Sheriff Arapio confronted by a prisoner at the Maricopa County concentration camp [VIDEO]

A brave indigenous man from Mexico, Guillermo Perez-Aguilar comfronts the neo Nazi racist Sheriff Joe Arpaio, at the Maricopa County concentration camp. Watch this video and read the translation please.

A Native woman protests today against the SB1070 law at the Supreme Court in Washington, DC,  while holding an image of Tonantzin, the indigenous goddess representing Mother Earth (known today as the Virgin of Guadalupe). Photo by Karen Bleier/AFP/Getty Images

This courageous Native man, Guillermo is asking Arpaio why is he treating people as criminals, when they are making sacrifices to provide for their families, trying to reach their goals seeking for a better life. I wrote a translation in this post.

This interview with Joe Arpaio was produced by PBS's Newshour about Arizona's Senate Bill 1070 (SB1070) a xenophobic and racist law that allows local police to check the immigration status of anyone who "looks illegal" targeting indigenous Latino people, mostly Mexicans.

   

Thousands of prisioners are forced by Arpaio to live outdoors in the desert, facing extreme weather conditions, human rights violations and permanent abuses. Most of them are Native peoples, Latinos of indigenous heritage, mostly from Mexico and Central America.

Translation

Mister Arpaio. What would it take for you to give us an opportunity for those who really want to be here in good terms…? [...] 

I’m asking him… Mr. Arpaio, what will take for you to give an opportunity for those of us who are here and want to do something for the State, for this country and for our family. [...] 

Exactly, so you if are a Sheriff then your responsibility is up to a certain level, the Federal [govt] is higher up here, so by judging us you are going even higher. You are taking away the opportunity from us, because the Federal is up here and you are down here. [...] 

When one has dreams, we fight to get them no matter how many times we fall, we get up. That’s why I am here… [...] 

Yes sir. [...] 

So he is judging us for [the fault's of one criminal]. He doesn’t seek for the one who commits the crime, but who can pay for it. That’s what he is saying. [...] 

What I speak of is because I have lived it thru, no what others say. He said he is attacking [the problem], why isn’t he attacking, as they say the sickness is attacked by its root. Why is he chasing the weak? For instance, here I’ve been here in Arizona for 16 years and I never had any problems, I had cars, if there are laws why they give us opportunities and then oppress us? We can get insurances, car titles, with a consular ID it doesn’t matter. Why don’t you start by the root [of the problem]? Why do you start by the branches? You are killing thounsands when you really can start here. Why? Because is it harder ? Or because you like to attack here [us]. [...] 

Because I have dreams, I have goals, and one of the goals I set to myself is to come here to do something to help my family…

The Arizona SB1070 law has been stopped partially by the Obama administration, and it is being reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court. 

There is a rally today against this law in from of the Supreme Court building in Washington, DC. starting at 10:30 AM. Follow in Twitter.

Occupy Gala: a bilingual performance in Washington DC

Today is the last day to see "Occupy Gala" a bilingual performance of Latino rock, reggae, Hip-Hop, spoken word, poetry and visual art exhibitions. Tonight at Gala Theater in Columbia Heights.

Photos by Carlos Arrien

Occupy Gala is produced and directed by DC-Salvadoran DJ, activist and musician Kike Aviles. I don't know if this play has anything to do with the Occupy movement but here is the info, sent by our friend Carlos Arrien.

OCCUPY GALAA Bilingual Presentation
Directed by Quique Avilés
Apr 13 - 14, 2012
Quique Avilés as "El Canuto del Roc", the first Salvadoran peasant DJ, returns to the GALA stage to “MC” two awesome evenings of Latino rock, reggae, hip-hop, spoken word, poetry and visual art exhibitions.
OCCUPY GALA is an artistic response to the world's social and political realities. Performances are April 13 & 14 at 8 pm. For more information, click on the link below to see the event's press release.
Ticket: $15 

Directions to Gala Theater.

One million Latinos in Washington DC: the Spanish-speaking communities in the DC area

Washington, DC, has been historically a city of White and Black communities since its foundation in 1791, but since in the past five decades, Latinos have become a significant part of the life and cultures of the nation's capital.

However, it's important to remember that the ancestors of Latinos lived in this land long before this city was created. Washington, DC, actually lies on Native lands that used to belong to the Piscataway, Nacotchtank, Anacostan and other indigenous nations that were forcibly displaced to concentration camps when the Europeans arrived.

