By Amanda Tovar, PhD Student in American Studies, UT-Austin

As a Latina who used to hate herself, Gloria Anzaldúa’s work challenged me to love myself. Additionally, her work propelled my journey in higher education. Her text Borderlands provided me the confidence I needed to see value in my lived experience to the point that it made its way into my work. But what does that mean in 2022 when valid critiques of her work have come to light? What does it mean that I read and used her work for so long but did not realize the problematics of her work?

For clarity, Gloria Anzaldúa’s work has come under fire recently for perpetuating Indigenous erasure via cultural appropriation. Likewise, her concept of mestiza consciousness stems from José Vasconcelos’ concept of raza cósmica (cosmic race), the result of mestizaje. La raza cósmica and mestizaje are both extremely racist and essentially call for the muting of Indigenous and Blackness for the sake of “one” “cosmic” race. There is no justification for using this, at all, in any way shape or form.

Admittedly and ashamedly, I wrote an introduction for an academic journal where I stated that Anzaldúa’s work “nourished my mestiza soul,” and not only is that CRINGEY for me now, but it is heartbreaking. Heartbreaking because I was so deep in my own world that I did not consider the real- life implications of a text that’s main theoretical concept upholds and perpetuates white supremacy.

For some time, I have wanted to hide my head in the sand and pretend that my previous writing and work did not exist, but that would be cowardly. Instead, I want to own the hurtful words I espoused and upheld and hold myself accountable for the sake of my own personal growth—academically and personally. Does this excuse me of my wrong doings? Absolutely not, but I want to be very intentional and honest with myself and others moving forward in my academic journey.

Being oblivious to the problematics of certain aspects of texts that I once regarded highly caused real harm to which I acknowledge fully. For some time, even, I “cancelled” myself to the extent of not producing or sharing my work with anyone outside of immediate professors because I felt immense shame in being someone who perpetuated harm. And then I came across Adrienne maree brown’s We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice and it greatly shifted my perspective.

brown likens us (people) to mushrooms, all connected underneath the surface and states that the same is true about conflict and harm (brown, 8). She states that a toxic substance in our interconnectedness is supremacy, that is has been invisible to those who benefit from it and is “desirable” by those suffering from it—and that was true in my case and the case of many colonized brown folks (brown, 8). My proximity to whiteness bred problematic ideologies that allowed me to uphold mestizaje and mestiza consciousness as something to be celebrated. And again, nothing excuses it, but I am holding myself accountable and unlearning what I once knew.

While I can dig and dig and dig and expose the crux that lies beneath the metaphorical soil that is my lived experience, it is not enough. brown writes that “we need to flood the entire system with life- affirming principles and practices, to clear the channels between us of the toxicity of supremacy, to heal from the harms of a legacy of devaluing some lives and needs in order to indulge others” and I fully agree (brown, 8). We need to unlearn behaviors and information that we have been immersed in and begin anew. As brown suggests, I will tell people I have hurt people, I will do the work, I will learn new things, and I recognize that it is not too late (brown, 76). My education—personal, academic, and otherwise—is in constant flux.