NewsTaco

By Victor Landa, NewsTaco

On a typical day there aren’t many Latinos walking around in front of the Alamo in downtown San Antonio, TX. Aside from the Latino raspa vendors, it’s mostly tourists snapping pictures and basking in the myth of the cradle of Texas independence. But on a recent Saturday morning a group of Latino college students gathered with banners, signs, microphones and speakers to denounce a proposed law that they say will infringe on their right to learn about their culture.

Led by Tony Diaz, better know as El Librotraficante, the group denouced a Texas Senate bill that they say would have the effect of eliminating ethnic studies from all Texas colleges and Universities, and as a consequence, eliminate Mexican-American studies as a course of study. The bill, TX SB 1128,  ”Relating to curriculum requirements in American and Texas history at institutions of higher education,” was sponsored by state Senator Dan Patrick, of Houston.

We caught up with El Librotraficante in front of the Alamo.

The bill was introduced the Friday before Spring Break, so the students and community opposition had little notice or time to organize. That same Saturday Diaz walked three blocks from the Alamo to U.S. Senator John Cornyn’s San Antonio office to hand deliver a letter asking him to intervene on behalf of the Texas Latino community that wants the bill defeated.

By Stephen A. Nuño, NBCLatino

Conservative leaders seem intent on ensuring that Latinos grow up without a sense of pride in their identity. The historical roots of our relationship with the majority in this country is indeed marked by hatred, resentment, condescension, and an assumption of inferiority, and that national narrative has a debilitating impact on our children’s ability to understand why Latinos have higher poverty rates, higher teenage pregnancy rates, and lower educational achievement.

Conservatives prefer that Latinos are taught that the illnesses of our community are self-inflicted, or a result of our inability to be more like them. That is not true, and an education that instead instills a sense of pride in our history would add important context to understanding how we can improve our communities. And this pride has a ripple effect across disciplines, like math and science.

Indeed, the Mexican-American Studies program in Tucson did just that. Students who enrolled in the MAS program did demonstrably better not only in the arts and literature, but in disciplines conservatives keep saying are important to succeed in the modern world.

Yet attempts to study Mexican-American programs are being attacked across the country where we are trying to carve out safe space to feel that important sense of pride. Measures filed in Texas would change a 1955 state law to stipulate that only courses that give a “comprehensive survey” of American history or Texas history would count toward the six history credit requirement, erasing the need to focus on subjects that focus on race, class, and gender which help Latinos better understand how systemic inequalities pervade throughout minority communities.

The conservative vision of education intently narrows our vision of reality, limiting our capacity to understand our own problems within a narrative we can connect to.

And so it wasn’t surprising to learn that a court had upheld most provisions of an Arizona state law used to prohibit Mexican-American Studies curriculum in Tucson last week. The Mexican-American Studies program has long been the object of scorn among the majority who find it a danger to obscure the injustices of our society.

Republican Representative Nora Espinoza of New Mexico reacted to the ban on Mexican-American Studies by saying, “These are are extremely racist and hate books”.

Perhaps it doesn’t dawn on Ms. Espinoza that when people are systematically discriminated against, an historical account of that might seem resentful. It may seem ironic that a Hispanic representative would be hostile against Mexican American Studies because it exposes students to the realities of our country’s history, but she is a testament to the power of an education system that perpetuates our ignorance of these events.

But while this temporary reprieve from reality helps to delay the inevitable time when white folks won’t dominate the narrative of our history, this will be yet another chapter in the history books our grandchildren will almost certainly read in the normal curriculum of their time.

Mexican-American Studies lost a temporary battle in the fight to own the story of our own forefathers, and it will be wise to use this loss to explore ways different perspectives can be integrated into the regular curriculum. It’s exclusion from our curriculum is precisely why Mexican-American Studies has been necessary, but it won’t be long until the narrative changes. And when it does, it will not look back fondly on the Espinoza’s of our new worldview.

This article was first published in NBCLatino.

Stephen A. Nuño, Ph.D., NBC Latino contributor and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics and International Affairs at Northern Arizona University. He is currently writing a book on Republican outreach into the Latino Community.

[Photo by mediafreedominternational.org]

By Jacquellena Carrero, NBCLatino

Students at public universities in Texas may no longer be able to take courses focusing on racial, ethnic or gender history to fulfill their core requirements for an undergraduate degree under new proposed legislation. Measures filed in the Texas Senate and House would change a 1955 state law to stipulate that only courses that give a “comprehensive survey” of American history or Texas history would count toward the six history credit requirement. The original Texas law simply states that students at public institutions must take two courses in American history.