Currently, there are between 790 thousand to 1 million Latinos living in the Washington Metropolitan Area.

Shaw neighborhood in D.C. Photo by Dylan Pulver 

Latinos represents 1 out of 6 residents of the 5,582,170 total residents in the Washington Metro Area estimated by the 2010 U.S. Census in the Washington DC-MD-VA-WV Metro Area (see PDF file, Table 3).

The Washington Metropolitan Area includes the District of Columbia and 11 jurisdictions of Maryland and Virginia. This area is also know as the National Capital Region. For this post, I'm using the abbreviation DMV (DC, MD, VA) which is used widely in the area.

There are about 790,000 Latinos in the DMV, according to the 2010 Census. This estimate doesn't include those residents who didn't fill the Census forms, due to fears related to their immigration status or lack of interest. The number could be as high as 1 million people. Source: Metro Diversity.

Washington Metropolitan Area. Source: Wikipedia

District of Columbia

Latinos in D.C. were very few until the 1960's when big numbers of Puerto Ricans and Cubans migrated to the city. In the 1970's middle class and rich Latinos moved to the area, mostly escaping civil wars and political unrest caused by the U.S.-designed Plan Condor.

In the 1980's a big weave of Central Americans came as war refugees, during the Carter and Reagan years. Since the 1990's many South Americans and Mexicans have moved after U.S. designed "free trade" policies ruined most Latin American economies.

The population of Latinos in D.C. represents currently about 9.1% of the total, according to the 2010 Census.

Most Latinos living withing the District are new comers and younger immigrants, old time residents, and members of diplomatic missions and international organizations. Traditionally Washington, DC, has been a safe place for immigrants to live, work and commute.

But once the immigrants settle down in the area and start making more money (or get their legal residence and citizenship in process) Latinos tend to move to fancier, most established neighborhoods in the suburbs of MD and VA.

In recent years with the increasing gentrification of DC, new immigrants and working class residents have been displaced to cheaper areas within the District and the suburbs, mostly in Ward 7 and Prince George's County, because of lower rental fees and properties prices.

Also, many Latino families with children prefer moving to Northern VA and Montgomery County because of the quality of their public schools, job opportunities, and also because their relatives live in those areas already in established communities.

The case of Ward 1 in DC is peculiar, because it's been one of the oldest traditional areas for immigrants but the cost of living is now so expensive that many Latinos (including myself) have moved away. The less popular area for Latinos is Ward 8, because of urban violence, lack of good public transportation and cultural misconceptions.

The blog R.U. Seriousing Me? created this image. Click for better view:

Spanish-speaking communities in the DMV area

The diverse Latino communities in the DMV area tend to group themselves based on our first nationalities, which refers to the country of origin or the parent's nationality. Not race or ethnicity, remember Latinos come in all shapes and colors.

This is the distribution of nationalities only in the District of Columbia:

The 1991 riots in Mount Pleasant 

When talking about the history of Latinos in Washington DC, we must talk about the riots of 1991 in the historical neighborhood of Mount Pleasant. As newcomers, many Latinos faced racial discrimination from both the Black and White communities. After years of silence something happened on May 5, 1991.

This is a video recorded by the Smithsonian Latino Center, of a very illustrating conversation “Remembering the 1991 Disturbances in Mt. Pleasant” recorded on Sunday, May 8, 2011 at the National Museum of American History

Video streaming by Ustream

Remembering the 1991 Disturbances in Mt. Pleasant - Smithsonian Latino Center  

On May 5, 1991, Washington, D.C.’s historic Mt. Pleasant and Adams Morgan neighborhoods erupted in violence after a confrontation between local police and Latino residents. Three nights of rioting engulfed the area, and four days of curfew ensued. These disturbances mark a controversial and unforgettable chapter in local history. This public conversation will revisit Washington in 1991 to describe and understand these events. The panelists and audience will reflect on how this episode affected Mt. Pleasant and surrounding neighborhoods and the organization of the local Latino community. Sharon Pratt, mayor of Washington from 1991 to 1995; former chief of police Isaac Fulwood; Smithsonian curator and Mt. Pleasant resident Olivia Cadaval; former head of the Latino Civil Rights Task Force and local resident Pedro Avilés; local poet, activist and Mt. Pleasant resident Marcos Del Fuego; former publisher of La Nación newspaper José Sueiro; and the audience will share their memories and analyses of the disturbances.

