Every Day is Magic: Ada Limón
In her 2015 collection, Bright Dead Things, a National Book Award finalist for poetry, Ada Limón writes of moving to Kentucky: “Confession: I did not want to live here.” It’s perhaps not a surprising sentiment coming from a coastally oriented person who was raised in Northern California, attended college in Seattle, and then spent over a decade in New York City.
But Limón and her husband, Lucas, have been in Lexington for seven years now and the effects of settling into this place are noticeable in her new book, The Carrying (Milkweed, Aug.). It’s a phenomenally lively and attentive collection replete with the trappings of living a little closer to nature. While Bright Dead Things is marked by a preponderance of light, such as images of fireflies and neon signs, The Carrying features numerous appearances by various trees, birds, and beetles. Limón also demonstrates a greater willingness to be explicit in naming colors, particularly green. “It’s crazy green, the whole book,” she says. “Lexington is the greenest place I’ve ever lived.” Similarly, where in Bright Dead Things, Limón tells a lot of stories and anecdotes, in The Carrying she is very present in her thoughts and experiences.
As it turns out, these shifts in focus have another, altogether unexpected source. While putting Bright Dead Things together, Limón was diagnosed with chronic vestibular neuronitis, which can cause bouts of vertigo. “If I’m really having vertigo, it’s pretty intense and I really have to focus,”
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Chico State activist wins Student Advocate of the Year
Chico State student Karla Camacho recently won the California State Student Association (CSSA) award for Student Advocate of the Year for her lobbying efforts in support of students who are part of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, student mental health, student food and housing insecurity and funding for the CSU system…
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Why don’t you look or act ‘Latino’?
Imagine having to wear a shirt for the rest of your life that labels you as someone you’re not
Now, imagine always having to check a box and identify yourself with people who are completely different from you. You never say your name or your origin, yet others readily assume who you are and where you are from.
This is what nearly 57 million Latinos in the United States have to live with, and if trends continue, by 2050, 106 million of them will have to live while wearing this shirt wherever they go.
I have never identified as a “Latino” until I came to the United States. Growing up in Venezuela and moving directly to Princeton, I have never in my life used, or even considered using, the term “Latino.” I was technically Latino whenever I filled out a box describing my race for a college application, because that is how the United States functions. We all knew we were technically Latino and brothers and sisters in the same continent, but it was more of a term that had been placed in our heads due to globalization, not because we decided to use it. We were all brothers and sisters in the South American continent, but we were not the same. At the end of the day, I was Venezuelan first, and then I was Latino…
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Hispanic dropout rate hits new low, college enrollment at new high
The high school dropout rate among U.S. Hispanics has fallen to a new low, extending a decades-long decline, according to recently released data from the Census Bureau. The reduction has come alongside a long-term increase in Hispanic college enrollment, which is at a record high.
The Hispanic dropout rate was 10% in 2016, with about 648,000 Hispanics..
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Latino community mourning loss of an “exceptional” couple known for helping others
KALAMAZOO, Mich. — Juan Muniz was always helping people in the city’s Latino community, said their friends at El Concilio. Whether it was addressing the needs of the people on the radio or helping a senior citizen find employment, he was doing something to serve others.
“He definitely was someone who was constantly on the move, trying to find ways of helping people,” said Lissette Mira-Amaya with a smile. “And so ways Maria. We cannot forget Maria.”
Muniz’s wife — who also went by Mary — was always by his side, said Mira-Amaya who’s known them for decades. According to police they were both tragically killed Tuesday night in a car crash…
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Anthony Acevedo, U.S. Army medic who endured prison-camp horrors during WWII, dies at 93
During the winter of 1944-45, Anthony Acevedo was a 20-year-old Army medic assisting wounded soldiers fighting against Nazi forces in World War II. The war in Europe was coming to an end, but for Mr. Acevedo the horror was just beginning.
His ordeal in German prison and labor camps, which he kept hidden for decades, led to his recognition as the first Mexican American soldier to be designated a Holocaust survivor…
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HSBC Highlights Corporate Optimism’s Resilience Over Global Trade Uncertainty
Protectionism has cast a shadow of uncertainty over global traders, and North America’s trade relationships are in flux.