The bill was proposed by State Representative Giovanni Capriglione and State Senator Dan Patrick in response to a study on the state of higher education in Texas. The study Recasting History, which was conducted by the National Association of Scholars, concludes that “all too often the course readings gave strong emphasis to race, class or gender” and therefore diminished the attention given to other important subjects in American history like military, diplomatic and intellectual history. The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin) and Texas A&M University at College Station were the schools studied in the report.

UT Austin issued a statement back in January when the report that the legislation was based upon was initially released, saying that it “paints a narrowly defined and largely inaccurate picture of the quality, depth and  breadth of history teaching and research.”

Several history professors from UT Austin and Texas A&M largely condemned the proposed legislation, saying that it would isolate race, class and gender as something separate from American history rather than incorporate them.

Anne Martinez, an Assistant Professor at UT Austin, teaches courses on Mexican American history, history of Mexican women, and Borderlands history among other subjects. She calls the proposed legislation “misguided.”

“One of the ideas is the presumption that students aren’t going to learn US history when in fact they are. It is an opportunity for students who have taken general US history throughout Kindergarten to 12th grade to explore something more specialized,” Martinez says. “That’s what college is about.”

One of Martinez’s biggest fears is that the legislation would send a message that U.S. history does not encompass all people.

“It says that Mexican American history somehow isn’t as valuable another history,” she says.

One issue of broad concern to history professors was the foundation upon which the legislation was based. Several history professors called the study methodology flawed because researchers solely looked at syllabi and course reading materials and did not visit classrooms on site.

“None of them visited my classroom. When I lecture in class, I give students a broad context to the specific things they read. We talk about the Monroe Doctrine, also known as part of diplomatic history, because it’s important for setting the stage for US Mexican relations,” Martinez says.

Carlos Blanton, a history professor at Texas A&M who teaches a course on Latino history, agreed with Martinez’s concerns and called the legislation a shallow way to think about history.

“If you’re not in my class you’re not going to know how it was presented. Judging a course by the syllabi is like judging a book by the cover and saying oh I see that there’s a woman on the cover, this must be about gender,” Blanton says.

Representative Capriglione and Senator Patrick did not immediately return requests for comment. However, Director of the National Association of Scholars Peter Wood, defended the legislation.

“I do support the bills that have been introduced in the House and the Senate. They are small clarifications of the original legislation and it’s quite clear that what was intended was comprehensive, but the universities were substituting other kinds of courses,” Wood says.

Wood also stood by the methodology of the study. He called the decision not to attend classes an explicit methodological decision since visiting the 85 classes that the universities offer would have been an unfeasible task. Wood also argued that looking at course syllabi provided for a more meaningful study because different topics could have been discussed on days that researchers were present.

“Our findings would have been treated as anecdotal. While we do not believe that syllabi show everything, it is one piece of data that we took seriously. We went out and purchased all readings assigned and read all 635 readings,” Wood says.

History professors are not the only ones upset about the proposed legislation. Librotraficantes, a group of writers, professors, school board members, and students in Mexican American Studies programs have planned to travel to Austin Texas to protest the proposed change to Texas history requirement law.

Tony Diaz, leader of Librotraficantes, said that the impact of the law would be wide ranging.

“What people don’t understand is that this bill would make Mexican American and African American history courses not count toward the degree,” Diaz says. “It would impact community colleges that would have courses that don’t transfer over or count for advanced credit, and it might discourage students.”

Diaz says he has gotten broad support for his protest of the law, with conservatives coming out to support the cause as well because they don’t want to hurt their standing with the Latino community.

“It blows my mind that in the age of a global economy, Dan Patrick would want to build a border wall around history,” Diaz says.

The proposed legislation comes as a conservative state legislator in New Mexico made headlines for saying that Hispanic culture books should be banned from schools. State representative Nora Espinoza slammed a resolution calling for schools to embrace  diversity in the state’s curriculum.

The proposed legislation changing to Texas public university history requirements is scheduled to be discussed in the Texas House on May 23.

This article was first published in NBCLatino.

