“Why can't you people just all be Hispanic?" Same reason that all white people can't just be called English. Just because you speak English or Spanish does not mean that you are one group. Hispanic is a census term that some dildo in a government office made up to include all Spanish-speaking brown people. It is especially annoying to Chicanos because it is a catch-all term that includes the Spanish conqueror. By definition, it favors European cultural invasion, not indigenous roots. It also includes all Latino groups, which brings us together because Hispanic annoys all Latino groups.”
—Cheech Marin
This. This. A million times this.
“I wear my culture on my skin. They want to make me forget who I am, the beauty of my people and my heritage, but to do it they got to peel my skin off. And if they ever do that, they’ll kill me doing it— and that’s good, because once they make you forget the language and history, they’ve killed you anyway. I’m alive and free, no matter how many bars they put me behind. ”
—Jimmy Santiago Baca
“I felt no shame. Only one thought had passed through my mind when I had taken off my last piece of clothing and stood naked: I belong to myself. I was not like my mother who had to get permission of all her relatives and ancestors before making any decisions about her life. She was ruled by ghosts and their dead words: La decencia, el sacrificio, el deber de la mujer buena, para la familia. But in the end, had all these magic formulas saved any of us from pain? It was time to learn a new language. ”
—-Consuelo from, Meaning of Consuelo by Judith O. Cofer
This book is a must read for all young Latinas!!
