Pedro Santana is one of the best known faces of the Latino community in southern New Jersey. He is currently a member of the Hispanic Association of Atlantic County and serves as Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs at Stockton University. In this interview, Dr. Santana talks about his Latino roots and the motivations that led him to take an active role in improving the quality of life of the Latino community in Southern New Jersey.
What is your personal experience that links you to migration?
From my personal life, my grandparents traveled to this country in the 40's or 50's. At that time the country of the Dominican Republic had a stable economy and even the Dominican peso was equivalent to the dollar or had a higher price. But as many of us know, many things have happened in Latin American countries, and little by little the opportunities left the countries.
My parents were the first to come and live here. Both my father and mother were the youngest in their families. My cousins and uncles came to New York. When they came there were many difficulties for them, facing a new language. There was also a lot of racism and disrespect. But because we as Latinos, as Hispanics, have always been in community, we were able to move forward.
Some of my relatives worked in factories, my mother worked in a factory sewing clothes and curtains. My father worked in cleaning and plastic factories. My whole family came to this country in search of a better life. Because little by little life no longer existed as it did in our countries.
But the reality, with every era they spent here, they always had difficulties. Although my father and grandfather came to this country legally, in any case, many times they did not manage to see the American dream as it is projected to the whole world. But, for them it was the opportunity for the next generation, which was me, to have the opportunities that they didn't get in this country. So I am very grateful to my father, who died in 2012, and to my mother who lives in New York.
That same story is repeated for the entire Hispanic community, we are a humble community with much love and we like to celebrate our culture, because it is something beautiful, it is an example to the world. What I have seen in this country is that many times they make minorities confront each other. That unfortunately takes away our sense of community, when in reality, as a Latin American community we have African, indigenous and European blood.
As a child of Latin Americans growing up in the United States, what has it been like to fluctuate between American and Latino culture?
I was born in the Dominican Republic and my parents brought me here when I was about 5 months old. I have traveled to visit my family in the summers but I have spent most of my life here. However, where I spent my youth in New York, it was a community where there was a lot of Hispanic, a lot of Dominican. That's why I spoke only Spanish until I was about 5 or 6 years old, because that's when I was able to go to school and that's when I started learning English. After that I had more practice speaking English, even from time to time I forget some words in Spanish.
However, I've had the benefit of taking advantage of opportunities that other people haven't been able to take advantage of because they don't have the ability to speak the language. For me, that has worked well, because I have gone to school, I have a PhD in business administration. But other people, who may be my age, didn't have those opportunities because the situation at home was different. I was lucky that my father and mother were together. Even though a lot of the things that were happening in my community in New York were ugly things, because there was drug trafficking, violence, and you could see that. But I was lucky that the way my parents helped me and gave me a chance for me and my kids. So my experience is very different from the previous generation and the reality is that many of my generation didn't make it to college. Many of them didn't even finish high school, worked in different jobs, or had children at very young ages.
That's where the problem exists, because in order for the community to get back on its feet you have to do a lot more work in education. That's why I made the decision to go into education, as did my wife.
From your experience working with communities, what have been the difficulties faced by people trying to integrate and adapt to a new society?
The biggest difficulty may be finding people who can guide them through the system. Many times, churches are a way for the community to find help and find themselves as a community. Many times, our community when it comes to this country, goes to church and many times communities help each other. Because not knowing how to look for an apartment, not knowing how to look for a job, the language.
If you look at the economy of this country, the businesses of our community are the ones that are going to make the economy of this country grow. So, that means that little by little, our community is getting back on its feet, owning companies. Because we are in that stage of evolution of our community in the United States. Because many times when members of our community come to this country, they manage to get jobs in companies or companies of Latinos. They may not be able to do it in the language, but the sons and daughters of that generation are going to do it. Little by little this country is going to keep changing. This year, I want to say that of all the minorities, the Hispanic community is going to be the largest. The numbers today, in 2016 there were 60 million Hispanics, there is an estimate that in 2050 the Hispanic community will grow to 130 or 150 million. We are growing and the country does not accept it, and if we do not start supporting each other to support our youth, the economy will not develop as it should.
