“A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to
write fiction.”
—Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own
There is no singular Latinx experience. To assert such would
be to reduce the histories of nations and continents, of imperialism and
genocide, of liberation and expression to one set of eyes, one lifetime, one
breath.
Every Latinx person lives a Latinx experience, whether or
not it resembles that of another. Naturally, though, certain similarities arise
among stories written by or about Latinxs, especially where the Latinx diaspora
in the United States is concerned. Themes of exile, longing, (un)belonging, and
isolation create a common thread through many Latinx stories, while differences
in culture, race, and gender bear new iterations of the Latinx identity with
each generation.
My story begins in my birthplace, Puerto Rico. Before my
first birthday, my family left the island, settling in South Florida where I
grew up surrounded by other Latinx kids for whom communicating in Spanish was
nothing but natural. The same was true in college in Miami, where students’
conversations were peppered with Spanish phrases and most employees expected
you to address them as “usted” instead of “you.” This constant
confirmation of my Latinidad molded my self-definition; before all else,
I am Boricua, the product of an island inextricable from its language.
Even though I lived away from the rest of my family,
frequent visits to my island and confidence in my Spanish assuaged much of the
uncertainty I felt around my cultural identity growing up. In the years since
leaving South Florida, however, I have noticed gaps in my Spanish vocabulary
where there once were none, and this unwelcome discovery has caused me to
question myself. Am I Latina enough? It’s a concern I’ve heard echoed by
other Latinxs in the diaspora, and one which I hope to ease as this column unfolds.
“A House of Our Own” is a love letter to Latinx literature.
With an intersectional collection of writings, I hope to tease out the common
narratives that tie each of us to Latinidad. This column will cover writings
in different genres written by Latin American authors who either immigrated to
the U.S. or are the descendants of those who did. With its limited scope of
twelve books, this column is not my attempt to define Latinidad with any
degree of certainty. Rather, I hope to piece these authors’ stories into a
mosaic to which readers can relate, regardless of their cultural identity.
Each month, I will post a new book response. The books have
all been released or are slated for release in 2021 and 2022. I hope to
interview as many of the authors as possible and incorporate their words into
my writing. The tentative reading list is as follows:
2021
October: Variations on the Body by Maria Ospina
November: Dreaming of You by Melissa Lozada-Oliva
December: Gordo: Stories by Jaime Cortez
2022
January: We Are Owed by Ariana Brown
February: Wild Tongues Can't be Tamed by Saraciea J.
Fennell
March: x/ex/exis by Racquel Salas Rivera
April: Andale Prieta by Yasmin Ramirez
May: Muscle Memory by Kyle Carrero Lopez
June: Velorio
by Xavier Navarro Aquino
July: Desgraciado: (the collected letters) by Angel
Dominguez
August: A Woman of Endurance by Dahlma
Llanos-Figueroa
September: The Kissing Bug by Daisy Hernandez
I hope you will take this journey with me, that your own
anxieties about identity will be somewhat eased, and that you find some part of
yourself reflected in these words.
Un abrazo,
Brittany
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