Early in President Donald Trump’s presidency, the U.S. withdrew from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. One year later, the nation’s participation in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is also changing as the U.S., Canada and Mexico engage in negotiations that are expected to continue through April, according to Bloomberg reports this week.
Despite ongoing change and uncertainty, however, new analysis from HSBC finds corporates across North America remain confident in their future global trading operations…
…Eighty-seven percent of Mexican professionals, 77 percent of U.S. professionals and 70 percent of Canadian professionals say they are optimistic about increasing cross-border trade volume over the next year…
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Seeking better data on Hispanics, Census Bureau may change how it asks about race
Federal officials are considering major changes in how they ask Americans about their race and ethnicity, with the goal of producing more accurate and reliable data in the 2020 census and beyond. Recently released Census Bureau research underscores an important reason why: Many Hispanics, who are the nation’s largest minority group, do not identify with the current racial categories…
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Indigenous Poetry in Contemporary Mexico: Voices, Translations, Cultures
Event Date:
Thursday, April 5, 2018 – 12:30pm to 1:30pm
Event Contact:
Lety Garcia, Programs and PR Manager
805-893-2951 or lgarcia@museum.ucsb.edu
As part of the Conference “Verbal Kaleidoscope” hosted by the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, several contemporary poets from Mexico, including the renowned Mazatec poet and Director of the Mexican Institute of Indigenous Languages (INALI), Juan Gregorio Regino, and prominent Zapotec poet Irma Pineda Santiago will read from their work written in indigenous languages (including their own translations into Spanish and English). This is a great opportunity to listen to these new voices that are re-defining the literary landscape of Latin America today…
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Growing minority student population contrasts largely white faculty
More than 60% of faculty, administrators and board members in California’s public two-year and four-year institutions are white, but more than 60% of students are racial minorities, according to a new report from The Campaign for College Opportunity…
Posted in Education, Front Page Items
Question of race not simple for Mexican Americans, author says
Those are assumptions drawn from the experience of European Americans, but they don’t match with the experience of Latinos, particularly those of Mexican origin in Texas, according to Dowling, the author of the new book “Mexican Americans and the Question of Race” (University of Texas Press).
For most European Americans, marking “white” likely means they experience little discrimination based on their racial background, Dowling said. For a Mexican American, it’s often a response to discrimination. “It’s for them a way of saying, ‘I belong, I’m an American citizen, and I want to be recognized as such,’ ” she said.
Her case in point: the border counties of southern Texas. Most are more than 80 percent Latino, and more than 80 percent of those Latinos marked “white” on the 2010 census…
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UTEP’s New Online Chicano Studies Program Growing March 11, 2018
An online multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary program that offers intuitive understanding of the dynamics of the U.S.-Mexico border and the Latino presence in the U.S. is gaining momentum at The University of Texas at El Paso.
Dr. Dennis Bixler-Márquez, director of Chicano Studies at UTEP, said a new Chicano Studies degree there allows students to learn about U.S.-Mexico economics, culture, history and arts…
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Stanford Study: Latino Startups Are Growing In Numbers But Are ‘Underbanked’
An annual Stanford study — known as the State of Latino Entrepreneurship — arrived this year with its usual mix of good news and bad news for Latino entrepreneurs and their supporters.
The good news: the growth rate of Latino businesses in the US continues to outpace that of other groups. The bad news: as in previous years, the Stanford study reported that a disproportionate few of those Latino businesses are growing beyond the $1 million annual revenue mark, the Stanford threshold for a “scaled business.”…
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A family saga with bounding heart, poetic delivery and plenty of swagger
Luis Alberto Urrea’s “The House of Broken Angels” is a big, sprawling, messy, sexy, raucous house party of a book, a pan-generational family saga with an enormous, bounding heart, a poetic delivery and plenty of swagger. It’s not perfect — in fact, even its flaws are big — but it stays with you, and it stands as a vital reminder of the value of fiction in defining the immigrant experience…
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Latinos grab spotlight at Oscars, and hope to hold it
NEW YORK (AP) — The 90th annual Academy Awards were, by any definition, a moment of triumph for Latinos.
