West begins with 'O'
A few weeks ago, one of my classmates asked me how I can reconcile being a Westerner in a Latin American philosophy class. Whilst this was not a question I thought would arise from a casual invitation to the photocopier, it was a reality check and made me confront what has been sitting in the back of my mind. UNAM is the hardest university to get into Latin America, let alone Mexico, and as an exchange student, my application was remarkably easy in comparison. I wrote a short cover letter in Spanish and asked my study abroad coordinator to provide a reference, submitted it, and two months later received an offer. For domestic students it is, first of all, a case of having access to a decent primary education, which varies drastically based on where you live in the country. Being able to study at UNAM is also reliant on location, socioeconomic conditions, and above all passing entrance exams,with an acceptance rate ranging from a miniscule 3.5% to a slightly less miniscule 6.5%.
My response to my classmate was that I’m here to experience new perspectives, both in my academic and everyday life, but that I should also be aware of my place here, as a Westerner. I'm not really sure I managed to fully express this in Spanish and there's a lot more to be said on this matter than this brief (and inadequate) answer.
Coming from a eurocentric education, I am now seeing the concepts of ‘subject’ and ‘object’ reversed as I find myself in the placed in what could be labelled as 'the other'. This is a careful path to tread, and it is really only now that I'm becoming aware of the subconscious marginalisation or 'othering' that we make of Latin America (even the term itself inviting criticism). Last year I studied a module entitled 'Visual Culture in the Hispanic World', a comparative unit dissecting various works of art, cinema, and photography produced in Spain, Chile, Mexico, and Argentina. Whilst I can single-handedly say that this was probably one of the best modules I've studied at university (and really is the reason I chose to study in Mexico) I can now see the fault in grouping these countries together via their common tongue. This was something we discussed in the seminars at the time, but placing myself amongst hispanohablantes in the 'Hispanic World', I have come to realise that 'Latin America' is not something we can understand as one unified entity, but a complex network of tongues, cultures, religions and peoples, contradicting and corroborating, just like any other geographical area or continent. My perspective has been turned on its head, and rightly so.
There are a multitude of stigmas and stereotypes surrounding Mexico and this geographical area which I see dissolving before my very eyes. Earlier this year I met a man from Mexico City who strictly warned me to only live in Roma or Condesa (lovely, pretty neighbourhoods but very much ex-pat/yuppie/digital nomad paradise) as anywhere else in the city would be perilous for a young güerra like myself. This is not true, and I am glad I didn't follow his advice.
The people here are warm and inviting, they want to share their culture, their food and their history. I have unexpected conversations nearly everyday - at my local mercado, with taxi drivers, on the metro. I keep recycling the joke that a warmer climate results in warmer people - but it really seems to be true. People want to know where I'm from, what languages I speak, what I think of Mexico, what I think of Brexit, and also what the British royal family actually do (I'm still unsure on how to answer this one). The desire for intercultural exchange -whether that is conscious or subconscious - is evident and whilst I'm lucky to have only really had positive experiences (bar a handful of creepy men in bars who want to know if I like Oscar Wilde and try to force-feed me horrid beer) it is not just by coincidence that I've had so many lovely and memorable interactions.
I do not feel anymore unsafe here than I would in a big city in the UK. Of course there are extra precautions to be taken - avoiding certain (infamous) areas of the city, not taking public transport at dodgy times, and opting for the women and children carriage in the metro. Not to mention that machismo is very much alive and kicking.
Obviously I am only seeing one façade of this country and I realise that the capital city is not by any means representative of Mexico as a whole. I live in a fairly middle-class area of Mexico City which is populated by families, young professionals and other exchange students. Nonetheless with each day I am realising the necessity to deconstruct the subconscious linguistic and cultural stereotypes that Westerners tend to hold.
These stereotypes are even more blatant within my academic experience in the UK as well. Here, the Western canon is taught alongside the works of Latin American scholars. There is a necessity to study both. At home, on the other hand, (and I suspect that I'm not only speaking for my degree course - but for the vast majority of humanities subjects) I have received little to no exposure to academic works produced here in Mexico, and elsewhere in the continent. This is in no way to place blame on my university, or any of the staff. It is systemic, and engrained within our way of learning and thinking. Eurocentrism has never seemed so obvious and I cannot understand how intellectual priority is still placed on works primarily produced in English, and primarily in Europe. Whilst virtually all the greats of Western philosophy and literature are translated into Spanish, there is no reciprocation, at least in my experience.
There is so little intercultural dialogue with literature produced outside of the West that, as a language student, I feel as if my entire education - and in particular my degree - has been confined by an invisible barrier of subconscious prejudice and ignorance, which only now is beginning to open.
Whilst my Mexican counterparts are discussing Foucault, I am only just discovering the tip of the iceberg that constitutes the vast underbelly of Latin American philosophy.
Whilst my Mexican counterparts are discussing Foucault, I am only just discovering the tip of the iceberg that constitutes the vast underbelly of Latin American philosophy.
There is so much more to be said, and I don't really feel as if I have done this issue any justice by writing this. There are enormous gaps in my knowledge, and everyday I find myself confronted with situations and conversations which fluctuate, and contradict how I experience life here. But ultimately, my perspective is shifting, and for the first time I am seeing things in a whole new multisensory dimension. It is exciting.
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