Lana Del Rey
Lana’s portrayal of Latino/Cholo culture in her short film 'Tropico’ is only a small piece of the actual stereotyped depiction of Latino American culture, but it is still a huge issue, due to her enormous, young adult following. As a woman of Hispanic descent, I do not feel offended because cholo culture is not one that I feel represents an entire culture of people, or even specifically my cultural group. Of course, we should make the space for actual Latinas/Latinos to speak about whether this image that Lana is portraying is actually an act of cultural appropriation. If a Latina says it’s fine with her, then end of argument right? I also think that we need to shift the focus to what Lana is trying to do. Is Lana celebrating Latino culture or cholo/gangster culture? How do we know if she’s celebrating it or exploiting it? How do we know if white people genuinely want to celebrate an oppressed group’s culture or are further exoticize it? Spreading awareness of cultures is a great thing for a celebrity to do, especially through film or through song. The world, as in every country and continent, could use more exposure to the customs, traditions and histories of foreign countries. The problem here is how to do it tastefully, and where the line should be drawn between cultural awareness, and just plain wrong. Using another person or culture as an outfit to make your art edgy is in poor taste. That it is. Del Rey’s Tropico is most definitely in poor taste. If she is trying to make a point of spreading cultural awareness, she’s doing an extremely bad job of it. Her 27-minute video features herself dressed in the style of a Latin-American gangster, amongst many other strange and inexplicable references, including religious ones. On top of the weird costume, it is unclear exactly what Del Rey is trying to convey through the appropriation, and through the whole video. This only serves to exaggerate her inapt use of the Latino style. Glamorization is the perfect word for what Del Rey has done. So is stereotype. To pay homage is one thing, but throwing clichéd references to the Latino gangster culture into a video, and pasting them on a Caucasian female who was educated at a posh boarding school, is not only strange, but also unfitting. While I don’t find these ladies’ culture appropriation personally offensive, I can see how easily the references can be taken out of context and used as props. A main issue is her name is not actually Lana Del Rey, but Lizzy Grant, which she changed to sound more “exotic” and because it “sounded good rolling off the tongue” and a reason many members of the Latin American community find this irritating and frustrating is thousands of Latinos have to face deportation and profiling just due to foreign names, so why should a wealthy white woman get to profit off the struggles of actual Latinos, moreover she profits off stereotypes of Latin American culture without having to deal with any of the consequences of actually living it.
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