Jacquellena Carrero is a multimedia journalist with a passion for writing and working behind the camera. Jacquellena is proud of her Puerto Rican roots and hopes to get more stories on Latinos into the mainstream news media. She is graduating from Columbia University with a degree in Political Science in Spring 2013. Jacquellena has interned with NBC News for over a year. Most recently she interned with MSNBC Dayside, where she researched, gathered elements and occasionally wrote and produced short segments. Prior to MSNBC she interned with NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams, and assisted producers in all areas of production for the daily broadcast.

[Photo by alamosbasement]

PRESS RELEASE

Court Orders Tucson School District To Reinstate Culturally Relevant Curriculum That Reflects The History, Culture and Experiences of Mexican Americans

TUCSON, AZ - Yesterday Judge David C. Bury ruled in favor of Latino plaintiffs in the longstanding desegregation lawsuit against the Tucson Unified School District (“TUSD”), filed by MALDEF in 1974 in federal district court in Tucson, Arizona. In his order, Judge Bury adopted the Unitary Status Plan (“USP”), designed to eliminate segregation and improve educational outcomes for Latino students in TUSD, that was jointly filed last year by TUSD, the Fisher Plaintiffs on behalf of African American students, the United States Department of Justice, MALDEF on behalf of the Mendoza plaintiffs who are Latino students, and the Court-appointed Special Master, Dr. Willis D. Hawley.

Thomas A. Saenz, MALDEF President and General Counsel stated, “Once fully implemented, today’s order promises to dramatically improve educational opportunities for Latino students in Tucson. The plan addresses critical issues, such as the education of English learners, discriminatory disparities in access to critical programs, and the restoration of culturally relevant courses to the curriculum. When these issues are addressed, the educational experience of all students will be richer and more equitable.”

In his ruling, Judge Bury found that TUSD has not eliminated the vestiges of past discrimination identified in a 1978 court-approved settlement of the case and that it had not acted in good faith because over the years “the District had not addressed ongoing segregation and discrimination in TUSD, both physical segregation and unequal academic opportunities for Black and Hispanic minority students.” Significantly, Judge Bury upheld the section of the USP that calls for culturally relevant curriculum designed to reflect the history, experiences and culture of the Mexican American community as a strategy to improve student achievement and one that was agreed to by the parties as a “meritorious strategy, fully supported by the experts and the Special Master, to improve the academic performance of minority students.”

Nancy Ramirez, Western Regional Counsel and lead attorney stated, “Today’s ruling is the culmination of years of vigilance by the Latino and local communities in Tucson demanding accountability and transparency by the Tucson Unified School District that would ultimately lead to equal opportunities for Latino students. We look forward to continuing to work on the implementation of this comprehensive and ambitious plan that offers much promise for improving educational outcomes for all students in TUSD”.

The Court’s order also denies the State of Arizona’s attempt to intervene in the case to litigate the issue of Mexican American Studies. The Court concluded that its ruling does not override a 2010 Arizona law targeting ethnic studies for elimination “and even if it did – the Supreme Court has held that state laws cannot be allowed to impede a desegregation order.” The Court believes that Arizona’s role in the case may be concluding and has requested that Arizona Attorney General Thomas Horne demonstrate why the state’s participation in the case should not be ended now.

Other important outcomes of Judge Bury’s order include the following: The Court agreed with MALDEF that the USP must include a district-wide professional development plan for all educators working with English Language Learners. Overruling the District’s objection the Court stated, “Given the large amount of ELL students in TUSD and their substandard academic achievement, there is a clear need for teachers to learn how to better teach ELL students.” The Court also agreed with MALDEF that annual goals should be set for GATE programs and Advanced Academic Courses to “steadily increase the number and percentage of African American and Latino students, including ELL and exceptional (special education students).” And it agreed with MALDEF’s concern that minority students are overrepresented in special education classes and requested the Special Master to include language to address this concern.

The Special Master will oversee the District’s revisions to the USP incorporating Judge Bury’s order, which will be filed with the Court on February 19, 2013.

Lois Thompson of Proskauer Rose LLP, serving as pro bono counsel stated, “The Court-adopted plan, if implemented effectively and in good faith, should finally improve the educational environment and outcomes for the District’s Latino students and lead to a day when the District can be released from Court supervision.”

A copy of the order is available at
http://www.maldef.org/assets/pdf/MENDOZA_020613_Order.pdf 

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Founded in 1968, MALDEF is the nation’s leading Latino legal civil rights organization. Often described as the “law firm of the Latino community,” MALDEF promotes social change through advocacy, communications, community education, and litigation in the areas of education, employment, immigrant rights, and political access. For more information on MALDEF, please visit: www.maldef.org.

