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Hispanic Heritage Month and Your Identity

A 20-cent commemorative stamp honoring Hispanic Americans was issued in 1984.

According to the 2020 Census, the Hispanic or Latino population grew to 62.1 million in the United States. For Hispanic Heritage Month, listeners call in to share which terms best describes their identities and suggest terms that might be more inclusive than "Hispanic," like "Brown," "Latin American," "Latino" or "Latinx."

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. We'll wrap it up today with a call-in for those of you who are Hispanic, Latino, Latinx. On which of those as you'd like to be called, 646-435-7280. From now until October 15th if you didn't know the US is celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month. We're going to open up the phones. We'll do a number of Hispanic heritage month segments between now and then. We're going to kick it off with this. Asking simply what term or terms do you use and do you prefer to identify yourself in this respect? Whether Hispanic, Latino, Brown, we hear Black and Brown people, right? The Brown people are you plus South Asians, and some others, Latin America or Latinx. For that matter is it time to change Hispanic Heritage Month to be more specific in some way to Latin Americans.

Give us a call if this sounds like you. On which term you use to refer to yourself, and which you prefer that we would use on the show. People elsewhere in the media, 646-435-7280, 646-435-7280. I'll tell you one personal anecdote for just a second here. I got dinged by somebody on Twitter a few months ago after I used the term Latinx, and the person said, "Oh, that's just something white people use who were trying to be politically correct or whoever they put it. Nobody who's Latino or Hispanic actually says that." If you use Latinx call in and say so, or if you hate Latinx call in and say so 646-435-7280. Do you like the word Hispanic? Which if you think about it is a pan-ethnic term meant to describe people from Spanish-speaking countries.

That would include Latin America. The countries there in which Spanish is spoken, and I guess Spain itself, but if you say, Latino, then you're referring to those Latin American countries including Portuguese-speaking Brazil. Do people call you Hispanic? If you're Brazilian do you call yourself Hispanic if you're Brazilian, even though you don't speak Spanish? Or people in Haiti who speak French and Haitian Creole. Do you call yourselves Latino or Latina? 646-435-7280. You get the idea. Which do you prefer if you are any one of those? 646-435-7280. We'll take your calls right after this.

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Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Again here at the beginning of Hispanic Heritage month if you are in that group do you like the term Hispanic? Do you like Latino, Latina, Brown as in Black and Brown people, which said frequently these days. Do you like Latinx? The X is supposed to be gender-inclusive, because it's not genderizing Latino, Latina, et cetera. Which do you prefer? Julio in Brooklyn. You're on WNYC. Hi Julio.

Julio: Hi, good morning. I tend to prefer using the term Latinx or Latine with an E at the end. Just because I feel it's more inclusive. It doesn't have a gender term, but I don't necessarily get upset or like when people use Hispanic to refer. I just politely correct, or I don't get frustrated when people use Hispanic or Latino referring overall. I just personally prefer Latinx or Latine.

Brian Lehrer: How about when people say Black and Brown people to include obviously Black people, but also that most of the Brown people they're referring to are Hispanic, Latino, Latinx?

Julio: I don't mind that either, because as a Latine person I'm Brown. I consider myself a Brown person.

Brian Lehrer: Julio thank you for starting us off. Melissa in Fairlawn, you're on WNYC. Hi Melissa?

Melissa: Hi Brian. I am actually opposed to the Latinx thing. I prefer Latina or Latino. As long as they [unintelligible 00:04:54] thing. It doesn't bother me, but we are all shades. Technically that doesn't quite fit with the Latino community, because we're white, we're Black or Brown.

Brian Lehrer: Yes that's right. Even the census recognizes that you can be I guess what they call Hispanic white or Black or other race.

Melissa: It's so confusing. [crosstalk]

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead.

Melissa: Also I think when people mistakenly say, "Oh, you're Spanish," for everything, which drives me nuts, because I'm not from Spain, and I just tend to try to correct gently but that also is another fault.

Brian Lehrer: If they say you're Spanish you don't like that. What if they say you're Hispanic?

Melissa: That doesn't necessarily bother me. It's more the Spanish thing, and I get it because we speak Spanish, but that's a whole other issue because we're also divided by the same language that we speak because it's so diverse. It's just a whole other topic altogether.

Brian Lehrer: Why do you hate Latinx?

Melissa: I don't know. I just feel like it's trendy. It's just the thing to say now for non-Latin people. I don't know. It just doesn't feel like it comes naturally to me to say. I would just say, "Oh, you're Latino or Latina or Latinos in general."

