The Boricua Dialogues

The Boricua Dialogues was born out of a desire to challenge and engage with my identity as a Puerto Rican who does not speak Spanish, does not know how to make arroz con gandules or pasteles, and who was not raised in a Puerto Rican cultural atmosphere. I have always been vaguely uncomfortable in Hispanic environments, perhaps due to the perception that I should feel more at home than I actually do. Building off of my personal history as someone who has wrestled with my Puerto Rican identity, then, this work uses both photography and interviews to construct and articulate aspects of the shared cultural narrative of Puerto Rico between Puerto Ricans on the island and those in America. The goal of this project is not to establish a set definition of being “Puerto Rican,” but rather to bring together a group of Puerto Rican voices into a photo book that highlight the lived experience of being Puerto Rican.