Transcription
Hi, and welcome to this brief lecture introducing Chicana and Chicano history by answering the question, what is a Chicano? As you can see, we use Ruben Salazar's 1970 "El Chicano" column, "Who is a Chicano and What is it That Chicanos Want?"
Very quickly, Ruben Salazar was one of the most prominent Chicano voices in the community. Ruben Salazar was a US Army veteran. He went to college and graduated on the GI Bill. He became an LA Times reporter and KCMX news director, you might know it as KMEX Channel 34. Also, remember this is a time of significant social and economic racism, and to have a voice like Ruben's in the mainstream media is unprecedented. We will thoroughly discuss this later, but Ruben attended the 1970 Chicano Moratorium and was killed by an LA County Sheriff. His head was nearly blasted completely off by a tear gas canister as he was sitting in a bar. But we're very grateful that stuff like that does not happen anymore. Remember, this is written in the height of the Chicano Civil Rights Era.
So, who is a Chicano and what is it that Chicanos want? Keep taking your handout, which is posted on Canvas, and you could also one, read along with this page for the entire article, although it's very small. Two, read along with the handout on Canvas, or three, you can just follow along with my magical voice on this video. I won't read every word, but I'll highlight important passages.
So, who is a Chicano and what is it that Chicanos want? According to Ruben Salazar, starting at column one, "Chicano is a Mexican-American with the image of himself he resents. He resents Columbus discovering America when the Chicano's ancestors, the Maya and the Aztecs, founded highly sophisticated civilizations centuries before Spain financed the Italian explorer's trip to the New World."
Chicanos will tell you that their culture predates that of the Pilgrims, and that Spanish was spoken in America before English. So the problem is not theirs, but the Anglo's. So don't speak Spanish.
They will complain that when the governor dresses up as a Spanish nobleman for the Santa Barbara Fiesta, he's insulting Mexicans because the Spanish conquered and exploited the Mexicans. It's as if the governor dressed like an English Redcoat for a Fourth of July parade.
Chicanos say Chicano is an insulting term, and may even quote the Spanish Academy to prove that Chicano derives from "chicanery." A Chicano will scoff at this and say that such Mexican-Americans have been brainwashed by Anglos and that they're "too taco" Uncle Toms. This type of Mexican-American, Chicanos will argue, don't like the word Chicano because it's abrasive to their Anglo-oriented minds.
What then is a Chicano? Chicanos say that if you have to ask, you'll never understand, much less become a Chicano. Actually, the word Chicano is as difficult to define as soul.
For those who like simplistic answers, and actually this is kind of important, so pay attention. Chicano could be found to be short for Mexicana. For those who prefer complicated answers, it has been suggested that Chicano may have come from the word Chihuahua, the name of a Mexican state bordering on the United States. Getting trickier, this version then contends that Mexicans who have migrated to Texas call themselves Chicanos because having crossed into the United States from Chihuahua, they adopted the first three letters of the state, Chi, and Cano for the later part of Texano.
Mexican-Americans, the second largest minority in the country, and a top contender for the largest in the Southwest states, have always had difficulty making up their minds what to call themselves. In New Mexico, they call themselves Spanish-Americans. In other parts of the Southwest, they call themselves Americans of Mexican descent, people with Spanish surnames, or Hispanic Americans. Average ten years in the Southwest, unlike others, even less. Mexican Americans have to live with the stinging fact that the word Mexican. Chicanos fought the barrio word Chicano as an act of defiance and a badge of honor. Mexican Americans, though large in numbers, are so politically impotent that in Los Angeles, where the country's largest single concentration of Spanish-speaking live, they have not one of their own on the City Council. This, in a city politically sophisticated enough to have three Negro councilmen. Chicanos then are merely fighting to become Americans, yes, but with a Chicano outlook.
Well said. So what is a Chicana? What is a Chicano? It takes some time. Think about it. By the way, a Chicana is a female label, and a Chicano is the male. And while it's common that the male is placed in front of the female, not in this case. In fact, Chicana and Chicano Studies departments are one of the few departments on college campuses that puts the female first and the male last, as a true social justice paradigm.
So, what is a Chicano? What is a Chicana? Let's look at one more source. According to the source, "For many in California in the 1970s, Chicanismo was a way of life, a spiritual calling, and love and respect. And they do it. I couldn't have said that better myself. Duty." What does that mean? In the 1970s, a duty to whom? To social justice and a stronger and better community. Not all those who are brown are Chicanos. Brown is a color. A color cannot love, nor can it have respect. Only a warm human being can love and respect. To be Chicano means to have learned of respect and to have been moved by social injustice to the point where the person sees it as his or her duty to fight wrongs wherever they have been found. If Chicanos acted yesterday, our grandfathers lived with fears and injustice, but today we resist and fight for all that is right and just. So, in the height of the Civil Rights Movement, to be Chicano means to be active and politically aware. It means to do something.
So, what is a Chicana? What is a Chicano? Well, there are many parts to this answer, but let's start here, and feel free to add any elements you like. Keep in mind, this is really focused in the Civil Rights Era. This is the time period that we're talking about. But either way, one, a Chicano lives in the US, is a citizen or resident, for example. Two, but with Mexican heritage and Mexican culture. We're not talking about the experience of Americans in Mexico. This is about US citizens or residents who happen to be of Mexican descent. The Chicano experience in the United States. Be sure, this course, this Chicano history course, this Chicana history course, is a US history course. This isn't a Mexican history course. Three, it's important to stress that Mexican Americans are exactly that: US and Mexican mix, the hybrid, the mestizo. And although it's complicated, the average Chicano is a mestizo. The average Chicano is half Native Mexican, native, and half Spanish. Of course, many people are further mixed or not at all, but let's, let's start here at least.
