Olivia Cadaval: ‘Latino’ is a form of cultural citizenship
By hola | Published | 2 Comments
Dr. Olivia Cadaval, Hola Cultura’s Humanities Scholar, is a folklorist and curator at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. While a graduate student at George Washington University in the 1970s, she began investigating and writing about Washington’s Latino community, developing an interest in la comunidad that she continues to cultivate.
We talked with Olivia about the ever-evolving nature of culture and how the District’s Latino community has changed over the years.
HOLA CULTURA: When did the term “Latino” first start being used in Washington, D.C.?
OLIVIA: In interviewing people and talking to them, I think I contributed to constructing that term in the early 1970s as the community began to define itself and mark its place.. People began to refer to each other as Latino, when they started to organize the festival (a precursor of Fiesta DC). At that time, they called it the Latin American festival, so you can see where they were coming from. It gave people a sense of belonging, of solidarity.
HC: Has “Latino” overtaken the term “Hispanic” in the popular vernacular in recent years?
O: Latino has blossomed. Everyone identifies with Latino. It’s a much friendlier term than Hispanic. Hispanic is associated more with the Census, Latino has more of a cultural sense to it. Latino, I would say, has been co-opted but in a very healthy way, so that you can now ask, ‘What is it to be an American? Is it to be a Latino?’ Latino is now associated with being an American.
It has become a form of cultural citizenship in this country.
HC: Since Washington’s community hails from so many different countries, did the term Latino prove a particularly good fit here?
O: Yes. “Latino” might be adopted in other places but it’s a self-definition here. The term was first used by Chicanos and Puerto Ricans in Chicago in the 1950s as a tool for civic and political organization.
It was totally strategic. It wasn’t about saying, ‘We’re this kind of people or that kind of people.’ It was about saying, ‘We are Spanish speaking. We are minorities. We have to do something to pool our forces.’ And probably they learned a lot from the black Civil Rights Movement.
HC: How are second-generation Latinos changing the Latino identity?
O: It’s O.K. now to not to speak Spanish and be Latino. They are the first generations that are American. Most of their parents probably had to work cleaning offices or hotels because of the language barrier. Their kids are going to college and there’s been a blossoming of the arts too. They are building the bridges to their parents.
HC: But does cultural assimilation lead to a withering of the home country connection?
O: I don’t think it is assimilation. I think it’s the construction of a new culture. If you take a look at the kids of Latino origin and the kids of non-Latino origin, they are different. They have different values and different ways of understanding each other.
So it’s not a matter of assimilating to something that we think is American. Culture is very diverse and continually being adapted and transformed. We—both Latinos and non-Latinos—are creating what contemporary culture is. And it’s always contested; who has the right to create culture? That’s why the criticism of the Spanish Embassy’s exhibition is so interesting. Latinos now seem strong enough to contest some embassy coming in and defining “Latino.” That is a change. Having the force to say, ‘Hey wait a minute!’
Not that it’s easy to define what it is to be Latino. I can ask any friend of mine and it’s always interesting because it’s never a homogeneous thing. There’s room for a diversity of perspectives.
That’s why “Latino” going to last longer and maybe it’s going to transform the country. It’s not this linear, homogenous way of forcing everyone into the same mold.
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