Race and Class in the Dominican Republic

Video Transcript

The Dominican Republic is much, is very open, I think, about their kind of accepted racism. And something that surprised me was just how separated the social layers were based upon the color of your skin. And so it's not to say that as a darker skinned person they couldn't succeed or get higher into the society. But in general the European skin, the European hair, believe it or not, hair is a really big deal. That's the higher level of society. That's that one percent that has the top 10% of the income or whatever. And then it goes from there, and then the lowest of the low [are] the Haitians, and typically they're also the darkest [skinned]. And so that kind of, they're very matter of fact about it, almost. It's, so I think initially if you're not prepared for it, it comes as a bit of a shock. They're very open about it.

In this video, a Coast Guard lieutenant commander discusses race and class in the Dominican Republic, after living there.