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revisited</title></head><body>
<div>Synchronicity at work once again.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Last night, Rima goes</div>
<div>===========</div>
<div><font
color="#000000">Date:
Tue, 6 Feb 2001 23:47:59 -0800<br>
From: Kim & Rima McKinzey <rkm@SLIP.NET><br>
Subject: Re: people of color &
Chicano<br>
<br>
Actually, I would like to know why "Hispanic" is
offensive. My<br>
impression has been that Chicano/a referred to Mexican-Americans
and<br>
that Latino/a referred to those from other Latin or South
American</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">Spanish speaking countries...</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">====================</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">and this morning I go</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">=============</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">Date: Wed, 7 Feb 2001 09:15:52
+0800</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">From: Laurence Horn
<laurence.horn@yale.edu><br>
Subject: Re: people of color & Chicano<br>
<br>
Leaving aside the question of offensiveness, on the referential side
I'd argue, as would the AHD4--<br>
<br>
LATINO<br>
1. A Latin American.<br>
2. A person of Hispanic, especially Latin-American, descent, often
one living in the United States.<br>
<br>
--that "Latino" does NOT criterially exclude
Mexican-Americans (any more than "finger" criterially
excludes thumbs); given the existence and salience of the term
"Chicano", those Latinos/as who hail from Mexico will
predictably tend to be called Chicanos/as, particularly when the more
specific information is relevant.<br>
=============</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">so I'm reading my detective novel* at the
gym an hour ago and I come across this passage:</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">"Behind the desk was a swarthy woman
of about forty...She was a<b> Latina</b> of some variety, but
probably not a Puerto Rican. Her skin had a cinnamon sheen to
it, her cheekbones were broad and sharp, and her mouth had that
lovely, lanceolate sculpting of the lips that said<b>
Mexico.</b>"</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">(emphasis added) So
"Latina" here clearly covers "(probably)
Chicana/Mexican-American". Now I should in fairness add
that the story is set in New York, and the narrator (and probably the
author) are New Yorkers; "Chicano/a" is far less salient as
a classifying term around here than it is in California,
say. </font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">So I'm heading up the stairs to my
office to report this finding and I see a poster for a new course in
American Studies and History, "The History of Latinos in the
United States". Checking in the Yale blue book, I find
that this seminar includes a "primary focus on Mexican American,
Puerto Rican, and Cuban communities". The same instructor
offers another more narrowly focused course in "Chicano Cultural
History". A different American Studies instructor, on the
other hand, offers a course in "The Politics of Identity in
Latino and Chicano U. S. Literature". Go know.</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">larry</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">*_Falsely Accused_, Robert K. Tanenbaum,
1996</font></div>
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