Hispanic Heritage Month runs September 15 - October 15, and it is a time to celebrate the history and cultures of Americans whose ancestors hail from Spain, Mexico, South and Central America, and the Caribbean. According to the Library of Congress, this recognition began under President Lyndon Johnson as Hispanic Heritage Week in 1968, and then President Ronald Reagan expanded it to a month in 1988. The date range was chosen because it encompasses a number of independence anniversaries for Hispanic countries.
As of 2020, the CDC explains Hispanics or Latinos are the largest racial/ethnic minority in the United States.
Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress.
Although it seems like the terms Hispanic and Latino/a are interchangeable, they are not. According to Garcia-Navarro (2015), the term Hispanic refers to a language. We use the term Hispanic to refer to a group of people who share Spanish as their common language regardless of their geographic location. We use this term Latino/a to refer to someone who is of Latin American descent. Latin America is a geographic area encompassing countries in Central and South America and the Caribbean where Romance languages derived from Latin (for example, Spanish, French, and Portuguese) are spoken.
The terms Hispanic and Latino/a do not refer to a person's race.
Another term that is used is Chicano/a. This word refers to Mexican Americans living in the United States. The origins of this word are unclear, but according to Planas (2012) it became a popular term in the U.S. during the civil rights movement in 1960 and was originally used as a pejorative term by wealthier Mexican Americans to refer to describe Mexican Americans who were in a lower socioeconomic status; however, it was adopted by those in the civil rights movements of the 1960s as a point of pride. Because of the political undertones, some people avoid using the term Chicano/a while others embrace its use.
In the Spanish language, words are assigned genders. Typically, nouns ending in "o" are masculine while nouns ending in "a" are feminine. That means Latino and Chicano should be used to refer to males while Latino and Chicana should be used to refer to females; however, the terms Latinx and Chicanx are growing in popularity. Replacing the gendered ending of the nouns with a gender neutral "x" is being embraced as a way to encourage diversity and gender inclusivity.
Finally, it's important to remember that someone who speaks Spanish is not necessarily Spanish. A person who is Spanish is from Spain. It's important to remember that the word Spanish denotes both a language and a nationality, and those concepts are not interchangeable.
According to the CDC, Hispanics and Latinos in the U.S.:
There are also health disparities within the different Hispanic subgroups. For example, according to the Office of Minority Health (2019), "Puerto Ricans suffer disproportionately from asthma, HIVAIDS and infant mortality. Mexican Americans suffer disproportionately from diabetes."
Here are some facts about the Hispanic population in the United States and in Lancaster.
An influential Latina figure in medicine is Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias (1929-2001). She was the first Latina president of the American Public Health Association, and she was instrumental in advancing women's health and the health of underserved communities. You can learn more about Dr. Rodriguez-Trias at:
Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.