[Photo by mediafreedominternational.org]

By Matt Mendez, Librotraficante.com

I am waiting for Marjorie Ann — my wife, Marlo, is seven months pregnant with her. Our soon-to-arrive daughter is named after her grandmother, my wife’s mother who died just before the start of Marlo’s senior year in high school. I never had the chance to meet her, but I’ve gotten to know her through the stories Marlo and her family tell: a free spirit who fearlessly loved her children. Yet if Marjorie’s experiences had been made into a book and taught to students of the Mexican-American Studies (MAS) program in Tucson’s Unified School District (TUSD), her story would more than likely be banned — because Marjorie was Mexican American.

On January 10 TUSD suspended the MAS program and in at least one classroom had books, written primarily by Mexican American authors, physically removed while a class was in session. In a press release TUSD explained that the books used in the former MAS program had not been banned but instead moved into storage and claimed the “stored” books were available in most of the district’s libraries. TUSD also claimed the curriculum taught in MAS will not be lost, but instead added to the general curriculum.

In 2010 93.6% of students enrolled in the MAS program graduated from high school; a comparison group had only an 82.7% rate. This gap in graduation rates has been consistent since 2005, according to TUSD’s Department of Accountability and Research. Higher graduation rates among MAS students means higher graduation rates for Mexican Americans, meaning more will be eligible for and attend college. The success of the MAS program and the changing demographics of the state, of the entire Southwest, mean that soon our governments will reflect this new and better-educated majority.

TUSD’s untenable position of inclusion by removal is the doing of current Superintendent for Public Instruction John Huppenthal, and his predecessor Tom Horne. Despite TUSD’s weak statement to the contrary, the only plausible goal of ARS 15-112 (the state law banning ethnic studies) is to target the Mexican American population in Arizona by diluting its history and delegitimizing the native voices of the state. Huppenthal and Horne seem to believe that the MAS program was creating an army of Mexican revolutionaries bent on overthrowing the government.

That works of fiction by Sandra Cisneros, Dagoberto Gilb, Manuel Muñoz and Luis Alberto Urrea (just to name a few, see entire list here) — coming-of-age stories about a young girl in Chicago and of men looking for work and love, of young men discovering their sexuality California’s picking fields and of a boy growing up in the streets of Tijuana, stories as meaningful and instructive as Marjorie’s — are somehow a threat to national security. I find it hard to believe that either Huppenthal or Horne actually believe an armed rebellion is marching their way. Instead what they really fear is demographic change. Horne, now Arizona’s attorney general, has been a hardliner against immigrants and immigration for years, accusing “illegals” of voter fraud. Neither man is working to stave off revolution, but cynically fomenting a culture of fear in Arizona.

Revealingly, neither Huppenthal (an Indiana native) nor Horne (a Canadian) are native Arizonans or from the Southwest — for that matter neither is Governor Jan Brewer (California) or Sheriff Joe Arpaio (Massachusetts).  While both men have lived in Arizona for a number of years, it is clear that neither of them has truly assimilated into the indigenous culture of Arizona. They do not, or do not want to, understand what it means to live on the border.

While I am waiting for my daughter to be born I am not waiting to make the schools she will attend better. I am working with groups like Save Ethnic Studies, UNIDOS, and the Librostraficantes to end the ban of the Mexican American Studies program and bring the books by our historians, cultural critics, and literary greats back to our classrooms. When Marjorie Ann Mendez is born I want her to live in an Arizona where she is not a second-class citizen, where her culture will proudly be represented in schools like it will be in her home. I want her to be free to learn about our heritage, our history and our stories just as freely as she will learn about her family, especially the grandmother for whom she was named.

[Image Courtesy Librotraficante]

Arizona State Representative Cecil Ash proposed that Arizona create a White Appreciation Day when whites are no longer the majority in the state. Many are in awe that Ash only asked for one day; he has since clarified that this single day will be so spectacular that only one day will be necessary.

He wants to point out that while other groups need an entire month, whites are more efficient and just plain better. For those who partake in White Appreciation Day, some preliminary events could include the following:

• Dane Cook stand-up marathon.

• Large white flags that, in a really useful move, will double as festive clothing. That’s right: stylish and economical.

• To conserve energy and keep the party going into the wee hours of the morning, lower-case Ts will be set ablaze throughout the state. The Ts will represent the intersection of cultures that make up “white.”  The Ts will be placed on the lawns of non-whites as an invitation to join the festivities. It will, all in all, be a very inclusive celebration.

