In this article, I argue that mestizo immigrants from the Mesoamerica region experience a low socioeconomic tracking compounded by a racialized subordinating discourse in the United States. These immigrants come over to the United States from a region where social stratification and racial prejudice are based more on cultural and linguistic differentiation than on pigmentation. Once in their new surroundings, mestizo immigrants live a reversal of power relations as well as a new cultural regime that places them in a secondary social role.Key words: diasporic studies, race theory, identity formation theory, identity and education, immigration, Latina/Latino/Chicano culture, people of color and socialization I'd marry a black guy immediately, just like that. But not even dead I'd marry an indian.-A Guatemalan ladino woman. 1Comments like the preceding one are not out of the ordinary in today's identity politics of Guatemala. Such comments indeed reflect the torturous and sad terrain of postcolonial racial discourse in which gender, race, and class constructs appear profoundly linked and expressed in daily interaction among Guatemalans. How-
JOURNAL OF LATINOS AND EDUCATION, 3(4), 251-265Copyright © 2004, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.Requests for reprints should be sent to Gilberto Arriaza, San Jose State University, College of Education, Educational Leadership Department, One Washington Square, San Jose, CA 95192-0072. E-mail: garriaza@email.sjsu.edu 1 Ladino is the ethnic identifier for those of mixed ancestry and/or who have adopted urban and westernized cultural traits. Indian, the opposite to ladino, is the ethnic identifier for people who claim Mayan ancestry and/or exhibit cultural traits associated with the Mayan culture (clothing, language, etc.). Ladino and mestizo are used in this article as interchangeable names.