NEW LATINO/A MIGRATIONS

BY CARLOS

Lately in class we have been talking about the movement of Latinos from the inner cities to the suburbs and, more recently, the population of Latinos in the American South. The topic of Latinos moving from traditional barrios and ghettos to other areas has always been of interest to me. The neighborhoods of Columbia Heights and Mount Pleasant in the Washington D.C. area are particularly interesting. These two places have attracted many Latinos over the last few decades, especially Salvadorans. However, because of gentrification and the rise in housing prices/costs, they have steadily started to move to other parts of the metropolitan area. Even though technically these neighborhoods such as Georgia Ave are still within the city limits, they are getting closer and closer to leaving the city itself. I bet this had led to or will lead to culture clashes and potential violence between the previous dwellers and the newer Central American arrivals. The article District's Hispanics leaving Mount Pleasant for Georgia Ave from the Washington Examiner talks about specifically about Georgia Ave. According to the article Georgia Ave hasn’t had much of a Central American population until recently.

  

The main reason why there are so many Salvadorans to begin with is because of the civil war which occurred there.  The U.S. backed a right-wing regime which was putting down an armed rebellion by left-wing revolutionaries. Especially in the 80’s a large number of them came to the U.S. and a large portion of them settled in the D.C. area. Recently the movement of former guerrillas has been elected to government in El Salvador. Another issue which heavily involves Salvadorans and other Central Americans is that of gang violence. This is also one issue, so-called “concerned citizens” speak of when complaining about the immigrant communities.

    In class we watched a documentary, 9500 Liberty, which detailed the hostility displayed towards many of the Central American immigrants.  Young children and even babies were labeled as “parasites”. I think as more and more Latinos move towards mostly white suburban areas more and more violent actions will be taken against them. I think so many people are afraid of losing the status quo, which is why armed vigilante groups are on the rise again, and so are militias. Newer KKK factions now focus more of their rage against Latinos and so-called “illegal aliens”. I think it will be interesting to see how the children of immigrants and the coming generations adapt to life in the ‘burbs and if things will get worse before they get better.