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South American NYC

South American New Yorkers come from somewhere between La Guajira, Colombia in the north and Tierra del Fuego, Chile/Argentina in the south; between Easter Island, Ecuador in the east and Recife, Brazil in the west.

Our heritage is Indigenous, European, African and Asian. While long suspected, DNA studies have recently proven that we have Oceania in our blood too. Humans are amazing.

Vuelvo al Sur
como se vuelve siempre al amor,
Vuelvo a vos
con mi deseo, con mi temor…”

“Vuelvo al Sur,” Astor Piazzolla and Fernando E. Solanas

The Inca in Peru built South America’s most famous Indigenous civilization, but there were many who didn’t build in stone and had less contact with the colonizers.

We had Spanish, Portuguese, French and Dutch colonizers. We love the culture we inherited because it is part of us now. But the legacy of colonial social, political and economic systems is dysfunction. Those systems were designed for people at the top to steal everything.

Brazil is the most African country outside of Africa. It is also South America’s biggest economy.

Argentina had a big Italian migration at the same time as New York City. Rich Italians moved to Argentina, poor Italians moved to New York.

Colombia with its Atlantic and Pacific coasts has tremendous diversity in its biosphere, regional cultures and people.

Venezuela was the South American country most like the United States because oil brought Texans in the 1920s.

Ecuadorian Chagra Cowboy

South American (Dreamstime Agency/Dreamstime)
South American (Dreamstime Agency/Dreamstime)

We chose this photo because it represents some of our cultural mix. Spaniards brought modern horses to the Americas. They brought the first cattle to Vera Cruz, Mexico. The rope is Spanish or Mexican. The poncho is Andean.

The cowboy is a U.S. cultural icon, but of course there are cowboys and cowgirls wherever there are cattle. The iconic U.S. cowboy is white, but the reality is that most U.S. cowboys were Indigenous, Mexican and Black.

The man is an Ecuadorian Chagra cowboy. He is an Andean cowboy.

“Cien Años de Soledad”

Nobel Prize-winner Gabriel García Márquez was a Caribbean Colombian (© Everett Collection/Adobe)
Nobel Prize-winner Gabriel García Márquez was a Caribbean Colombian (© Everett Collection/Adobe)

“One Hundred Years of Solitude” (1967) is one of the world’s great novels. In it Márquez develops his central thesis that history repeats itself, by telling the story of generations of the Buendía family in Macondo, Colombia. Filled with heat and mystery, the novel is said to be the story of Latin America written in a kind of code.

There is no real Macondo, but it may be modeled after his hometown of Aracataca which is just south of Santa Marta on Colombia’s Caribbean coast.

The “Magical Realism” style of writing captures the real magic that is part of Caribbean and Latin American life. Surrealism is the same thing in art. If you think about it, magical realism is part of any natural life, anywhere in the world. It’s how humans try to make sense out of the endless cycle of life and death, and the beautiful illusions that lie to and with us in between.

[Yo vivo con ustedes en Macondo.]

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The project is led by Keith Widyolar, a travel writer and marketing communications consultant who builds brands and businesses through public, media and government relations. He was named a “key Hispanic journalist” and “Hispanic travel market influencer” by NYC & Company, New York City’s official branding and tourism agency. He also works with Discover Puerto Rico.

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