Let's start at this point. They're not treated like "true Americans." They're treated like hyphenated Americans, just like African Americans. They're having a hard time in this country for obvious reasons that I don't, I don't need to get into right now. Just open your eyes. They weren't accepted into mainstream society. So African Americans resisted and adjusted and planted their cultural flags for hundreds of years. And Chicanos and Chicanas did the same thing. They planted their cultural flag in this country too. Yes, we're from the United States, but made from Mexican parts. We belong here. We've been here for more than 25,000 years. We're native. We're the first ones here. We're the first Americans. Our DNA is unique and distinct to America. We have fought for this country since the American Revolution. We still bleed for this country. A Chicana or Chicano is a social justice activist, a warrior. Racism was palpable in the 1970s, not like today. Anger and racism is over, and everything is beautiful and rainbow shot out of, shine out of every leprechaun's pot of gold. Racism was bad back then, not like today where everything's cool. And it was their duty to end this type of racism and inequality. Chicanos are culturally aware of their heritage, but like many hyphenated Americans, they have to master more than one narrative: white mainstream America and their Mexican cultural roots. They have to know US history and Mexican history better. Infante and Frank Sinatra, litter Richard and Richard balanced, and it's freaking exhausting. As mestizos, Chicanos weren't treated like enfranchised Americans and therefore acted accordingly. One of the results is that is that they reconnected with their Mexican heritage and not their Spanish colonizers. In a way, Mexican Americans have been colonized twice. First by the Spanish, 300 years in Mexico. Then by the English, hundreds of years even before. From Texas to California was sovereign Mexican land before it was invaded by the United States, the most peaceful country on Earth. Chicanos are US residents and citizens, and thus they don't want to take back. They, what they don't want to take it back for Mexico. We are home. This has been our home for 25,000 years. Many of us are born here. We just want to live here as we see fit, as guaranteed by this thing called the Constitution of the United States. And who do Chicanos identify with more? The history and culture of their indigenous past, native to this area for tens of thousands of years, before the Europeans that spawned a genocide in the 15th and Mina, I'm meeting those legs, English legs, right? And even more important, how do people see Mexican Americans? How do people see Chicanos? How are people of color treated in this country? The most peaceful country on Earth. Are Mexican Americans treated like Europeans? Are Mexican Americans treated like Americans or like white Americans? And you know, I was saving this for later, but here we go. Technically and legally, Mexican Americans are classified as white in the United States. That is, Mexican Americans are legally white. They are members of the white race, according to the United States of America. Now, you can take all the time you need with that. Go ahead and hit pause. Do you feel like a white American? Have Chicanos and Chicanas been treated like white Americans? If not, what's a normal human reaction? One of the answers is planting your cultural flag.
And as we end this lecture, the obvious questions are: What is a real American? Why have blacks, Chicanos, Asians, Native Americans, and other people of color historically been shunned from mainstream America? Racism, discrimination, American schools, Native schools, genocide, slavery, Jim Crow, Quan Crow, and all these things. What was the driving cause? Who do they serve? Who did this to all these people that I just mentioned? Who is an American? What do Americans eat? What do they dress like? What music do real Americans listen to? What does it mean to be an American in the 1970s, or in the 2010s, or in the 2020s? Of course, the answer is there is no homogeneous American identity. Americans in Alabama can be as American as Floridians, or people in their house, or in New York, or California, or Oregon. They can eat whatever they want. They can listen to chanting, or or Vanilla Ice. They can go to the doctor. They can put Vicks VapoRuben. Say, "Sana, sana, colita de rana." They can eat pastrami or hot pockets. They can eat Cheetos or regular Cheetos. You can do whatever you want. You're an American.
Now, one of the last things I'll leave you with is the other terms being used to describe Mexican Americans and Chicanos and Chicanas. There are also terms that you should definitely know. Chicana, Chicano: female first, US-based with Mexican roots. Chicano with the X: that cool, new, retro, indigenous spelling. What the heck is like many Machiko words or Aztec spellings? Latina, Latino: the person of Latin descent. Latin America. Hispanic: is a term that you shouldn't use because it emphasizes your European side and downplays your indigenous heritage. This term racializes you as white. Remember, remember, remember, remember, Mexican Americans are legally white. And a term like this enforces this. They would gatekeep the figuration of any cultural or heritage you bring to the table. That is, this is the classic term that says, "Quote, you can be with us only if you forsake everything that your ancestors have taught you." This is similar to what the Spanish did in Mexico 500 years ago. This is a term born in the 1980s. Latinx: as a recent term that is gender-neutral. And Mexican-American: is pretty much what we've been talking about now. That's it.
So, our ancestors have been here for 25 to 30,000 years. They created some of the most amazing societies in the world before it was discovered by Europeans. And that's how we'll start the semester. And we're learning about these things much later. Thank you for watching. I look forward to a great semester. But thanks for watching. Have a great day. I'll talk to you later. Bye.