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Diversity in Roots: Resilience Through Immigrant Struggles
Growing up, I never paid it any mind that my family was completely made of immigrants who spoke English with heavy accents and barely made it past the eleventh grade. My mother came to the United States from the Dominican Republic. Despite the fact that she was unfamiliar with the environment and language, she gave her all to create a new and better life for herself. My father came to the U.S. from Guatemala with the same goal in mind.
By the time I turned five, I was being raised by a single mother. My father embodied many of the negative stereotypes that Central Americans immigrants have to battle. He immigrated to the United States and fell into a life of criminal activity and alcohol abuse. His decisions had an adverse impact on not just me but also our community at large. Thankfully, my mother and I had a close relationship, which made it much easier to overcome the absence of my father. For most of my childhood, I was shielded from knowing too much about my father, but I knew enough to feel overwhelmed with disgrace. The feeling was strong enough for me to develop a tunnel vision of creating a life opposite to that which my father had built.
Working towards a better future did not come without obstacles. Due to the language barrier and the limited education my mother had, we were constantly struggling financially. This is how we landed in Adelphi, MD, the only place she could afford to put a roof over my head and food in my mouth on her small salary. Adelphi is everything the people claim it to be: dangerous and destitute. Nevertheless, it is still home, and as much as I have tried to separate myself from this place, growing up in Adelphi has had an undeniable impact on me. Steering clear from the criminal aspect in my community required a deliberate choice to exclude myself from the majority and often made me feel left out. Several of my peers criticized me and called me stuck up because of the choices I made. But I still stood by them.
Diversity in Aspiration: From College to the Courtroom
During my freshman year in college, the various layers of my diversity unfolded in a discordant manner. It took some time for me to integrate my experiences as a first-generation Latino and first-generation college student. I did not find many other students who shared my background when I began my studies at the University of Maryland. Not only did I stand out as one of the few persons of color, but I also stood out as a socioeconomic outlier. I began to feel inferior about my life and background. I avoided conversations that involved my home life.
As time went on, I began to understand that while I had a different racial and socioeconomic background than the majority of my classmates, these differences were not harmful. My different experiences allowed me to stand out from many other students at my college; these experiences became the foundations of pride and strength. As I cultivated my perspective, I learned to develop and utilize this voice by speaking up and adding my diverse experiences to class discussions. As I begin my journey in legal education, my experiences as a person of color and daughter of a low-income immigrant Latina can help contribute not only to the law school environment but the legal field as well. My unique voice can serve as an advantage, permitting me to represent and bring forth the experiences of those who may not have a platform from which to do so because, at the end of the day, diversity of perspective and thought is central in the study of law.
References
- Portes, A., & Rumbaut, R. G. (2014). Immigrant America: A Portrait. University of California Press.
- Potochnick, S. (2018). How states can reduce the dropout rate for undocumented immigrant youth: The effects of in-state resident tuition policies. Social Science Research.
- Garcia, A. (2017). Diversity in Higher Education: Examining the Experience of First-Generation Latino Students. Lexington Books.
- Sanchez, P. (2019). First-Gen Voices: Stories of Resilience, Identity, and Academic Success. Routledge.
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