Please TAKE NOTE: These events about history of Latinos in DC organized by the Smithsonian Latino Center:

• The Latino Presence in D.C. Public Schools

• Stories of Spanish-speaking Washington DC

The Howard Theater reopens in Washington DC: see PHOTOS and VIDEOS

The historical Howard Theater reopened today in in Washington, DC, with a community event and a ceremony held by the authorities of the D.C. government. 

This important cultural venue has reopened after 32 years of being unused, thanks to a $29 million dollars investment coming from private and public funds (D.C. taxpayers paid $20 million dollars).

The city of Washington, DC, has recovered a historical landmark and added a new place for the performing arts in the Shaw neighborhood.

Photos by Carlos A. Quiroz

D.C. Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton, a native Washingtonian, said, "It is not going to be quite the Howard some of you and I knew when I was a kid. That was a really funky Howard. But it's going to be that and more. It's going to be a state-of-the-art 21st-century Howard." Photo and caption via ABC 7 News

Howard Theater reopening community event. Photo by DDOT

VIDEO of today's community event including an interview with Malik Ellis, co-owner and developer of the new Howard Theater:

A few weeks ago, a friend was telling me about the days when he went to the Howard Theater to see James Brown's live performances with the woman he eventually married. Alfred made emphasis on the strict and neat fashion that most people followed when attending this venue.

"Howard Theater and U Street were the Black Broadway...", he said enthusiastically.

That same expression was used often today during the opening community event [see photos here posted by ABC 7]. When I arrived there, I thought the external architecture of this building was rather simple, nothing gave me a sense of a glamorous past by just looking at its exteriors.

The humble exterior design of this building doesn't really reflect its symbolism and the importance that this venue represents for the city and its people, for the musical and cultural history of the United States.

For the people, it was a great day. I heard several comments in the Metro train and buses, cafes, mostly seniors, old D.C. residents. During this event, I saw people with smiling faces, taking photos and some where standing next to a strange-looking sculpture honoring Duke Ellington, the famous D.C. jazz musician.

However, this project is not completed yet.  The non-profit that supports the renovation of this venue, is planning on building the Howard Theatre Culture and Education Center which will include a "museum, recording studio, listening library, classrooms and donor lounge." A fundraising concert is planned for this week.

I couldn't get inside the theater because a robust security worker reminded me the event had ended already, even though I got there 30 minutes before closing time according to what was announced via Twitter. Hopefully I will return later to visit the interiors.

With about 800 seats, this theater will not be a space for big performances. You can see some images posted by The Washington Post while these renderings of its new design suggest this theater will be used more as a place for small public and private receptions. Today, DC-rapper Wale announced a sold-out before his inaugural performance.

By the way, I think this remodeling project was part of an attempt to bring more businesses to D.C. including a failed effort for Radio One to move its headquarters back to the District. Instead, Radio One is moving to Silver Spring.

Here are some links and videos about a place that was abandoned for too long. It's a good thing the people of D.C. has recovered it.

Before restoration in 2010. Photo by Luis Gomez via Borderstan

Useful links

• The Howard Theater - the official website
• Howard Theater - Wikipedia
• Memories of Howard Theater - Afro newspaper
• Howard Theater restoration news - Howard Theatre Restoration, Inc. nonprofit organization

The Washington Post blogs:

• D.C.’s Howard Theatre: What made it an essential sanctuary of black Washington?
• Howard Theatre’s rebirth comes amid neighborhood’s dying past

[more] Videos

Revealing the Original 1910 Facade

The restoration process 

Update: Watch videos of Wale's performance last night.

When labels don't fit? We are not Hispanics

In the United States people are grouped in labels of race and class. This is done so the minority elites can control the masses and keep their political and economic privileges.

That is why European descendants in the U.S. insist on imposing the term Hispanic on non-European communities in the U.S. who use the Spanish language. White Hispanics who are a tiny minority among us, force the numerous non-Hispanics to accept their identity, so that they can control us.

Image by LULAC

After 36 years of its creation the term Hispanic is a failure.

Most Spanish-speaking people in the U.S. and their descendants are people of color: Native Americans, African descendants, Arabs, Asians, etc. and we don't like that word. But many use it because they want to fit in, they want to be accepted by the White supremacist system that controls the money, politics and everything else in this country.

