Okay, so I was supposed to write this review in time for National Hispanic History Month (September 15 to October 15) and clearly I didn't make it. This is the second year in a row I miss this deadline, so my psychoanalytical self lifts its antenna and ponders this evidence of resistance. I recognize that the late August deadline for the September All Write News interferes with my late summer vacation, but I sense some other hidden truth. And then again, not so hidden. I will admit that I feel, at best, ambivalence toward National Hispanic History Month. It originally had something to do with the ghettoization of our history into the space of 30 days but I've made peace with that part of it. As with Black History Month, if it means that our contribution to this country is revealed to some little kid in the Bronx or Peoria, so be it. There are worse things going on in many classrooms. No, mi gente, it has to do with the timing of this purported celebration. You see, it was dated to coincide with the arrival of Columbus and the Spanish into what became "las Americas." It is considered by many latino americanos as the "birth" of la raza mestiza, the blending of races and cultures of Latin America. I do accept mestizaje as a fact for afterall it is in large part who I am. But a celebration that takes as its point of departure the anniversary of the invasion of a whole continent, the pillaging of entire peoples and the onset of slavery, umm...I don't think so. So, I humbly declare May to be National Hispanic (I'm not even going to get into the debate on using Hispanic vs. Latino) History Month. No specific reason for me (although a friend reminded me of the Cinco de Mayo celebration by Mexican Americans), except that May is such a nice month, with budding flowers and the promise of summer around the corner. And even better, we still have six full months to get ready for this celebration. Que Viva Mayo! Till then, the following are some new additions to our library of books on Latino literature and history to celebrate about all year.
From Colonia to Community&emdash;The History of Puerto Ricans in New York City, by Virginia E. Sanchez Korrol, Berkeley and Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1994.
This year marked the centennial of the Spanish-American War with nary a peep in the press or Washington. This is surprising, considering the significance of that war for the United States and Latin America, not to mention the Philippines. One result of the Spanish American War was the annexation of Puerto Rico as U.S. territory, a status which continues to this day. But the puertorican presence in the U.S., especially in New York City, predates 1898 by at least 60 years, according to recorded history. Many were revolutionaries in the war for independence against Spain, collaborating with Cubans also exiled in New York City. It was really this movement that spearheaded what became known as the Spanish American War of 1898.
This book concentrates on the history of Puerto Ricans in NYC after the turn of the century, but it records their settlement patterns and organizational activities that began with increased immigration in the 1890's. It is fascinating to read about their political and social clubs, including the following description of activities at a club for tobacco workers, the "Circulo de Tabaqueros."
The particular day which I am remembering, Carlos Tresca, director of the newspaper Il Martele, spoke in Italian on "Anarchism and Darwinian Theory"; Elizabeth Gurley Flynn spoke in English on "Utopian Communities and Free Will"; Pedro Esteves spoke in Spanish on "War and Peace and the Role of the Proletariat"; and Frank Kelly, a Catholic anarchist, spoke also in Spanish on "Jesus Christ, the First Communist." Discussions were followed by a question and answer period. (p. 140)
Included in the book are some wonderful photographs, mostly of people in groups representing various social clubs and political organizations, asserting the Puerto Rican presence and contribution to American life.
500 Años del Pueblo Chicano&emdash;500 Years of Chicano History in Pictures, edited by Elizabeth Martinez, Albuquerque, Southwest Organizing Project, 1991 (with accompanying video, "Viva La Causa").
We first heard about this book from Howard Zinn, the noted historian, during a lecture he gave at the A.L.R.I. a few years ago on the Quincentennial of Columbus' fateful voyage. Zinn mentioned it as an example of a book that records a piece of American history usually ignored in U.S. history books. The photographs alone are a treasure and a visual testimony to the Mexican presence in what later became the United States of America.
