First off, Rick and Morty is hilarious and if you’re not caught up (only 3 seasons) then you’re plainly missing out! But just incase you are one of very few unfortunate people who don't know who or what Rick and Morty is, let me briefly fill you in.
Rick and Morty is a cartoon series. The premise of the show is centered around a young teenager named Morty and his out of the world, galactic adventures with his mad-genius, vulgar, dark humor having of a grandpa, Rick Sanchez.
In this particular episode, Tales from the Citadel, the Citadel of Ricks, a secret society created by Rick, is both currently collecting funds to rebuilt it and holding elections for a new leader to lead the Council of Ricks, a universal government created by multiple Ricks from multiple dimensions. In this particular dimension, the population of the world only consists of infinite copies of Ricks and Mortys.
This episode is filled with social commentaries on relevant, pressing issues today. They range from social inequalities, government corruption, police brutality, etc. However, what captured my interest the most was Cop Morty. Overlooking his position as a Cop for a second, Cop Morty straight up hates other Mortys.
Cop Morty hating other Mortys reminded me of the many Latinx, in particular within the Dominican community, who deny their African lineage. I also thought about conditions of the troubled relationship between Haiti and Dominican Republic (post about this for another time). And of course, as an ethnic Dominican myself, this topic is very important to me. And now that I understand some history on the Dominican Republic, I’d like to share some information about why we should not deny our ancestry.
[-- Quick History Lesson --]
In 1492 Christopher Columbus first set sail to find the New World and eventually landed on the island known as Hispaniola today.This island is divided into two countries; the western side of the island is Haiti and the eastern side is the Dominican Republic. After Columbus had found this Island (not discovered), Spain, short after, colonized the side that would later become the Dominican Republic.The Spaniards settled in the capital of DR and was named Santo Domingo by Columbus’ brother, Bartholomew. Because DR had been colonized by Spain until 1863-64, the mother tongue of the Dominicans is Spanish. Haiti, however, was originally colonized by France, which is why the base of Creole is French.
Over a 11 million slaves had been brought over to the Santo Domingo to work the fields, or to be sold. Additionally, Dominican Republic already has it’s indigenous people, the Taino. So the Dominican people are a combination of Spaniards, African slaves and the Taino. According to a project done by the Dominican Academy of History, the University of Pennsylvania, and the National Geographic Society’s Genographic Project, Dominican blood is tested to be 49 percent African.
[-- History Lesson Over --]
This information, that I myself learned in the recent years, isn’t to attack my brothers and sisters, but to pass along information that's still not known by many in the Dominican community. Furthermore, I am not challenging Dominicans’ in the US to racially identify as something different other than Latino if they don't wish to do so, because according to the US taxonomy, Dominicans are classified as such. However, we should never disassociate, or have ill will towards our ancestry and those whom we share it with.
