On Sept. 5, Dr. Manuel Vargas of UC San Diego gave a presentation titled “What are Latin[a/o/x/e]s Anyway?” to an audience of 38 students, staff and faculty. Vargas is a professor of philosophy and affiliated faculty in Latin American Studies and Chicanx/Latinx Studies at UC San Diego. Dr. Amy Reed-Sandoval, assistant professor of philosophy at UNLV, introduced Vargas with some of his recent publications and research interests.
As Vargas took the stage, he prefaced his lecture by making the audience aware of their role in upcoming conversation. ”This discussion is an opportunity for us to think together and ask questions together,” Vargas noted. “Hopefully, everyone leaves a little more confused than when they walked in, but also start asking important questions.” Vargas began by recounting a case study involving Jess “La Bombalera” Krug, who identified as a Black woman of Dominican and Puerto Rican descent.
However, she later confessed to being White from an affluent Kansas City suburb. “What we have here is a case of performative identity,” Vargas reflected. “We sometimes feel obligated to adopt a certain way of being that is disingenuous to our true selves.” Vargas also noted one scene in Paul Beatty’s novel “The Sellout.” In this scene, the main character, Hominy, groups all Central, South and North American-born people as Mexican. “This generalization is largely due to regional discrepancies,” Vargas claimed. “The relationship between race and Latino identity is by no means straightforward.” Branching off the notion of Latino identity, Vargas also addressed the “x” that can be found in association with Latino and Chicano identities. “The ‘x’ in Latinx and Chicanx attempts to solve the gendered and gender binary problem in language,” Vargas explained. “However, the biggest problem with this is the fact that it’s mostly English people attempting to solve a Spanish problem.”
Another issue present with the Latino classification is the confusion regarding the term as a racial or geographic category. “Believe it or not, White Latinos do exist, so we have to assume Latino as a racial category,” Vargas stated. “Unfortunately, there are no common characteristics or traits that tie all members of that category together.” To attempt a reclassification of the Latino label, Vargas put forth a theory that grounds Latino in a geographic foundation. “Latin[a/o/x/e]s are people in the United States from the Latin American region, so we may call this a geographic descent group rather than an ethnic or racial one,” Vargas affirmed. “In this way, we allow for the possibility of error in classification, but allow for diversity of race/ethnicity/appearance/forms of treatment.”
To conclude his discussion, Vargas left the audience with one final consideration once they left for the evening.“The geographic descent theory is an answer to what it takes to be a member of a category in the most fundamental sense of the term,” Vargas said. “But consider how social membership might distort perceptions of identity in informal settings.”
