It’s kind of hard for me to believe how many people think that every Latino in the U.S. must be an immigrant.  The fact is that a lot of Latino families have deeper roots in this country than a lot of citizens do.

Of course, there are plenty of Mexican-Americans who like to think and say that they are simply reclaiming their ancestors’ homeland when they immigrate here, but that is far from the truth.  Mexico took the land by force after Spain had tried its hand at “owning” much of the current USA.  Furthermore, the different populations native to some of the United States never considered Mexico to be the rightful heir to their land and people.

Still, many Latinos have been here for hundreds of years, well before the European ancestors of some people who gripe about America being sold out to immigrants.  If we say that almost all of us are immigrants, we can sort ourselves out into groups of those whose ancestors came long ago and have lived here for several generations, and those who are fairly new.  Yes, some Latinos are new to this soil, but others were here possibly before your great-grandparents.

I find that nonLatinos have a strong tendency to think that people who speak more than one language and who are not white or black are immigrants.  That’s a hilarious misunderstanding of the American patchwork.  We are many different groups and languages.  Always have been.

Most people in the U.S. don’t know very much about Canada or Mexico. On the other hand, I find that Canadians and Mexicans know a lot about the United States. For instance, our nextdoor neighbors to the north and south can name a lot of our states, but most people in the U.S. can’t name even one state of Mexico. Mexico has 31 states and one federal district, Mexico, D.F. The federal district contains Mexico City, which has about 20 million inhabitants, depending on how you measure the population. The number falls between 17 and 22 million.

That’s why everybody knows about Mexico City. Well, I mean they know it’s big, like really big. And everybody here knows that everybody in Mexico eats burritos, except that it’s not really so. Most Mexicans don’t eat burritos. And most Mexican burritos don’t look or taste like the ones you buy here. Well…maybe people here don’t know much about Mexico after all.

Or Canada. Can you name any prominent Canadians? Canadians can name lots of prominent people of the U.S.

I met a woman from the Dominican Republic the other day who doesn’t know much about her island country’s neighhbor to the west. Do you know which country that is? I asked the young woman if she spoke the neighbor’s language, and she said no. She said Haitians speak Portuguese.

How is it possible that she could think that? Haitians speak French, Creole, and oftentimes English.

People born and raised in U.S. aren’t the only ones who don’t know much about their neighbors.