• Betty White, Jack White, Shaun White, Vanna White, and Jaleel White (of Steve Urkel fame) will be the featured entertainers.

• In honor of Cecil Ash, the Ash Hole Award will be given to that individual who best represents the morals and intellect of the award namesakes — Cecil Ash and Harold Hole.

Your handsome and humble servant —

El Guapo

[Image By Huebi]

By Richard G. Santos

The State of Arizona has been foremost in anti-Mexican American legislation, ordinances and rhetoric in recent years. National boycotts and the U.S. Department of Justice and even the U.S. Supreme Court have failed to normalize the Republican-controlled hate movement. Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio and Arizona Superintendent of Public Education John Huppenthal continue to thumb their noses and wear their prejudices, intolerance and ignorance with pride.

It should be noted that Huppenthal ran for office and was elected on the promises that he would “do away with la raza.” Not surprising, within the last two weeks Huppenthal ordered the Tucson School District to suspend its Mexican American studies classes and issued a list of some 100 books to be immediately removed from its classrooms and library. Most were written by Spanish surnamed and Native American authors.

The list of banned books ranges from the ridiculous to the insane. 

Also, among the books banned from the classroom were: Shakespeare’s play “The Tempest,” and “Civil Disobedience” by American author H. D. Thoreau. Also removed: “Pedagogy of the Oppressed” by Paulo Freire, the Declaration of Independence, “Cross-Examining American Ideology” by Howard Zinn, “Ten Little Indians” by Sherman Alexie and “A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America” by Ronald Takaki, Sandra Cisneros’ “Women Hollering Creek” and “Curandera” by Carmen Tafolla, “Bless Me Última,” by Rodolfo Anaya and many others by non-Spanish surnamed authors and poets.

In defending their action, Cara Rene, Tucson School District Communications Director stated the books have not been banned — merely removed from the classrooms and libraries and sent to the school district’s storage facility. The books “are still available through the TUSD library system,” according to the district. The immediate reaction has been an outcry from teachers, authors, political activists and civil rights activists of diverse ethnic, racial and educational background. Moreover, politically active Latinos are boosting the Democratic party membership in Arizona and elsewhere assuring that whoever the Republican presidential candidate may be, he will not be getting the Latino vote.

It seems as if the Republican presidential candidates, not to mention state anti-Latino laws such as in Arizona and Georgia, are guaranteeing the majority of the Latino vote will go to the Democratic party. As it currently stands, the Republican presidential candidates will have done a good job of killing each other at the polls while seemingly guaranteeing the re-election of President Barack Obama. Meanwhile, for Latinos in this country, such exaggerated Republican party-generated, anti-Mexican, anti-immigrant rhetoric has had the unfortunate consequence of increasing hate crimes against people who “look” Latino.

Richard G. Santos is an international research historian and retired university professor who lives in Pearsall, Texas.

[Photo By Lalo Alcaraz]

By Nicole Cipri

In December, Arizona lawmakers passed the controversial bill known as HB2281, which banned ethnic studies in the Tuscon Unified School District. Last week, while students watched in stunned silence, teachers were forced to box up the seven books that were part of their Mexican-American Studies classes. Amongst the outlawed titles were Shakespeare’s The Tempest, which was used to teach students about race and colonialism, and Rethinking Colombus: The Next 500 Years, which included a critical essay by Tuscon resident and Pueblo writer Leslie Marmon Silko. Other titles included Critical Race Theory, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, and Occupied America: A History of Chicanos.

At a community forum, students spoke about the trauma of watching their teachers being forced to hand over the books that had been part of their curriculum. This program and its books have been denounced by Arizona politicians, such as District Attorney Tom Horne and state superintendent of public instruction John Huppenthal, the latter of whom actually compared the Mexican-American Studies program (MAS) to the indoctrination practiced by the Hitler Youth. Critics of MAS choose to ignore (or in Huppenthal’s case, deliberately misrepresent) the fact that students in the program have a graduation rate of 98%. Students speak passionately about finding themselves, finding a community, becoming enthusiastic about learning.