The term Hispanic is discriminatory because it imposes a Euro-centric view of the world. It applies to a population that is not of Spanish heritage. We so-called Hispanics are mostly Mexican Americans, Central Americans and South Americans who share a strong Indigenous heritage, including the mestizos.

This word Hispanic was created by U.S. Spaniard descendants and mostly-White Mexican Americans working for the Richard Nixon administration in 1976. No other country in the world uses this term to describe the peoples of the Americas.

The Pew Hispanic Center released this week a report that intends to discuss the failure of the terms Hispanics and Latino to unify the diverse communities they intend to represent, while it reinforces the use of the discriminatory term Hispanic.

The Pew Research Center is a national think thank created, owned and run by conservative Whites under the umbrella of by the Pew "Charitable" Funds. In 2001 The Pew created its Pew Hispanic branch.

Indigenous children in Washington DC. Photo by Carlos A. Quiroz

We are not Hispanics

We need to stop using the term Hispanic -even when our kids are forced to use it since early school-  because it does not represent our peoples, it's not unifying and it does not include the true heritages of our communities, for the following reasons:

• The word Hispanic refers to the Roman province Hispania, which includes today Spain and Portugal. This term involves a cultural and ethnic connection to the Iberian peninsula population. 

• Most of so-called Hispanics are Native Americans and African descendants, including the vast majority of "mestizos" who are mixed Native Americans and Afro descendants, also mixed with other heritages. Also many "Hispanics" are Arabs, Asians and European communities from all backgrounds. 

• Even if we speak Spanish or if we have Spanish surnames but our roots are not in Spain. Most of our last names were imposed to our ancestors when they were slaved by true Hispanics, ironically. If this same concept were applied to English speakers, Blacks should be called Anglos today.

• Mixed Native peoples are still Natives. We the people who descend from the original civilizations of the Americas, we survived unlike what the European "history" books are saying. We remain Native peoples regardless of what European language we speak or the nationality we inherited. 

• We Natives peoples keep our ancestry regardless of post-colonial borders. Today we live from Canada all the way to Chile. Our Native ancestry predates thousands of years of history in this continent, and it doesn't just disappear depending where we live neither. Most indigenous peoples today live in urban areas in all the Americas.

• Many Spanish-speaking people also speak Native languages. We have over 800 million indigenous peoples in the American continent, this without including the "Hispanics" in the U.S. who are actually mostly Natives. Also, many so-called Hispanics do not speak Spanish at all.

This is a very important issue. The United Nation's Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples includes the following articles (read the declaration PDF file). This document was finally endorsed by the U.S. government by the end of 2010.

Article 33
1. Indigenous peoples have the right to determine their own identity or membership in accordance with their customs and traditions. This does not impair the right of indigenous individuals to obtain citizenship of the States in which they live. 

Article 3
Indigenous peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. 

Article 8
1. Indigenous peoples and individuals have the right not to be subjected to forced assimilation or destruction of their culture. 

Article 9
Indigenous peoples and individuals have the right to belong to an indigenous community or nation, in accordance with the traditions and customs of the community or nation concerned. No discrimination of any kind may arise from the exercise of such a right. 

Annex - Article 2
Indigenous peoples and individuals are free and equal to all other peoples and individuals and have the right to be free from any kind of discrimination, in the exercise of their rights,

A few months ago I interviewed Mark Lopez of the Pew Hispanic Center. Somehow that video is not in Youtube any longer, but I will repost it again later on today.

Meanwhile, please watch this conversation I recorded between Maya teacher Marina Diaz and the National Council or La Raza CEO Janet Murguia:

Who we are

Embracing our Native American heritage, or any other true heritage for that matter, is very important for our communities, especially for our youth who need a strong sense of identity, belonging and community.

This is not about dividing Latinos. We were never one community in the first place, but we are trying. When people ask my heritage is reply I'm Latino of Native heritage, or Native American period.

As a result of ignorance, self racism and White-supremacist views, many Latinos reject their own heritage. They tend to praise the European side of their families, while ignoring or purposely hiding our main roots. Have you noticed how many Latino women and men change their physical features through plastic surgery?

This happens because we learn that self loathing racism at home or school and it's reinforced by corporate media in a daily basis. So instead of embracing our ethnic roots, we tend to embrace our nationalities. Maybe because that is all we know, or because is easier to avoid talking about race.

I will continue writing about this later, as time allows.

