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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University of California Graduate Admissions for Chicano/Latino students
UC is making slow but steady progress in diversifying the racial/ethnic makeup of its graduate academic students
Enrollment of underrepresented race/ethnic groups (African American, American Indian and Chicano/Latino) in UC’s graduate academic programs has grown over the past decade. In 2012–13, UC awarded academic doctoral degrees to underrepresented racial/ethnic groups at greater percentage rates than did its peers…
Unsurprisingly, Mexicans held a much more favourable view towards the United States before Trump
Within the last 30 years pro-American tendencies, from both Mexican authorities and the general public, brought the United States to be one of the most favored countries of Mexico. However, recent findings from Jesús Velasco show this tendency has reversed due to Donald Trump’s statements about Mexico during his presidential campaign. Today Mexicans are highly anti-Trump, and anti-American. Whether or not this pattern will change in the near future is difficult to say.
Donald Trump’s antagonistic rhetoric toward Mexico has caused an increase in anti-American sentiment among Mexicans.
Today, many in Mexico reject Trump’s policies and fear his administration, citing it as fascist, authoritarian, populist, dictatorial, xenophobic, misogynist or simply an aberration…
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UC-Irvine brings intentionality to its designation as a Hispanic-Serving Institution
The University of California, Irvine is among the latest to earn the “Hispanic-Serving Institution” designation, joining a fast-growing group of U.S. higher education institutions that educate a student body that is at least 25% Hispanic.
And while many colleges and universities become HSIs by accident — simply by virtue of changing demographics — UC-Irvine’s goal of becoming an HSI has been a clear part of its strategic plan. The number of Latino students on UCI’s campus has more than doubled in the last decade, thanks to targeted recruitment efforts and pipeline building…
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Funding awarded for new Latino Center of Excellence
UC Berkeley’s School of Social Welfare has won a five-year $3.4 million grant to fund recruitment, scholarship and research efforts in the school’s new Latino Center of Excellence.
Awarded by the federal Health Resources & Services Administration, the grant will support efforts to boost Latino youth interest in behavioral and mental health and encourage them to pursue undergraduate and/or graduate degrees in social welfare…
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Tampa Chamber of Commerce offers boost to black and Hispanic-owned businesses
Nearly half (48 percent) of all Hillsborough businesses are minority-owned, yet those minority businesses contribute less than 5 percent of the county’s total revenue, according to a study by the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce.
A new Minority Business Accelerator sponsored by the Tampa chamber seeks to fix that by providing black and Hispanic businesses with the skills, resources and networks to grow their businesses..
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UC San Diego is failing in equity and diversity
I recently retired from my position as a student affairs administrator and education studies lecturer after 28 years of service at UCSD. In 1991, along with UCSD alumni, faculty, students and staff, I helped found the UCSD Chicano/Latino Concilio to advocate for the access and success of Chicanos at the elite La Jolla campus. Creating an external organization was necessary as virtually no Chicano voices existed among the UCSD administration or academic senate to increase institutional diversity and equity…
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How Silicon Valley appropriates Mexican-American ideas, plus degrees of assimilation.
Ripping off music and movies? We call it piratería, and we know a guy at the Paramount Swap Meet who has Guardians of the Galaxy 3 on VHS. AirBnB? We’ve been renting out the couch to visitors since the days of the Toltecs. Uber? The aforementioned raiteros, what the gabacho media used to call gypsy cabs. Some app that you can use if you need someone to cut your lawn or fix your clogged toilet? Day laborers. Dia de los Muertos everything? BRUH…and all of this caca will continue…
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The Chicano Studies Program at the University of Texas at El Paso has recently launched a new online Bachelor of Arts in Chicano Studies option enabling students across the United States and around the globe to have access to one of the oldest and most respected Chicano Studies programs in the nation.In 1971, UTEP became the first university in Texas to introduce a Chicano Studies program…Link to article
Highest Honors: UCSB graduating students
For their scholastic achievement, their extraordinary service to the university and the community, and their personal courage and persistence, three graduating seniors at UC Santa Barbara have been named winners of the university’s top awards…
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6 Reasons Corporate America Misses Out On Trillions of Hispanic Dollars
America is changing and becoming more multicultural. A big part of that has been due to the Hispanic market. They are not just a sub-segment of our economy anymore. They have become a powerhouse of economic and political influence. Their purchasing power of over $1.5 trillion is larger than the GDP of Mexico, which is considered one of the top 10 economies in the world…
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The California Promise Program
If you are an Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT) student and a California resident entering SF State University in Fall 2017, you are invited to participate in the California Promise Program
If you are committed to graduating in 2 years, the CA Promise program can help you make that goal a reality. We encourage you to join the CA Promise Program and earn your degree in two years!
