On this date, President Lyndon Baines Johnson signed the National Hispanic Heritage Week bill (P.L. 90–498) into law. In the 90th Congress (1967–1969), Representative George Edward Brown of California submitted H.J. Res. 1299, easily passing the House; the bill authorized the President to designate the week of September 15 as “National Hispanic Heritage Week.” During subsequent celebrations of Hispanic Heritage Week, Presidents issued public statements and hosted receptions while praising the contributions of Hispanic Americans to U.S. society. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus celebrated the week by citing examples of Hispanic-American contributions to the United States, drawing media attention to legislative interests for Hispanic Americans, and networking with grass roots and civil rights activists inside and outside the Hispanic-American community...Read More.
Hispanic Americans (also known as Latinos/Latinas) are individuals whose ancestors came from Latin American countries, such as Mexico, Puerto Rico, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and other South and Central American countries, such as Colombia, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. Hispanic Americans are one of the fastest growing ethnic minority groups in the United States. Read More.
The Dominican American writer Julia Alvarez was born in New York City, returning shortly thereafter to the Dominican Republic, where she spent her early childhood. In 1960 her family immigrated to the United States, fleeing the dictatorship of Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina and the threat caused by her father's involvement in antiregime activities. She was raised in New York. Read More.
Alberto R. Gonzales served as U.S. attorney general from 2005 to 2007. GEORGE W. BUSH tapped Gonzales to the position to succeed JOHN ASHCROFT , and upon his confirmation, Gonzales became the first Hispanic American to serve as U.S. attorney general. Several controversies arose during Gonzales’s tenure, leading to his resignation on September 17, 2007. Read More.
Since its beginnings, mariachi music has been the music of the countryside and its inhabitants—a much-loved local and regional musical genre. But by the late twentieth century this changed, as mariachi music became a significant force in U.S. popular culture. It influenced the Tejano music that arose in the United States and helped to solidify the latter genre as a serious contender in the American music scene. Mariachi music infiltrated into American ceremonies and rituals such as weddings, masses, birthdays, and other... Read More.
Reformer and activist, George I. Sanchez is recognized for his contributions to educational equity, especially for Mexican-American children. Sanchez was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and attended schools in Arizona and New Mexico before graduation from high school in Albuquerque. He taught for eight years in rural schools while working on his bachelor's degree and taking weekend and summer courses at the University of New Mexico. After graduation Sanchez received a fellowship for... Read More.
Spanglish rap refers to rapping that mixes or blends varieties of Spanish and varieties of English. The term is often used in reference to the lyrical production of Latinx hip hop practitioners in the United States. Latinxs in the United States have varying proficiencies in standardized Spanish and standardized English, and many bilingual or multilingual Latinxs engage in code-switching or code-mixing practices, where discourse includes words, phrases, or sentences from varieties of Spanish alongside words, phrases, or sentences from varieties of English in the same utterance or discourse. The popular name for the use of this multilingual repertoire of styles is Spanglish, a portmanteau of Spanish and English used in both languages (in Spanish as espanglish) at least since the 1930s or 1940s. Read More.
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