On the making of transnational identities in the age of globalization: The US Latina/o‐‘Latin’ American case1

Abstract

Representations of a transnational US Latina/o—'Latin’ American identity are being produced and circulated by multiple social actors. The development of representations of this transnational identity does not have any particular pre‐assigned meaning. Speculations about whether it may result in being more or less strategically beneficial are also taking place, but ‘for whom?’ and ‘how?’ become the obvious questions. The overall argument presented in this article may be summarized as follows. Identities are not legacies passively received but representations socially produced, and — in this sense — matters of social dispute. The case under discussion presents particular dimensions in connection with both the context of the present age of globalization and the histories of the US and the different ‘Latin’ American countries. Every and each collective identity construction highlights assumed similarities while obscuring presumed differences that at times may become more or less significant. Current representations of a US Latina/o identity as well as of a ‘Latin’ American identity and of an all‐encompassing transnational US Latina/o—'Latin’ American identity entail images that, according to several social actors’ representations, obscure differences that are significant. The existence of assertions of difference does not invalidate per se any social practices based upon representations of a US Latina/o—'Latin’ American identity. Nevertheless, the existence of these assertions of difference makes it unavoidable to think that these identity representations by means of those representations of difference, be they related to race, ethnicity, class or socioeconomic status, gender, sexual orientation, local experiences, international and transnational relations of domination, or any other relations of power.