So I understand over time. Spanish people start having kids with native Americans. Eventually Mexicans grew tired of the Spanish rule and didn’t want it anymore. Now when I go to Mexico. I understand people call themselves Mexicans. But when I was there In puerto Vallarta I encountered 2 men who spoke Spanish but also a Native American language. Nahuatl. They referred to themselves as different people. I can’t remember the name. My Mexican cousin referred to them as different people. I thought abt it and I just find it weird that as a Mexican you share the same blood yet you identify as a different nationality or ethnicity. I’ve heard my grandma use the word Huicholes. Shes Mexican as well.
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In the North America, colonists kept themselves isolated from native peoples, so many Native Americans will have ancestors who were all Native Americans.
During the colonization of South and Central America by Spain and Portugal, they didn’t. While native peoples weren’t treated equally, there were marriages and children. Some people can, like the Native Americans in the US have lineages that go back to pre-colonization. While others are mixed, and others are just straight descended from the Spanish.
They don’t usually identify as another nationality but it’s like how the Native Americans are US Citizens, they are also descendants of the pre-colonial people.
I remember my anthropology teacher being really curious about the difference. The Spanish forces were brutal to the natives, but now, hundreds of years later, they are comparatively more abundant than the Native Americans are. Mexico and Peru have the largest populations of indigenous people in all the Americas.
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