), and their 
social class:
We still feel a little like outsiders, especially anyone of indig-
enous origin, because people always look at you sideways, even 
Mexicans: “Oaxacans are shorties, we’re dirty, we’re I-don’t-
know-what.” But that’s not everybody. There are some people 
who think we’re nice and hard-working. (Carmen, no date, Made-
ra, California)
As mentioned above, language is a fundamental factor 
for understanding how the colonialist structures have acted 
and the consequences for the descendants of indigenous. 
For many families, the transmission of the Mixtec language 
became something devoid of meaning given the ideological 
young oaxacans, whether Mixtec, Zapotec, 
or Triqui, are a group of migrants whose 
profound historic, cultural, and social heritage
has been transmitted over generations.
103
special section
demands of the Mexican nation-state, which has sought to 
impose a single language, Spanish, on the entire population. 
As Martina says,
My Dad used to tell my Mom not to teach us Mixtec because 
if she did, we weren’t going to speak very well and we were go-
ing to have a hard time and be discriminated against more than 
we are now. So we just spoke Spanish so we wouldn’t have a 
hard time. So, I didn’t learn it until I grew up and had children 
of my own because I wanted them to learn it because it makes 
me sad to think that I’m from Oaxaca and I don’t know how to 
speak the language. I feel that our not speaking it is like saying 
that the Spaniards won; we lost our language. So, I’m trying to 
learn again and so are they. (no date, Madera, California)
Migration and interaction with other socio-cultural groups 
has shown the descendants of Oaxacan indigenous that it is 
possible to remain close to their origins through defending 
different aspects of their culture. This is a response to the need 
to feel part of a world they were brought into in their child-
hood and where they have developed different forms for eth-
nic-cultural survival. The ethnic awareness that is awakened 
in interacting with other ethnic groups occupying the same 
space is part of a complex process of integration in which they 
resignify and reconcile memories of colonialism in the face of 
the new signifiers and challenges found in receiving societies.
in the manner of an epilogue
In the early twentieth century, sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois 
proposed a debate about “double consciousness,” emphasiz-
ing that in the context of racialized difference, individuals are 
able to self-identify and situate their cultural limits vis-à-vis 
others.11 Franz Fanon’s approach centers on the mental nature 
of conflict, on psychological situations that affect the popu-
lation of descendants situated in a multi-ethnic reality: the 
one inherited from their groups of origin and the one that 
the discri minatory, racist scenario reveals to them. According 
to post-colonial authors, these complex contexts form the sub-
ordinate subject, who has to modify his/her subjectivity vis-
à-vis others, but in the framework of unequal social relations.
Walter Mignolo calls this conflict the remnants of the 
colonialist-modernity relationship surpassing the limitations 
of territorial thinking and overflowing historic memory.12 In 
this sense, indigenous social actors themselves name and place 
new values on their national historical, post-colonial heritage 
through new narratives, often very different from the tra-
ditio nal image of the Mexican indigenous, as a new configura-
tion of their identity, to a certain extent the product of human 
mobility. 
notes
1  For Boaventura de Sousa Santos, internal state colonialism is a vast so-
cial system of interlocking relationships (or a “social grammar”) that cuts 
across sociability, public and private spaces, culture, mentalities, and 
subjectivities. “Epistemologías del Sur,” in Utopía y praxis latinoamerica-
na. Revista internacional de filosofía iberoamericana y teoría social vol. 54, 
year 16, July-September 2011, p. 14.
2  For Rita Laura Segato, “Every state, whether colonial or national, installs 
its own ‘others’ to create positions of superiority to hold power; one way of 
achieving this is by pushing identities considered ‘residual’ or ‘peripheral’ 
to the nation out of the way.” In her book, Segato presents a wide-ranging 
dissertation about the ideological continuity between the colonial period 
and the creation of the nation. La nación y sus otros: raza, etnicidad y di-
versidad religiosa en tiempos de políticas de la identidad (Buenos Aires: 
Prometeo Libros Editorial, 2007), p. 138.
3  Laura Velasco, “La subversión de la dicotomía indígena-mestizo: identida-
des indígenas y migración hacia la frontera México-Estados Unidos,” in 
Laura Velasco, Migración, fronteras e identidades étnicas transnacionales 
(Tijuana: El Colegio de la Frontera Norte, 2015).
4  Aníbal Quijano, “Colonialidad del poder y clasificación social,” in Contex-
tualizaciones latinoamericanas vol. 5, year 3 (July-December 2011), p. 33.
5  Naturally, this does not apply only to the indigenous population; we could 
say the same for parts of what is called the mestizo population. However, 
I am interested in focusing on the former here.
6  John Rex, “Multiculturalism and Political Integration in Modern Nation 
State,” in HMiC: història moderna i contemporània no. 3, 2005, pp. 249-261.
7  According to National Council for Evaluating Social Development Policy 
(Coneval) data, poverty levels among the indigenous population are prac-
tically twice those of the rest of the population: 55.1 percent of Mexi-
cans who do not speak an indigenous language are poor, while 79.3 percent 
of the indigenous population falls into this category. Coneval, “Pobreza 
2010,” http://www.coneval.gob.mx/cmsconeval/rw/pages/medicion/pobre 
za_ 2010.es.do.
8  Sara María Lara, Nuevas experiencias productivas y nuevas formas de orga-
nización flexible del trabajo en la agricultura mexicana (Mexico City: Juan 
Pablos Editores, 1998).
9 All names of the people quoted are pseudonyms.
10  Or, as Franz Fanon said, from the point of view of the effects on people’s 
mentality when subjectively fixing identities. See Black Skin White Masks 
(London: Pluto Press, 1986).
11  Bruce D. Dickson, Jr., “W. E. B. Du Bois and the Idea of Double Con-
sciousness,” in W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, Louis Gates, Jr. 
and Terri Hume Oliver, eds., Norton Critical Edition (New York: W. W. 
Norton and Company, 1999).
12  Walter Mignolo, Local Histories/Global Designs. Coloniality, Subaltern Knowl-
edges, and Border Thinking (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000).


English

Special Section

Bingham, Gwendolyn

Major General Gwendolyn Bingham, US Army

Rodríguez-Blanco. Sergio

Art and Culture

Núñez García, Silvia

Escamilla-Hamm, Patricia

El papel de las mujeres como actoras en las fuerzas armadas de América del Norte

Wilson, Christopher

Wood, Duncan

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