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The Postcolonial Identity --- by Natalia de Leon '22

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Growing up in Guatemala, I never realized the postcolonial environment that surrounded me until I left for university. My postcolonial identity permeated unto little things. When a friend was proofreading an essay of mine, she brought to my attention that I had not capitalized the word "Indigenous." It did not come from any sort of malicious intent. However, I am proof that little things like that are so subconsciously in your head as an effect of being raised in a postcolonial environment with a privileged postcolonial identity. "The distance enables us to actually more clearly see how our countries operate," says Franklin University Switzerland 's Postcolonial Studies Professor Kate Roy . It was until I left Guatemala that I noticed the lasting effects colonialism has in the country and even on my identity. Of course, I knew that there was strong Spanish influence in Guatemala, but I could not clearly visualize the legacy that colonialism had left absolute