What’s the power of a word, of an idea? Already, the Tuscon Unified School District is denying that this is a “book ban,” knowing the connotations of the phrase, and has pointed out that the titles are still available to students through school libraries. To any modern, sane society, the censorship and destruction of books is an act tantamount to evil. It brings to mind images of goose-stepping Nazis and violent Red Guards in Maoist China, bonfires in which a people’s words and history go up in flames. When a people’s words become ashes, so do their collective identity; with their identity gone, eventually the people themselves follow. “Wherever they burn books,” wrote German poet Heinrich Heine, “they will also, in the end, burn people.”

In his book A Universal History of the Destruction of Books, Fernando Baez writes, “Public or private book destruction almost always takes place in alternating melancholy phases: restriction, exclusion, censure, looting, destruction.” By forcing teachers to remove these books — in a traumatizing, humiliating, and public way — the leaders of the Tuscon Unified School District, State Superintendent John Huppenthal, and state District Attorney Tom Horne, have sent a clear message: Be silent. Be obedient. Be empty, be acquiescent, be powerless, be alone.

Politicians in Arizona do not want their youth to talk about racism or oppression. In an interview with Jeff Biggers, who has been writing extensively about the ethnic studies ban for Salon.com and Huffington Post, teacher Curtis Acosta spoke about a meeting with his school administration: “What was clear is that our curriculum and pedagogy must be entirely overhauled. Which means the alterations are not only what we teach, but how we teach. No further support has been given to this point.”

The law itself is vague. It forbids “any courses or classes that: promote the overthrow of the United States government; promote resentment toward a race or class of people; are designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group; advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.” These programs have been shut down halfway through the academic year, with no guidelines for a replacement curriculum, only the threatening promise that these teachers will be monitored for their compliance.

In response to the ban, students in the district have been walking out in growing numbers, and a planned protest and teach-in was planned for Tuesday. A bill has already been introduced into the Arizona House to repeal the ban. Community leaders have been calling for federal court suit against the state, and for the Department of Justice to investigate Huppenthal and Horne on charges of racial profiling, hate crimes, and fraud.

Censorship is a form of violence. This law equates learning about Chicano history with promoting the overthrow of the government. It treats ethnic solidarity as treason. Arizona has become infamous in the last five years for eroding the rights ofimmigrants, undocumented people and Spanish-speaking citizens. Both Horne and Huppenthal campaigned on promises to“destroy” the ethnic studies program and “stop la raza. Arizona’s politicians talk is if they are on the front lines of a war, but a war happens for one of two reasons: a gross failure of diplomacy, or because someone, on one side or another, was spoiling for a fight.

In this case, it’s obvious which it is.

The men and women in the Arizona legislature who have enacted these bans are terrified of having a group of educated, empowered, and unified Latino youth in their state. They are so scared, they have bent the laws, lied on record, and sold their own fear and hate to their constituents. That is the power of an idea, of an education.

[Video By ThreeSonorans; Photo By steev]

The video shows a man hanging out in front of the trunk of a car filled with books you may recognize, books about Latinos, books written by Latinos. He says his name is Tony and he has a few things to say about Arizona’s ban on Mexican American studies.

The man’s name is Tony Diaz, novelist and writer originally from Chicago but now living in Houston. His organization is called Nuestra Palabra, which promotes Latino literature, literacy and culture. His mission is simple: to smuggle Latino books back into Arizona.

“In my delusion, it’s good to be thousands of us,” he told NewsTaco about his plan to organize a banned book caravan to Tucson, Arizona this March. “We’re taking all the ‘wet books’ that are illegal in Arizona back across the border.”

Of course, Diaz’s plan is accompanied by plenty of theater, but the Librotraficante Banned Book Caravan he is organizing to kick off on Sunday, March 11 — which will see the caravan of at least one bus drive from Houston to San Antonio to El Paso to New Mexico and finally to Tucson — is the real deal. Thus far, he told us there about 70 people in Houston planning to make the week-long trek, but organizers and authors in other cities in Texas, as well as New Mexico and Arizona, are piling on their own plans.

What happens when Diaz and his cohorts get to Arizona is still up in the air, he told us, but it’s likely that upon arriving in Tucson the group will celebrate literature currently banned in the state. A workshop on Mexican American studies, talking to politicians and community members, and perhaps even writing around in an ice cream truck giving out Mexican American studies books is on the agenda, he told us.

If you would like to help, donate, participate, send books, or spread the word, this is what you can do. Visit his website, watch his video, donate money, or donate your books (send to P.O. Box) check them out on Facebook or Twitter. Check out his video below, and we will update you on the group’s progress.