This book can have different applications in adult basic education classes. Pictures dominate over text, which tends to be short, and it is fully bilingual in English and Spanish. Other themes besides Chicano history can be gleaned from the pictures. There are hauntingly evocative and rare pictures, for example, of migrant farm workers and miners and of the massive deportations of Mexicans during the 1930's up to the INS raids in the 1980's. The companion video combines the still pictures with real footage, and the narrative closely follows the written text of the book. It is clear that the project was put together to make Chicano history accessible to all folks, to the young and older, to high and low level readers. For those reasons alone, it deserves a place in any library set up for new readers in a literacy program.
Luna, Luna&emdash;Creative Writing Ideas from Spanish, Latin American and Latino Literature, edited by Julio Marzan, New York, Teachers and Writers Collaborative, 1997.
This is a wonderful collection of essays on how to use literature in the classroom, especially poetry. Although it concentrates on using Spanish, Latin American, and U.S. Latino literature, there are ideas here for any teacher interested in using authentic, full text to inspire their students to write creatively. The collection includes such popular writers as Julia Alvarez (How the Garcia Sisters Lost Their Accents) and Martin Espada, the poet, as well as contributions from teachers in public schools and colleges.
Alvarez' piece, "Missing the Zebras&emdash;Bilingual Poetry in the Schools" was one of my favorites. She describes how she took advantage of her students' bilingualism to play with words from both languages, resulting in increased vocabulary as well as original poems. She writes:
The advantage of working with a bilingual group is that poems from both languages can be used in the original&emdash;Whitman in English, Garcia Lorca in Spanish. Of course, the Spanish dominant students had problems with the English poems and vice versa. So I always supplied a translation or, with their help, translated the poem on the board..
She goes on to explain how she created a charades game that turned into a writing exercise:
On pieces of paper, I copied down words the students gave me, the English word on one side, its Spanish equivalent on the other. After filling a bag with wonderful and zany words, we each picked a slip and silently acted out the word. The challenge was to guess the word in both languages.... We then wrote poems about that first encounter with a new word in a new language. What did you think when you first heard "star"? Did you have an inkling it was an "estrella"? What did you see, smell, hear, in the new sound? One of my English dominant students wrote about this encounter with the word "ola" ("wave," as in the ocean):If I didn't knowwhat an "ola" was,
I'd think it was a star.
I'd think it was smoke
in the house
or a heavy blue coat
to go out.
&emdash;Raul Rivera, second grade
I wish I had read this book last year and tried Alvarez's writing exercise with the ESOL adult learners I was teaching. I would have also been interested in another essay from this collection, "Writing Vignettes with Sandra Cisneros's House on Mango Street," because I have used this book in ESOL classes for adults. Suzann Steele Saltzman writes of how she utilizes the book in a college preparatory writing class. She includes a list of the themes in each "vignette" or chapter of the book with accompanying writing ideas.
By the way, The House on Mango Street, by Sandra Cisneros, originally written in English, has been translated into Spanish by the renowned Mexican writer, Elena Poniawtoska (Hasta No Verte, Jesus Mio). Published by Vintage Books in 1994, we have a copy of it in the A.L.R.I. library, together with the English language version.
Hispanic, Female and Young&emdash;An Anthology, edited by Phyllis Tashlik, Houston, Piñata Books, 1994.
The inspiration for this collection grew out of an experimental class on Latina women taught by the editor in an East Harlem public school. The eighth-grade girls were inspired to write about their own experiences being young Latinas in the U.S. Through a two-year grant from the Apple Educational Grants Corporation, the girls and their teacher embarked on a project to research and read the work of Latina women writers. They also wrote about their own lives, often in response to themes from the literature they were reading. The result is this collection, which includes published writers like Lorna Dee Cervantes and Nicholasa Mohr, as well as the writings of the girls themselves.
There is a lot of material here that can easily be used in an ABE class. Primarily written in English, the collection is organized around themes such as the family, growing up, and "making it." Most of the pieces are short, including those from the established writers, and the text is printed in larger type. Another fine addition for a collection of books for new readers.
Maria E. González is the SABES Coordinator at the A.L.R.I.