Latinos/as in Chicago and the Midwest: Scholarly Interventions

Long overshadowed by the scholarly production about Latino/a communities in the East and West coasts, the Latino Midwest is emerging as an increasingly significant geocultural space for understanding the life experiences of... [ view full abstract ]

Long overshadowed by the scholarly production about Latino/a communities in the East and West coasts, the Latino Midwest is emerging as an increasingly significant geocultural space for understanding the life experiences of many Latino/a national communities. While historically the Midwest has been bracketed as an exceptional space of pan-latinidad, it has also been deemed as a region not Chicano or Puerto Rican enough, not authentic for valid recognition in Latino/a Studies. As a response to this structured secondariness, the Latinos in Chicago and the Midwest book series at the University of Illinois Press emerged in 2004 as a site that would showcase the increasing scholarly production about Latinos in the heartland. This roundtable consists of authors of various publications, some already in print, and others in production, that represent the rich heterogeneity of themes, methodologies, and genres included in this ten-year old series. Delgadillo will summarize her oral histories with Latinas in Milwaukee, while Fox and Pulido will share their experiences and objectives co-editing each an anthology on Latinos in the Midwest (Fox) and on Latinos in Education (Pulido). Jose Angel, author of Illegal, will comment on the unexpected ways in which his published memoir has circulated and the impact that this has had in his life in the shadows. Merida Rua, also a published author with the Series, will serve as moderator and will comment on her own anthology dedicated to the writings of Elena Padilla. These diverse types of contributions not only address the need for us to reclaim the older foundational writings by our pioneers, such as Padilla, but also document and analyze the life stories of our communities, as Delgadillo has done. The role of anthologies also will be addressed as critical teaching tools and as reference sources that legitimize this region as a dynamic Latino space. Thus, the diverse genres and approaches to documenting Latinos in Chicago and the Midwest highlight the need for more multi- and interdisciplinary interventions that can document not only the demographic diversifications of Latino neighborhoods and rural communities, but also our contributions to labor, culture, and the arts.