Yanga and Mataclara

We went to town of Yanga today with Dr. Sagrario Cruz-Carretera, an expert anthropologist and historian here in Mexico. Needless to say, we got a lot of history in a short amount of time. I was late getting up and had to rush to catch the bus at 8am (though I wasn’t the only late one). We all slept on the bus ride to Yanga. The town is named after the African slave who fought the Spanish in the late 1500s along with other runaway slaves. They lived up in the mountains and their guerilla tactics repeatedly frustrated the Spanish. The Africans eventually won free status and recognition after years of fighting because the Spanish crown basically couldn’t stop them.

I got the chance to ask some other questions about slavery and got some really good answers from Professora Carratera. We also stopped at a small museo in this place called Palmillas (which I think might actually be a part of Yanga). Though not many people of direct African descent live in Yanga today, we visited another town called Mataclara, where people can be more clearly identified as being of African descent and in the past few decades have come to recognize their African roots. Florentino Virgen, a local leader at Mataclara, spoke with us about the town and gave us some insight into the the Afro-Mexicano experience. For hundreds of years many Mexicans of African descent deny their African slave past and give numerous other explanations for their dark skin or West African features. However, Florentino commented that “Negro no es un pecado” (Black is not a sin). This comment really struck me, as did much of what he had to say about reclaiming an African past, the closeness of the community, and labor issues.

Another thing I’m learning more about world labor systems, especially as they concern immigration and remittances (money made by immigrants in a foreign country that is sent back to their home country / communities). NAFTA policies passed in 1994 really affected this area by destroying prices of locally produced sugarcane. It got to the point where syrup was imported into Mexico because it was cheaper than domestic sugarcane. Men were forced to leave their families to find work an in other towns and many went to the US. The township of Mataclara was so close-knit that the men who had immigrated to the US sent back money (remittances) to family and has been used by the community to do things like build roads in the town. What a trip! I didn’t realize the extent to which international policy can so directly and substantially affect people on the ground materially. The “boarder problem” in the US was created by our crappy policies in the US. Go to Mexico and ask somebody.