Latino arts, history and culture
June 24, 2020 An Open Letter to California Governor Gavin Newsom on Ethnic Studies Dear Governor Gavin Newsom: As one of the few tenured Latina/o faculty members at the California State … [Read more...]
I predict that former VP Joe Biden will defeat Pres. Donald Trump, or the “Hustler-in-Chief,” in 2020. Biden can’t win, however, without our help. He reminds me of a fictional story that I’ve … [Read more...]
My late mother, Carmen Mejía Huerta, built her own home, brick by brick, in Mexico. Too poor to secure a piece of the “American Dream” in el norte, during the mid-1980s, while residing in East Los … [Read more...]
“To Survive the Coronavirus, Americans Must Learn from Mexicans” During the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis in the U.S. (and beyond), it behooves Americans to learn from individuals of Mexican … [Read more...]
Nietzsche warned me about gazing too long into the abyss, but I didn’t listen. It gazed back into me. After spending my early years with extended family in Tijuana (Baja California) and Hollywood … [Read more...]
Dr. Alvaro Huerta is a professor of Urban and Regional Planning at California State Polytechnic University at Pomona. In his recent book, Defending Latina/o Migrant Communities in the Xenophobic Era … [Read more...]
Mexicans have officially become members of an endangered or hunted species in the U.S. (I’m not referring to our enormous demographics, as we’ll continue to multiply in el norte—where individuals of … [Read more...]
I have been practicing academic mentorship since I was a 17-year-old freshman at the University of California, Los Angeles (many moons ago). Once accepted into UCLA, I started to mentor high school … [Read more...]
As of January 20, 2019, the United States government remains partially shutdown for one month due to President Donald J. Trump’s insistence of $5.7 billion from Congress to fund his racist and … [Read more...]
The historical ties of Mexican immigrants to the U.S., specifically the Southwest, distinguishes people of Mexican origin from other immigrant groups, especially those from Europe. While Mexican … [Read more...]
In November, the urban planning community in general and Latina/o community in particular experienced a devastating blow with the death of Leo Estrada. As one of the few Latina/o urban planning … [Read more...]
President Donald J. Trump represents an existential threat to immigrants in the United States. Trump’s immigration rhetoric and policies consist of racist, xenophobic, enforcement-only and … [Read more...]
I Am Not Your “Wetback” “Anti-Mexicanism is a form of nativism practiced by colonialists and their inheritors. —Dr. Juan Gómez-Quiñones (2017) To borrow—more like steal—from the great James … [Read more...]
If Democratic leaders make a deal with President Donald J. Trump on his "s---hole" border wall, they will secure his re-election in 2020. (Here, I’m borrowing a word, "s---hole" or “shithole,” from … [Read more...]
Democratic leaders should unite and stand firm against President Donald J. Trump—“Racist-in-Chief” and “Hustler-in-Chief”—and the complicit Republican leaders on passing a clean DACA bill. A clean … [Read more...]
A Chicana/o Manifesto on Community Organizing: Reflections of a Scholar-Activist As an urban planning and ethnic studies scholar with an extensive background in community activism—over the past … [Read more...]
The "War on Immigrants": Racist Policies in the Trump Era President Donald J. Trump and his administration’s immigration agenda centers on draconian, enforcement-based policies and executive orders, … [Read more...]
On September 15, 2016, in an essay titled “The Hustler: Trump and the Mean Streets of East Los Angeles,” I argued that then-presidential candidate Donald J. Trump was hustling the American public. … [Read more...]
I'm the son of Mexican immigrants, but I ain’t no anchor baby. My late father, Salomon, first migrated to the United States during the 1950s via the Bracero Program, in which more than 4.6 million … [Read more...]
After failing to predict the 2016 U.S. presidential election, I recently attended and returned from our monthly Mexican meeting in Los Angeles, California. At these monthly meetings, all individuals … [Read more...]
He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee. ― Friedrich Nietzsche When you grow up … [Read more...]
