Issue Details: First known date: 2022... 2022 How My Black and Indigenous Grandparents Remind Me of My White Privilege
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

''Once you see the cemetery, you get off the bus,' my tio abuelo (greatuncle) Lucio said in Spanish with his Portuguese twang, his foggy eyes blinded by cataracts looking over my shoulder as he spoke to me, between his fingers a cigarette burning. 'Then you go to any local and ask for a Figueroa. All the Figueroas in Rivera are your relatives and we come in all shades and shapes.' Exhaling smoke, he flicked ash over the balcony, took another puff and continued, 'We're Black, Brown, White. Light eyes, dark eyes. Short, tall. Blonde, brunettes. With afros, curls, waves or straight hair like yours.' He cleared his throat, stubbed the butt into an ashtray then added sarcastically, 'But we're all Figueroas and you can thank colonisation for that. Those conquistadores couldn't keep their hands off our women or our land.' He belly-laughed as he pulled his blue comb out of his white shirt's front pocket and repositioned his storm-cloud-coloured afro behind his ears. I breathed in the past trauma, imagining the women who came before me, because of whom I am here, women of my blood being forced to submit to White supremacy and the patriarchy, their bodies capitalised.' (Publication abstract)

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

  • Appears in:
    y separately published work icon Meanjin Online 2022 23920292 2022 periodical issue 2022
  • Appears in:
    y separately published work icon Meanjin vol. 81 no. 2 June 2022 24904002 2022 periodical issue 'Things move in waves, rhythms of action and response. We thought, not so long ago, that we’d entered a new age of freely flowing facts and ideas, one in which the power of gatekeepers had been diminished, bringing ready access to new informational tools that would empower us all.' (Jonathan Green, Editorial introduction) 2022 pg. 10-13
Last amended 4 Aug 2022 10:30:04
10-13 How My Black and Indigenous Grandparents Remind Me of My White Privilegesmall AustLit logo Meanjin
https://meanjin.com.au/category/memoir/ How My Black and Indigenous Grandparents Remind Me of My White Privilegesmall AustLit logo Meanjin Online
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