Hispanic Heritage Month 2018 odds and ends

I don't know if any of these would need a full blog post. Maybe "needs" is an exaggeration for anything I write. (I am still feeling pretty subdued.)

Anyway, I have three thoughts left:

First, in Searching for Sugarman, Sixto Rodriguez was a huge hit in South Africa (though royalties didn't make their way back to him), but did not do well in the United States. One factor that seemed to hurt sales here is that his name led people to expect "Mexican" music, and they weren't interested in that. It's not mariachi music or son or tejano or anything like that; Rodriguez sounds most like Bob Dylan, except with a better voice. If he had used a different name, who knows?

It is fascinating to me that it was South Africa that embraced him. They were not a country free from racial stereotypes or prejudice. The people drawn to his music apparently were often against the government, so probably against Apartheid, and I think there is an interesting story there, but still, it was different prejudices. A name that sounded Mexican would not mean the same things on the other side of the world.

Next up, in reading many books about Cuba, mostly by people from Cuba, there was a lot about Columbus. That was mainly about the beauty of Cuba and his instant recognition of how beautiful the island was. Often there was also mention about how that was not great for the original inhabitants of the island, often mentioning the Taino by name.

It is interesting to me that the richer people get, the more insistent they are that there were no Taino left; they were all eradicated.

There was some serious genocide, that's for sure, but there are still Taino people. Often they are not only Taino, having African and Spanish blood mixed in as well. If they are in Cuba, there are also reasonable chances of Jewish and Chinese ancestry, I have learned now. It was just fascinating how much some people refuse to entertain it. Is it guilt? They are acknowledging the past, but it is erasure in the present. The worst one had already lost any possessions he had in Cuba, so he shouldn't have been worried about reparations. Mainly it strikes me as an oddity now. I am in the middle of Native American Heritage Month 2018 reading, and I might have more thoughts as I finish that.

Finally, the next thought is from The Boys from Little Mexico: A Season Chasing the American Dream by Steve Wilson. He followed the players of Woodburn's soccer team in their last season before the leagues were revamped.

While the soccer team was highly skilled, with almost all of the players having Mexican heritage, the rest of the teams and the school size and other factors were likely to result in Woodburn playing in lower leagues. For the soccer team that would mean it would be easier to dominate their league, but harder to draw recruiters and scholarships.

There were many frustrating things about education and accessibility and racism, but my biggest takeaway is that no one should have to need it so much. It's a ridiculous thing that access to a college education should depend not just on being really good at a sport, but being good at the right sport, and being seen by the right person who is interested and has something to offer. Yes, we are doing everything possible to slash at the advantages that a college education brings, but that is not part of an overall positive flow.

There are really a lot of ways in which we need to do better.