‘Hispanic’ label a creation of politicians
Lexington Herald-Leader
By Abdon Ibarra
CONTRIBUTING COLUMNIST
Recently, the Web site for Black Entertainment Television posed the question: “Does it bother you that Hispanics now outnumber African-Americans in the U.S.?”
Mireya Navarro reported in her New York Times article that the response was “torrential.” She wrote that the responses included, “Blacks are beginning to experience another wave of racial bias and favoritism not in our favor.” One said that employers now have a preference for bilingual workers and lamented “attempts to replace our threatening stance against discrimination with a Hispanic vote.”
But one surmised: “Sounds like the same old trick to me. ‘Divide and conquer.’ Are we really going to let some numbers dictate how we treat one another?”
Before we can constructively consider the bridges of trust and respect that must be built between the two communities, we must examine the substance of the “numbers” and of the term “Hispanics” that have caused so much turmoil. Further, are Hispanics a race or even language group?
err, race. but a race with no established name ie, latino, latin american, hispanic etc…
6/2/2004 12:19:09 PM
Latino pundit stop playing naive. Hispanic/Latino is not a race, but a catch-all, pan-ethnicity of many races created to increase their statistical population for politics.
6/5/2004 4:57:28 AM
Not a race? …many races? I wouldn’t think that there is a Mexican race and a Venezuelan race but that the two are one race under the pan-ethnic label “Hispanic” or “latino” or well that is the question. Yes it was created and is a catch-all. To say we are white or black undermines or unique race.
7/12/2004 10:13:15 AM