Dos Mundos (Two Worlds)
2024 WPOW Butterfly Grant winner - Olga Jaramillo
Inspired by Olga’s maternal Colombian family's experience of displacement during the period of La Violencia in the 1950s, Dos Mundos shares the intimate stories of four mothers from El Salvador and Honduras who immigrated to the U.S. to escape poverty, unemployment, political conflict, and violence. This ongoing multimedia documentary project, begun in Maryland in 2019 and expanded to Honduras in 2023, examines the intergenerational impact of their migration on their families in the United States, as well as on their families and communities in their hometowns.
Like many immigrants, these mothers inhabit two fragmented worlds: the hometowns they left behind and the towns and cities in the U.S. where they now live and work. Do they call both worlds—the places that have shaped their experiences and identities—home? With whom do they build close relationships that make them feel at home? What limits their sense of belonging in both worlds? Where are they rooted, and where do they truly belong?
Connecting with the human experience of these mothers—from the intimate places, both here and there, that have shaped them, where their stories, beliefs, rituals, and memories were born and continue to live—creates a bridge between two fragmented worlds.
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Sara Raquel S., born and raised in El Salvador, and a permanent resident of the U.S., cleans her Hyattsvile, Maryland, apartment when she has a day off from work. Sara Raquel puts wooden plant stakes to an indoor plant before leaving for the Washington, D.C., neighborhood where her mother, María M., lives on October 7, 2020. * Last names withheld intentionally.
Children watch as rides are set up in the main square of Apacilagua, Honduras, during the San Pedro festivities on June 20, 2024.
Vicky A. born and raised in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, stands in her home in Silver Spring, Maryland, and holds photos that she took of her children, Yohenlí, 7, left; Victoria, 5, middle; and Raul, 2, right, also born in San Pedro Sula, Honduras a few days before she crossed the Mexican border to the United States in 2003.
Carlos P., 31, born and raised in El Salvador, holds his newborn Maddison's hand on July 11, 2023, while his partner, Claudia J., born and raised in El Salvador, looks at her newborn daughter. Claudia J. was hospitalized before the due date on July 10, 2023, due to elevated sugar levels in her blood. Encouraging Claudia since labor started, Carlos P. was by Claudia's side the whole time they were at the hospital in Lake Arbor, MD.
Gael Izaguirre celebrates his 5th birthday with his family in Apacilagua, Honduras, on June 20, 2024. Gael’s mother, Norlin Izaguirre, runs a beauty salon in her parents’ home, where she lives with her children. Her income is not enough to cover all monthly expenses. With the help of her family and relatives living and working in the United States, Norlin was able to throw her son a birthday party similar to those celebrated in the U.S.
Digna Coralia A. (also known as Mami Coralia), 55, gives her 7-month-old great-grandson, Axel B., a sunbath for 10 minutes after bathing him on July 31, 2020, just as she did with her children when they were babies in their native country of El Salvador. Mami Coralia takes care of her great-grandson when his parents are at work. * Last names withheld intentionally.
Claudia J. checks her daughter Allison P.J's hair to remove head lice. Claudia says that there is an infestation of hair lice at Allison's school. Although Claudia washes Alison's hair with a shampoo to eliminate lice, she is convinced that the only way to completely eradicate them is by removing them by hand, just as her mother did with her and her siblings when they were children in El Salvador. * Last names withheld intentionally.
Nine-year-old Alison P.J. takes a Spanish dictation from her mother, Claudia J., 24, at their Adelphi, MD, home on October 13, 2023. Claudia J. communicates with Alison in Spanish and does not want her to lose their native language. * Last names withheld intentionally.
Vicky A., 46, applies red lip gloss to her 4-year-old niece Sofia, allowing her to play dress-up on February 13, 2020. Vicky A., taker her of her nieces and nephews when she has the day off from work and her sister Bessy is at work. * Last names withheld intentionally.
Don Eliseo Baquedano, 109, was the oldest person in his hometown of Apacilagua, Honduras, in 2023. Baquedano lies in bed after suffering a femur fracture in April 2023. Due to his advanced age and the low likelihood of surviving surgery, doctors decided not to operate, sending him home under the care of his daughter, Aracelly Castillo, 66, also a native of Apacilagua, Honduras.
Claudia J. grows tomatoes in her Adelphi, Maryland, home from spring to autumn. As a child, Claudia accompanied her parents to the market every day from 3 a.m. to 7 a.m. to sell tomatoes they grew on their farm in El Salvador. To remember her father, who lives in El Salvador, Claudia transplanted a tomato plant from the kitchen garden to an area close to the house in the summer of 2022. *Last names withheld intentionally
Following a rural Honduran tradition, Doña Alejandrina Rodríguez, 66, gave a hen to her neighbor Belqui Izaguirre on April 3, 2023. Izaguirre planned to prepare soup for her visitors during Easter. The hen was left loose in the patio, wandered into the kitchen and eventually flew to a neighboring home.
Don Colacho Sánchez, 67, y Doña Cándida Rosa Herrera, 67, pose for a portrait in their bedroom of their house in Apacilagua, Choluteca, on July 4, 2024Don Colacho Sánchez, 67, y Doña Cándida Rosa Herrera, 67, pose for a portrait in their bedroom of their house in Apacilagua, Choluteca, on July 4, 2024.
Angélica A., 48, born and raised in El Salvador, decorates a Christmas tree with her four-year-old granddaughter Ava, born in the United States., on December 7, 2021. Decorating a Christmas tree was not a tradition in Angélica’s family when she lived in El Salvador. However, following the family’s reunification two years after she and her husband, Dimas G., immigrated to the U.S., the family adopted the custom.