by Felice León

I am a Blacktina. Get it: Black [La]tina?

A friend gave me this nickname years ago, and it has stuck. My father is Afro-Cuban, and my mother Afro-American. I identify with both cultures and have tried to balance both, but I’ve found that I associate more so with my blackness, particularly while living in the United States.

by Dash Harris

The story of Jakiyah McCoy is not surprising.

It is sadly a story many AfroLatinos face every second of their lives. Erasure and invisibility.

On September 18th, a college friend of mine posted the link to the ‘El Tiempo Hispano’ story and commented that:

”[the pageant] required proof of only her ethnicity, not the other contestants. On top of that they take her title and crown away, because she can’t show proof of ethnicity because her undocumented grandmother who was from the Dominican Republic, which gives her the necessary 25% of Latino ancestry, is deceased.”