Colonial Mindset in Society

Analyzing how Colonialism has Impacted Puerto Rican Sense of Identity

Abstract

The knowledge of colonialism and its psychological effects on the Puerto Rican populace is imperative to comprehend the island’s attitudes, mentalities, and behaviors towards its colonial system. The development of a Puerto Rican colonial mentality has origins rooted in the island’s colonial history and political structures, which have resulted in its manifestation through attitudes of assimilation as well as resistance towards external cultural factors. The previously mentioned Puerto Rican attitudes are becoming increasingly significant as the island’s political tension increments alongside the need to conceptualize the predominant political ideologies within their origins as expressions of the Puerto Rican mentality and psyche. Puerto Rico’s colonial past and interactions with external cultural forces have impacted Puerto Ricans’ relationships and associations with cultural and national identity, their construction of self-concept, and their perspectives on the Puerto Rican collective. Mentalities of internalized inferiority have been found in circles of the Puerto Rican population as being connected to the island’s colonial status. Puerto Rican identity has nevertheless developed independently and distinctly from its colonial forces.