What's a Latino?

So, I'm on my way to dinner at Carlito's and I get a call from a family member, that I won't name, who asks "Are Cubans and Puerto Ricans Latino?"

Which brings us to an interesting discussion. What is a Latino/Latina? What is a Chicano? What does Hispanic mean?

Latino/a refers to people from Latin America. Latin America refers generally to all countries south of the US-- Mexico, the Carribean, Central and South America including Brazil. These countries speak Spanish and Portuguese, as a result of the conquest of these areas by Spain and Portugal in the colonial era. If you remember, or just in case you missed that day of school, Spanish and Portuguese are Romance languages, meaning they are derived from the language spoken by the ancient Romans. And what language was that? Latin. Thus, in region where these languages were spoken in the North/South American land mass is referred to as Latin America. That's how we got Latinos and Latinas.

Chicano/a refers to Mexican Americans. It's origin is speculation, but the theories often attribute the word to the way the 'x' is pronounced in many native languages-- much as the 'ch' sound in English. So, if you were to say 'Mexican', it would sound like 'Meh-chee-cun'. If you referred to someone as 'Mexicano' it might sound like 'Meh-chee-kah-no'. Take off the first part and you get 'Chee-kah-no.' It is used by Mexican Americans to describe themselves, and political and ethnic ties to Mexican culture. Political movements in the 1960's by Mexican American activists pushed use of the phrase-- and the word is still used with political connotations, rather than just cultural themes.

Hispanic is a term used by the US Census to refer to a sub-group of the population. The term is relatively new, and was first used in the 1970 US Census. As the the incomplete history goes, Hispanic was used to describe individuals who come from Spanish-speaking lineage, or who have genealogy originating in Spain. Thus, Brazilians and Portuguese-speaking persons from South America, or French -Speaking populations of the Carribean would not be considered Hispanic. Because of this, the Census often has both a 'Hispanic' category, and a 'non-white Hispanic' category-- you can be Spanish, which is essentially white/European, and be Hispanic, but this isn't what most people think of when they hear the term 'Hispanic.'

So, there is a little bit of what I know, a little bit of the history and meaning behind these words. It may be incomplete, but it's the gist of it.

Back to that phone call. Yes, actually, Cubans and Puerto Ricans are Latinos because they originate in Latin America.

The funny part was when I heard someone in the background ask: "Okay, that's fine. But are WE Cholas?" And laughter ensued on both ends of the phone call. Good times. Good times.