This Latine Heritage month, our “MI History” series -headlights Latin celebrities when they share how their families’ immigration stories shaped who they are -and why telling these stories is crucial to strengthening immigrant societies.
While most of us in the United States have a family’s immigration history – no matter how many generations back – debates about who “deserves” to be here remain ongoing. Too often, immigrant voices, as well as their children, are left outside these conversations – which in turn dehumanizes us.
But for the actress Mishel PradaHer family’s immigration story is a source of pride. She thinks it has shaped her into the woman she is today, and she wants the world to know how powerful these stories can be.
“My (grandmother) Grandma lived in the Dominican Republic and was in a poor violence situation and left,” says Prada Popsugar. “When I have grown older, I have developed so much respect and reverence for my grandmother when she left. She left in the middle of the night with three children as a woman back in the sixties and thought the strength was just like, ‘Nah, we don’t do this, and I’m out.'”
Prada’s grandmother, who was from the island’s capital Santo Domingo, boarded a plane to NYC with his three small children, very little money and no other plan than to get their children into a safe place where they could start over. But for several years, Prada did not know the truth about why her grandmother, her mother and her siblings came here. It was a family secret that had been kept close during the covers for decades.
“My mom always used to say that your grandmother came to New York to work on fashion. She would always frame it that way,” says Prada. “What happened was that my grandmother got a job in a factory, sewing.”
Prada recalls that it wasn’t until adulthood as her mother, that passed away in 2021Began to share her family stories with her. “I would say in recent years before my mom went, I started asking more questions and get more information,” she shares. “I believe in many ways, the women in my family and the people in my family never wanted to be considered victims.”
A story in particular stood for Prada: her grandmother, single mother, often had no choice but to bring her young children to the factory where she worked. As long as they stayed out of the way, the children had to be there. Prada’s mother told her about spending hours that were hidden under her own mother’s sewing machine as a child.
“Eventually my grandmother became really good at sewing on the sequence. She would sew on the sequence for designer dresses,” says Prada. “I always think about it when I dress for an event, and you can see the fine details. It just reminds me a lot about her, and it feels like poetic. It’s like these wonderful dresses that now have to be sent and I have to wear them and yet there is all this hidden work and victims behind it.”
There are other ways that Prada feels linked to the family’s experiences. After seeing her mother leaving an abusive relationship, Prada began to feel that she was supposed to break many of the family’s generation cycles – even before she heard about her grandmother’s trip to the United States. At the age of twenty, Prada was caught in a toxic, co -dependent relationship. It was the strength and resistance of the women in her family that ultimately gave her the courage to go away.
Prada explains that under that relationship she had become financially dependent on her partner. At the same time, her mother – who had also just left a toxic relationship – lost her home to foreclosure and faced her own financial struggle. At one point Prada would participate in a wedding with his boyfriend at that time, who at the last minute decided he could not go.
“I decided that I would just get my mom to come with me. My mom was my date, and at the end of the wedding there was a hotel room that we had reserved, but when we got there, my card did not go,” she says. “And it was just a moment where I realized we had no one to go.”
She continues: “The house we lost to foreclosure at the moment felt like the only safe place we knew to go, so we drove and slept in the car just in front of the house. And I remember I was as a hell, this will never happen again. I realized that I had spent so much time investing in another person … I never recognized.”
When you look back, Prada believes that her Abuela’s story – even before she knew all the details – helped to run her acting career and put her on a different path. Actors had always been a part of her life, from church productions to school games as a child, but it was not until she left the toxic relationship that she persecuted it as a career. In many ways it became a form of healing for her.
“It just created a space to grow and explore our humanity and our stories in ways that feel powerful and not victims or small,” she says.
Prada was only two years old when her grandmother died, but she is grateful that her mother lived long enough to see her not only pursue her dream of becoming an actress but also achieving success in it. She reminds how her mother never missed a chance to tell her how proud she was. Until today, Prada bears it with her, to live in constant gratitude and never take for granted the sacrifices that her grandmother and mother did as an immigrant so she could get the life she does today.
“I think it has also made me take my mental health much more seriously. I think we sometimes do not understand that the strength comes at a cost. That we sometimes would not have to be so strong,” she says. “It’s okay to be soft and vulnerable, and it’s been a big part of what I’ve lost in recent years – how a soft force looks and is not afraid to ask for help when I need it.”
Even the characters she played have often been inspired by the strength of the women in her family, from Emma at “Vida” to Detective Sergeant KD in “The Continental: From The World of John Wick.” Of the latter role, she says, “It’s a woman who has had to be so strong to be able to get there, and that woman only feels forward movement. And I felt very much because I have seen it. I have seen it so much with the women in my family and women in our communities.”
When it comes to immigration talks that are currently happening in this country, Prada wants people first to understand that Latina individuals are not a monolith – and she urges society to lean on each other now more than ever.
“Everyone has a different story. Everyone has another reason for being here, and I think one of the things that has been really tops for me is that it is less about fighting and more about resisting and nurturing,” she says. “We have to pour each other and create strength so that we can care for this moment. It does not mean that you do not advocate for the things you want. It is just a reminder that with what is happening right now, we have to lean to find that strength in ourselves and not outside it.”
Johanna Ferreira is the content director of PS Juntos. With more than ten years of experience, Johanna focuses on how intersectional identities are a central part of Latin culture. Previously, she spent close to three years as vice editor at Hiplatina, and she has freelanced for many stores including Refinery29, Oprah Magazine, Allure, Instyle and Well+Good. She has also moderated and spoken in many panels about Latin identity.
