Becoming Legible: The Racial Making of the Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole People in the Coahuila–Texas Borderland

<p>This historical ethnography analyzes the making of the Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole people as part of the production of the Coahuila-Texas borderland. In the quest to become legible to improve their living conditions and maintain a sense of dignity, Negros Mascogos/Black Seminoles use history and racialization as tools of negotiation between themselves and the two nation-states where they live: Mexico and the United States. I analyze the Negro Mascogo/Black Seminole people as a case of racialization that illustrates the ongoing mechanisms of settler colonialism (dispossession, exploitation, and elimination via genocide or assimilation), as they play out in specific socio-historical contexts.</p> <p>The main argument in this work is that Negros Mascogos/Black Seminoles have been in a double bind since the nineteenth century. Numerous external forces have put them in the position to choose between Blackness and Indianness, doing violence to the ways they understand themselves. However, this apparent paradox does not completely negate the possibility of Black-Indianness. Negros Mascogos/Black Seminoles have understood the double bind and have made their racialization more flexible to claim Blackness in relation to some socio-historical processes, and Indianness in relation to others.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Philosophy

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Anthropology

Grantor

The Graduate School and University Center of The City University of New York

Year dc:date.available

2019

Author dc:creator

• Gil Martínez de Escobar, Rocío

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Marc Edelman

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Leith Mullings
• Jacqueline Nassy Brown
• Jeff Maskovsky
• Claudio Lomnitz

• African American Studies
• Indigenous Studies
• Latin American History
• Latina/o Studies
• Oral History
• Social and Cultural Anthropology
• United States History
• Racialization
• Mexico-U.S. border
• Blackness
• Indianness
• legibility
• historicity
• settler colonialism
• Negros Mascogos
• Black Seminoles

Repository record dc:identifier

https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/3141

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:academicworks.cuny.edu:gc_etds-4281