El Otro Lado
(The Other Side)
What does it mean to be bicultural?
How has it shaped your life?
These were just some of the questions posed to our Latinx Employee Resource Group (ERG) members as we sat on a Zoom call brainstorming ideas to celebrate Latinx Heritage Month.
We discovered that we all shared the same experience. We had two sides of ourselves: one side that comes to work, speaks English and contributes the culture of the agency, and another side that is rarely seen, which may speak another language, care for extended family and seamlessly manage two separate personas at any given moment.
Our shared experiences led us to create “El Otro Lado” (The Other Side), an Instagram series that recognized our bicultural identities through personal stories that richly shaped our lives. In partnership with four Latinx artists from around the world, we brought these stories to life through inverted images, which aimed to encourage viewers to flip their phones upside down to experience the other side of the story – illustrating the complexities, yet beauty, in bicultural identities. By sharing a glimpse of ourselves, we help others gain a better understanding of “el otro lado.”
Special shout-out to Latinx ERG members Eneida Elenes, Josh Noa, Montse Barrena, Karina Azevedo and Ivan Perez-Armendariz for sharing their inspiring stories.