Brian Lehrer: Melissa, thank you. Thank you so much. Please call us again. Leyla in Inwood, you're on WNYC. Hello Leyla.

Leyla: Hi, good morning. Yes, I'd rather be called Spanish America. The Spaniards conquer America, so we are Spanish America. We're not Latinos. We don't speak Latin

Brian Lehrer: Yes, but what about the fact that it identifies with the conqueror which is even how you just put it. It's Spanish American because the Spanish conquered South America largely.

Leyla: South America, Central America, Florida also came from Spain. I do not understand this Latin Spain for years.

Brian Lehrer: I understand.

Leyla: Latin came from Charles de Gaulle, Charles de Gaulle if we did not understand someone they call him always Latin to me. I don't understand.

Brian Lehrer: Did not expect-- Go ahead.

Leyla: It became the Latin quarter in Paris where all the people from different countries lived that could not speak French correctly. That traveled, you know how words travel.

Brian Lehrer: Yes.

Leyla: That traveled to here.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much. I'm going to leave it there to get some more people on Leyla. Thank you so much. Suli in West New Jersey. Is it west New York? You're on WNYC. Hi there.

Suli: Hello?

Brian Lehrer: Hello.

Suli: How are you, Brian? Long time listening.

Brian Lehrer: So glad you called. I can hear you.

Suli: Okay. I am from the Dominican Republic, 28 years old. I do not mind being called Latinx or Latino or Hispanic. I understand where Latinx comes from, but personally, I prefer Latino. Maybe it's the old school in me I understand, or maybe because I'm not in the LGBTQ community, or I don't belong from that community, but I understand it and I accept it, all of it. That's just my opinion. I don't have an issue with Hispanic.

Brian Lehrer: You don't have an issue with Hispanic either. Well, for you calling yourself Latino as you're preferred it sounds like that's your first choice. What do you say to the previous caller who said she doesn't get Latino because you speak Spanish not Latin?

Suli: Yes. I also understand the previous caller, because what she meant is because we don't speak Latin, but our language was derived from Latin. Many other languages. She is right. She has a very valid point there, because if anything Italians would be called Latino because Italian language is derived from Latin and so is Portuges.

Brian Lehrer: That's right. I've heard some Italian people say, "Hey, why don't you call me Latino, Latin language." Anyway. Thank you very much. Vicente in Manhattan. You're on WNYC. Hi there.

Vincente: Thank you-- Great to be here. First-time caller long-term listener. When I was going to college quite a few years ago, I used the term Hispanic until I learned a little bit more about the history relating to Spain. I think I prefer the word, Latino. Now with the Latinx, I'm open to inclusivity, and I think Latinx includes both females, males, and I think it's something that's should be used a little bit more often.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much, please call us again. Corrine in Rosel Park, you're on WNYC. Hello Corrin.

Corrine: Hi Brian. How are you?

Brian Lehrer: I'm okay and you, I hope.

Corrine: Yes, I am. I'm calling because I am Polish and Mexican. I'm very white-passing but I speak way more Spanish than I do Polish. I've always identified with that side a little bit more. However, since I'm so white-passing, I never had to wrestle with that intersection of being Hispanic or Latina or whatever, because I'm essentially just a gringo over here, but I married a Puerto Rican man recently and he likes to be called Brown. Even though he acknowledges that his family is a variety of different colors but he likes to be called Brown because he oftentimes feels like Hispanic people or Latinx people forget about the roots from Africa especially as an islander, he calls himself. He really likes to embrace that part of his culture.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much. It reflects the fact that so many people who let's say come to this country eventually from Latin America are mixes of the Spanish conquerors and slaves who were brought from Africa and indigenous people down there. So recognizing all the parts of that, right?

Corrine: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: Corrine, thank you very much. We'll wrap this up with a tweet from listener MS, who writes, "As a Brazilian, I'll correct someone who calls me Hispanic. I don't mind opening it up and calling the month Latinx or Latino Heritage Month or something similar, but 99% of marketing advertising language, et cetera, is in Spanish. If you're going to be inclusive include Portuguese." Writes MS, originally from Brazil. Thanks for all your calls on that. We'll do other Hispanic Heritage Month, as it's still called, programming as the month goes on. The Brian Lehrer Show is produced by Lisa Allison, Mary Croke, Zoe Azulay, Amina Srna, Carl Boisrond. Zach Gottehrer-Cohen works on our daily podcast and we had Juliana Fonda and Liora Noam-Kravitz at the audio controls. Talk to you tomorrow.

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