Guillermo del Toro became the third Mexican-born filmmaker to win best director, and it was his lavish Cold War fantasy “The Shape of Water” that was crowned best picture. Pixar’s box-office smash “Coco,” the biggest budget studio release to feature a largely Hispanic cast, won best animated feature and best song. Lin-Manuel Miranda reminded viewers of Puerto Rico, rebuilding from Hurricane Maria. Lupita Nyong’o advocated for the Dreamers. Rita Moreno returned, resplendently, in the dress she wore to the Oscars in 1962. And Chile’s “A Fantastic Woman” won best foreign language film…
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Undocumented Student Program provides #UndocuBruins funds to students
The Undocumented Student Program provided $500 in financial aid for each of 19 undocumented students using crowdfunded money collected last quarter.
USP is using funds from the #UndocuBruins campaign to provide financial support for undocumented students, helping them renew their Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status, said Paolo Velasco, director of the Bruin Resource Center. The #UndocuBruins campaign, which was created by the Undergraduate Students Association Council’s General Representative 1 office and USP, raised approximately $16,000 last quarter to provide scholarships for undocumented students…
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News flash! The Oscars are still so white. Just take a look at the most excluded group
After the #OscarsSoWhite outcry, we’re seeing glimmers of hope in Hollywood — with black actors, writers and directors nominated in multiple categories this year. But when it comes to Hispanic-Americans and Asian-Americans, the Academy Awards still have a long way to go to flip the script.
Take a look at this chart. It’s a look at 90 years of Academy Award winners in the major categories. While representation takes many forms, for ease of comparison we looked at US Census data and compared that with representation in Hollywood films. And what you see is that even as African-Americans have fared better in recent years, Hispanic-Americans and Asian-Americans are woefully underrepresented…
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Center for Mexican-American Studies creates home for students
As a first generation student from Laredo, Texas, Ilse Colchado felt out of place when she began her college journey. She felt underrepresented and lost — until she found her home at the Center for Mexican-American Studies.
The Hispanic population makes up 20 percent of UT’s student body, according to UT’s 2017–2018 Statistical Handbook. Colchado, Mexican-American studies and anthropology junior, said her transition was difficult because she came from an environment with a majority Hispanic population to an environment where she was in the minority.
“I didn’t feel represented as a brown student, and so I added Mexican-American studies after my first year,” Colchado said. “That was where I felt like I belonged on campus, especially with having professors of color who integrated their own stories of survival.”…
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50 years after the Walkouts, Los Angeles Latino students are still fighting for educational equity
Before there were Dreamers, thousands of young Latinos marched out of their East Los Angeles classrooms half a century ago for their right to be educated.
“I was never told I was college material or capable of aspiring for something better,” said Bobby Verdugo, one of the leaders of the 1968 Chicano student movement known as “Walkouts or Blowouts.”
“Dreamers are being marginalized today. They are being treated like they don’t belong here, like they are not wanted. That’s how we felt 50 years ago,” Verdugo said.
March 1 marks the 50th anniversary of what has been called the nation’s first major mass protest against racism by Mexican-Americans. More than 15,000 students from Roosevelt, Wilson, Garfield, Lincoln, and Belmont high schools walked out of their classrooms to challenge the inequalities in Los Angeles public schools. Fifty years later, their bold action has reaped educational gains for Latinos, but they haven’t come fast enough, advocates say…
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Olympics 2018: Bobsledder Carlo Valdes shares his Must List, including The Hulk and ‘Clash Royale’
In the USA, the most famous bobsledders might still be the guys from Cool Runnings, but as one of the only Latino and Mexican Americans competing in the 2018 Olympics, Carlo Valdes might just be out to change all that. The 28-year-old athlete hails from Newport Beach, Calif., and competed as a javelin thrower for UCLA before switching sports to bobsledding…
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The Line Becomes a River: Dispatches from the Border, reviews
“It is a lament for what a broken immigration system does to families, and its final third is a riveting, heartbreaking exploration of one such case … His lyrical asides about the border, from the history of its creation to quotations of poets who’ve written about it, are passionately delivered and speak to his urge to give nameless migrants an identity. But he spends less time scrutinizing the institutions that create the namelessness. His discussion of the Mexican government’s bloody escalation of the war against the cartels only glancingly mentions the U.S. government’s implication in it or the way border crackdowns only made crossing the border more expensive and risky. The imperfection of Cantú’s approach, though, mirrors the messiness of the crisis he’s facing.”…
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