Benefits of SF State’s CA Promise Program
After Pledging to the program in your first semester, you will receive:
Priority registration every subsequent semester so that you can enroll in the courses you need to complete your degree program in two years (maximum of 60 units);
Guaranteed course availability with personalized academic plan;
Specialized advising each semester to ensure students stay on track…
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Mexican migrant workers came to California to pick grapes. Now they own wineries.
The Smithsonian recognizes five families who have worked their way up in the U.S. wine industry
Outside Robledo Family Winery, south of Sonoma, on a cool April Sunday, the U.S. and Mexican flags whipped a stiff salute in the wind blowing off the San Pablo Bay. A third banner bore the winery logo. The flags represent three themes central to the lives of Reynaldo Robledo and many other Mexican migrant workers who have helped shape California’s wine industry: heritage, opportunity and family…
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“When My Brother Was An Aztec,” by Natalie Diaz
I don’t think people usually take poetry to the beach, but this is different than your normal poetry book. Diaz is a powerhouse of a writer and this book is a wild ride. It has headlong rushes of ecstatic beautiful language, small details about life on Mahovi reservation. Diaz is Mohavi, one of the tribes of the Colorado river. And this is set in Arizona, but it’s also of course set in her heart and her head. There’s a sensibility that is so dark but so funny. It’s a rich, compelling piece of literature. And I would take it to the dock, put it down, and read it again. It’s the kind of book that you want to live with each poem for awhile…
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How The First Latina Senator Is Putting Congress On Blast
Donald Trump’s presidential victory on Nov. 8, 2016 was an upsetting night for diversity advocates. However, the night was not without its silver linings — and the the election of freshman Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto was one of them.
“I’m proud to be Nevada’s 1st female and our nation’s 1st Latina senator,” tweeted Cortez Masto, who filled Harry Reid’s vacant seat, on election night. “It’s about time our government mirrors the diversity of our nation.”…
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Erasing Borders: The Mexican-American Connecting Students and Mentors
As a young student, I’d wake up around 4 a.m. in Tijuana, Mexico, hustle into the car with my mom and two sisters and spend up to three hours waiting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border. We lived only 15 minutes from the border, but it was a process. Since we were born in San Diego, we could attend a private elementary and middle school in the U.S., which my parents believed would provide more economic opportunity later in life. My dad, who works for the Mexican government, stayed local. My mom is a manager of a health center in San Diego. For her, our school was just a stop on her way to work…
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A Man of Letters
Francisco Lomelí is one of the busiest men in Spanish publishing at the moment. The professor of Chicano and Chicana Studies and of Spanish and Portuguese at UC Santa Barbara has three works out now — a reference book on Latino literature, a revised and updated anthology of essays on Aztlán and a magazine of Latino arts and literature…
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Literary Dynamo
Author of more than 200 publications, books, essays, articles, reviews and short stories, UC Santa Barbara professor Sara Poot-Herrera is known for “always working” — organizing conferences or speaking events on Mexican and Spanish American literature, as well as writing, editing and teaching.
“According to my friends, I don’t sleep,” Poot-Herrera joked. Initially “torn” about missing her apartment and friends in Mexico, she sustains her cultural ties by inviting Mexican writers to speak to her students at UCSB, such as Elmar Mendoza, a key figure in the genre known as narcoliterature — crime fiction. The students, she noted, “were captivated.”…
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10 Interesting Hispanic Facts About Mother’s Day
Motherly love and love for our mothers are inherent human traits. This is why Mother’s Day is celebrated in one way or another around the world, and U.S. Latinos are no exception.
It is no surprise that many product and retail categories spike around the second Sunday of May, and since Latino moms are the fastest growing group of mothers in America, an increasing number of Hispanic advertising campaigns are trying to convince Latinos to use their brand for gifts to honor their moms.
Below you’ll find a list of facts and figures that are interesting and relevant for Hispanic marketing initiatives:…
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Beyond the Spitfire: Re-visioning Latinas in Sylvia Morales’ A Crushing Love 2009
From Dolores del Río to Salma Hayek and from Lupe Vélez to Eva Longoria, the portrayal of
Latinas in the United States has provoked debate, criticism and controversy. Since the era of
silent movies, Hollywood’s depiction of the Latina has been rigidly prescribed and reductive…
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