If this country does not start to recognize that, it is going to have a lot of difficulties in the years to come because the reality is that many of the countries in the world are standing up. The economies are growing.
Have you felt any resistance from the American community in your experience working and being a representative of the Latino community?
Since my work, I have had to deal with racism. At this university, we have students of all races and countries. Many of them live at the university, but others also live in the community. I remember years ago, we were taking the information from homeowners and giving it to students in case they wanted to rent it to students. One person from the community called and said that he couldn't rent the house to the student because he couldn't do that to his neighbors. He couldn't put a Hispanic on it, even when he called me, I think he heard my name, or possibly he didn't hear the Pedro, but he heard the Santana. If we are speaking in English, Santana is a name that could possibly be Italian. I let him know that I was going to take him off the list and not call here anymore.
Then, at another time I was dealing with a student who was not doing what he should be doing, so the student called the parents and the parents called and told me to do what he wanted me to do. So I said no, that's too bad and this school can't do that, so the man decided to ask me for my supervisor's number and I gave it to him. What he didn't know was that my supervisor was also Hispanic. So when he called the supervisor and said "that housing hispanic is doing this and this and that", she said well, I'm Hispanic too and you fucked up.
Sometimes they do things like that very directly, many times they do passive things. Many times when our families, our community comes to this country, they come with those same teachings, being humble, not wanting to ask questions or, for example at school, saying that the teachers may be wrong. In fact, the kids have to do what the teachers say and many times, that puts the students in pain more, the boys and girls of our community in pain more because many times when they are here the other children of this country make their life very complicated, they make them not feel comfortable, that is bad when you want a girl and a boy to develop and be able to put in the effort to learn. Many times that takes away their spirit. The school today has not yet caught that learning thing, when you talk to them and tell them, but why is there only one Hispanic teacher when 30 or 40 percent of the school is Hispanic? Why is there no administrator or staff. That's what's happening to our community, so I'm part of several national and international organizations that are pushing to make sure the system changes.
How do you do that?
The information must be given to the community, through social networks, television, and the church. Many times churches open their doors and you go and give reports to the community on issues that are important for them to continue to progress. But there is still much more work to be done. Another way is with politics, making sure that the politicians you put in office have our community in mind, and if not, next time get it out of the way.
From your experience within the community, have you had to deal with internal problems such as disunity within the community members themselves?
Ignorance is the first cause of disunity within the community, because many times because we are from different countries, we do not see each other as brothers and sisters. Also, because we are few in different parts or in companies. For example, here at the university, I am the only administrator of this level in the entire university. There are other Hispanics, but we are very few, we are almost reaching 15 percent of the students and right now, I don't know if 1 or 2 percent of the staff, it's very little.
The community has grown, but the staff and administration has not yet grown in proportion to the students. The system has to change and make sure that the community has representation on the staff, so that when students have problems or need help, there are those people in the community who tell you, we are here, go ahead, if you want us to support you let us know. That's something our community doesn't have. On the Upside of New York we have more strength, but not here, but we are growing.
What is the importance of a Latino media outlet in a place like this that you tell me has had more resistance from the U.S. community?
That medium was established to ensure that our community has an opportunity to amplify its voice. That was established by Unidos, to meet its goals of ensuring unity and communication within the university and within the community surrounding the university. Supporting each other here on campus and celebrating our culture, those are some of the goals. Another goal we have with Pa'lante is to demand that this university change its documents and continue to support our community. We also want to continue working with our students so that they can achieve their dreams and finally we want to join with other organizations around the university so that we can be more effective in pushing Pa'lante, because the future has to be better than the past. I know that within our communities there have been many tears, much lost time, many broken spirits and Pa'lante means for us to continue to be more courageous, stronger fighting the war for a better future.
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