Sometimes people fail to recognize that when it comes to heritage and being part of a new generation, there is the median of people who represent both and should be given the availability to express and acknowledge it.
The lack of proper media representation for other cultures that dictate singular images and the stereotypes that skewer one’s perception of their own identity has an enormous influence on first-generation Americans. We exist in large numbers, and I grew up thinking they had to be categorized based on a local generalization because of the fact that they didn’t have many popular figures to relate to.
Kali Uchis, a 22-year-old pop singer from Pereira, Colombia, grew up in the state of Virginia, a place otherwise realized to be “not Miami” by our immigrant parents. She sings mostly about relationships, love, rebellion and sexuality while she interviews on her experiences as a Colombian-American woman. The self-proclaimed “dislikable Colombian girl” has been on the music scene for a few years and is regarded as having an Amy Winehouse-esque voice, all while being featured alongside well-known names like Tyler, The Creator and Gorillaz. Kali Uchis doesn’t look like me, but that’s not what matters. Her image as a college-aged Hispanic girl with a lot of unabashed feelings makes me want to listen to what she has to say.
What’s the meaning of a young woman from one of my worlds making it big in the other? I mainly picture all of the little brown girls across the U.S. who may no longer feel forced to fangirl over the character of a show who simply looks most like them. I recently visited the American Girl website and, much to my 7-year-old heart’s content, they finally carry a doll whose skin, hair and eyes look like mine. Twenty-year-old me thinks that’s cool, but it would be cooler if they got my gut and thighs right as well.
In the years leading up to my naturalization, I slowly realized the culture I belonged to, which I knew nothing about, played so little a part in my life. I only spoke Spanish to my parents, and I never actually mentioned how arepas were my favorite food because none of my friends knew what they were. It was difficult to discern where I belonged when I knew my mother was Portuguese, my father was Colombian and I was born in South America. The only culture that I wanted to explore was digging up pumpkin guts on Halloween and cracking open plastic eggs during Easter.
In retrospect, my identity as a Hispanic person in this country felt reserved during my childhood, and even my adolescence, mostly because of the fact that I didn’t have an example of opinions, outside of my parents’ filtered interests in Latin America. What representation can do in the media is significant because of the power to empower; teaching immigrant children from a young age that they aren’t just an addition to a white man’s land, and showing them they aren’t what people generalize them as raises a generation more aware of what they will offer their country. It is another step toward equality. In a time when young voices want to be heard, seen and discussed, “dislikable Colombian girls” should stand out among them. It is our job as future guiders to choose diversity and market it for the sake of preserving culture and forming a definition for those who represent many. Happy Immigrant Heritage Month, Gainesville.
Karla Arboleda is a journalism and international studies senior. Her column appears on Tuesdays.
