'Mexicans will take the jobs that even blacks won't do': an analysis of blackness, regionalism and invisibility in contemporary Mexico

Mexico's unique form of mestizaje has successfully excluded Afro-descendants from Mexican national imaginary for decades, treating Afro-Mexicans as though they do not exist. However, there is a small population of Afro-Mexicans that reside primarily in Mexico's two coastal regions. So how do coastal Mexicans understand blackness? Using ethnographic and interview data, I show that while Mexico as a nation does not have systemic racial ideologies that incorporate blackness, distinct local ideas of blackness do exist within rural coastal Mexico, and are constructed, in part, through this national invisibility. Moreover, I argue that these local understandings are subject to transnational processes as Afro-Mexican immigration to the USA grows. The racial meanings produced among Afro-Mexican migrants in the USA circulate back to Mexico and reshape racial identities. This process highlights both the persisting role of race and mestizaje in constructing Mexican national identity.