Vida Newspaper - May 1983

POWER KNOWLEDGE: Invisible Barrier for Hispanics You are free to think differently from me and to retain your life, your property and all that you possess; but you are henceforth a stranger among your people. You may retain your rights but they will be useless to you, for you will never be chosen by your fellow citizens, if you ask for their votes; and they will affect to scorn you if you ask for their esteem. Democracy in America Alexis de Tocqueville 1837 More than a decade ago, an event took place in the United States, that, though little known, has very serious national and interhational implications. I am referring to the Chicano Renaissance of the late 1960’s. More than a “minority issue’’ this cultural struggle between the United States and Latin America and, more generally, between the English world and the Spanish speaking world. To be sure, there is an aura of invisibility to Latino [or Chicano] culture in the power/knowledge structure of the United States, and the few visible moments are characterized by negative, stereotyped attitudes. These attitudes started in the sixteenth century as a result of the political, economic and religious struggle between Spain and England, they were codified into a Black Legend, expanded into scientific “theories’’ about the inferiority of Mexican “Indians” in the nineteenth century and, in a diffused way, institutionalized in schools, fictional and non fictional literature, mass media, academia, and social and foreign policy in the twentieth cen¬ tury. The Chicano Renaissance developed various strategies to deal with this power/knowledge structure: political [La Raza Unida Party], economic [United Farm Workers] and educa¬ tional [Bilingual Education and Chicano Studies]. The educa¬ tional strategy called for the institutionalization of Bilingual Education and Chicano Studies as a means to achieve upward cont. on p.4