For those of you know very well that you are not European (Hispanic), I invite you to analyze and research your own history, look for your own information. Be proud of who you are, honor your ancestors, embrace your true heritage.

It all starts at home. Photo by thelearningcommunity.us

Video Native peoples think they are White:

Self racism comes from misinformation and bad education. I recorded this video in the Washington, DC, metropolitan area.

.

Workshop on Indigeneity in the Americas and Maya anthropology at University of Maryland College Park

The Latin American Studies Center at University of Maryland, College Park, presents a 4-day workshop with Visiting Scholar Dr. Juan Castillo Cocom (indigenous Maya) of the Universidad Intercultural Maya, Quintana Roo, Mexico.

Program

A. Lecture: Ethnoexodus: Strategic Forgetfulnesses and Flashbacks

Wednesday, April 4 5:00 PM - 7:00 PM
Location: 3202 Knight Hall

Professor Castillo Cocom will discuss the production of knowledge on “the Maya” through different channels, such as popular media, the tourism industry and academic discourse. His presentation provides a critique on anthropological knowledge and discourses as these infiltrate the social imagination. It investigates the “Maya” individual’s constant production of, dislocation from, and re-location in temporary points of identity as practical strategies of “ethnoexodus.” The concept of ethnoexodus is a critique of the idea ethnogenesis as a way of understanding “Maya” identity, and identity formation in general, and how it relates to production of ethnos. Ethnoexodus, as a conceptual tool, focuses on how an individual/social actor can “exit” a temporal “point” of identity suture without having necessarily ever been “in” that particular construction of identity.


B. Conversation: A Conversation on Indigeneity, Anthropology and Social Belonging: With Juan Castillo Cocom and Elizabeth A. Povinelli

Thursday, April 5 12:30 PM – 2:00 PM
Location: 2110 Taliaferro Hall

Professor Castillo Cocom will have a conversation with Elizabeth A. Povinelli, Professor of Anthropology at Columbia University. Povinelli has elaborated a critical theory of late liberalism that would support an anthropology of the otherwise. Her first two books examine the governance of the otherwise in late liberal settler colonies from the perspective of the politics of recognition. Her last two books examined the same from the perspective of intimacy, embodiment, and narrative form. Her ethnographic analysis is animated by a critical engagement with the traditions of American pragmatism and continental immanent theory.


C. Workshop: Ethnoexodus: Maya Yucatec Topographic Ruptures

Friday, April 6 1:00 PM – 5:00 PM
Saturday, April 7 9:30 AM – 3:30 PM with a working lunch
Location: 2120 Francis Scott Key Hall

The primary goal of Professor Cocom’s workshop is to think through the conceptual framework that gives rise to ethnoexodus. This will be accomplished by way of considering, in the first part of the course, the case study of Maya Topographic Ruptures. The goal will be to explore how and why the identity politics of being Indian/Indígena and Maya in Yucatan differ from the politics of Indigeneity in Chiapas, and other parts of México, Guatemala, and the Americas.

Juan Castillo Cocom 

Associate Professor and chair of the teaching faculty at the Universidad Intercultural Maya de Quintana Roo. He is the author of various articles on identity and, specifically, Maya identity politics. He has taught at Florida International University, where he also completed both his graduate work. In 2003, he was the Yucatán academic seminar leader for the Fulbright Hays Summer Seminar on Indigenous Cultures and Environmental Issues in México and Costa Rica. Professor Cocom has also held prestigious appointments with the Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán, Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politécnico Nacional (CINVESTAV), the Universidad de la Habana, Cuba, the Universidad Pedagógica Nacional in México and the University of California, Berkeley.His current work focuses on the production of knowledge on “the Maya” through popular media, tourism and academic discourse.

Elizabeth A. Povinelli

Professor of Anthropology and Gender Studies at Columbia University where she has also been the Director of the Institute for Research on Women and Gender and the Co-Director of the Centre for the Study of Law and Culture. She has focused on developing a critical theory of late liberalism that would support anthropology of the otherwise. Her first two books examine the governance of the otherwise in late liberal settler colonies from the perspective of the politics of recognition. Her most recent work examined the same subject from the perspective of intimacy, embodiment, and narrative form. Dr. Povinelli’s ethnographic analysis is animated by a critical engagement with the traditions of American pragmatism and continental immanent theory.

Those wishing to attend the workshop should RSVP to Winslow Robertson at wrobert1@umd.edu