photo from the New York Times
Although I don’t love the term ‘Hispanics,’ I connected with this article on many levels. I’m very interested in how people identify themselves on the census (much of my solo show explores the ever-changing ‘racial’ categories on the U.S. census). I also had the wonderful opportunity to play a Nahuatl woman (an indigenous culture mostly located in Central Mexico) in a performance at Cal State LA during my MFA program. Also as an ESL teacher, I’ve had a lot of Mexican students who are proud of their indigenous roots. I always encourage them to both learn to be fluent in ESL, and also to hold strong to the cultures and traditions from which they came – this article gives me hope that that is, in fact, what is happening!
New York Times article link: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/04/nyregion/more-hispanics-in-us-calling-themselves-indian.html?_r=1
Thanks to Glenn Robinson (mixedamericanlife.wordpress.com) for this comment and edit to the post: Nahuatl is the language spoken by the Nahua people. They are more commonly referred to as Aztecs.