[Screenshot And Video By hightechaztec; ]

High school students in Tucson, Arizona walked out of their classrooms Monday in protest over the ban on Mexican American studies in the Tucson Unified School District (TUSD) recently. NewsTaco reader Ricardo Bracamonte shared with us his observations from the protests, and this is what he said:

My name is Ricardo Bracamonte an independent student filmmaker at the University of Arizona in Tucson. Early this morning hundreds of students from 4 schools walked out in response to the banning of Mexican-American studies two weeks ago. It seemed like there was approximately 250 students.

They left school around 9am met at Santa Rita Park and marched to Tucson Unified School District (TUSD) hand in hand. The schools averaged about 2 to 3 miles away from the park and it was about 1.5 miles to TUSD. The effort was sparked last night (Sunday) via social media.  At TUSD they listed demands to the district which included the reinstatement of MAS class, chanted and created critical dialogue among themselves. They chanted, “Sí se puede, sí si se puede” and ”When our education is under attack, what do we do? Take it back!” [And] the students also recited “In Lak’ech’” several times.

They chose to not speak to the media because of their portrayal of their interviews in the local media.  The students were peaceful and they said they plan to be proactive to regain their classes.  There were cops following one group at first and then they followed the larger group. Cops were waiting at Santa Rita and TUSD.

In response to the ban, one of the groups organizing the protests, UNIDOS, organized a “Tucson community’s School of Ethnic Studies” today. Part of the school’s mission is to allow members of the community to share why Mexican American studies is important to them, as well as to make demands: that  the ban be lifted and that  all cultures fit into the definition of “education.”

Three Sonorans also took video of the walkouts, here they are below:

[Screenshot And Videos By ThreeSonorans; ThreeSonorans]

By Salomón Baldenegro

Tucson, Arizona — First, let’s get the media-driven nonsense out of the way: “ethnic studies” was not dismantled in the Tucson Unified School District. Mexican American Studies was dismantled. It is the Mexican American community whose legitimacy in this country is being challenged. All the other “ethnic studies” curricula in TUSD are intact and functioning — and “legal.”

The other bit of nonsense we need to get out of the way is the fiction that TUSD did what it had to do, that it really had no choice but to dismantle Mexican American Studies. The indisputable fact of the matter is that TUSD had a choice: to go along with Attorney General Tom Horne and Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal or appeal Huppenthal’s decision — which would have put a hold on the threatened financial penalties on TUSD until the issue was resolved in court.

TUSD made the conscious and deliberate choice to support Huppenthal.

The “Purging of the Mexicans” has begun in earnest in TUSD, one day after the school board, led by its chief anti Mexican American studies hater Mark Stegeman, voted 4-1 to join hands with Horne and Huppenthal and dismantle the Mexican American Studies curriculum. The very next day after its nefarious vote, while classes were in session, TUSD conducted a purge of any and all books and teaching materials having to do with Mexican Americans and/or that deal with topics that are banned (e.g., civil rights) from MAS classrooms. Journalist Jeff Biggers reported that:

According to district spokesperson Cara Rene, the books ‘will be cleared from all classrooms, boxed up and sent to the Textbook Depository for storage.’

TUSD teachers and students who witnessed the purging of the books corroborate what Biggers reports; here’s a video. I feel like the depth of TUSD Superintendent John Pedicone’s hate for our Mexican American Studies is evident in his ordering that the classrooms be purged of the books and teaching materials during class, forcing students to witness it. Also, purged were works from Rudy Acuña and Arturo Rosales, outstanding Chicano historians — both of whom, coincidentally, have Tucson roots.

Perhaps most strange is that Shakespeare’s play “The Tempest” is also banned. As you may remember, in “The Tempest,” Prospero comes to an island and enslaves the indigenous people (Caliban, Ariel) and takes over — i.e., colonizes — the island, raising the issues of morality, fairness, and oppression. Discussing these topics, and specifically oppression, in the context of Mexican Americans is “illegal” according to Huppenthal, Pedicone, Stegeman, et al. and is banned. Therefore, Mexican American students are not allowed to read this subversive play.

The above and the following examples are just that — examples. All books and teaching materials (there are too many to detail here) used in the MAS curriculum are banned and were seized by TUSD in the Great Mexican Book Purge. But the book ban is racially-ethnically selective. Rodolfo Anaya’s award-winning novel “Bless Me Última” is also banned, but only if read by Mexican American Studies students in predominantly Mexican schools where this program exists. Anaya’s book is still “legal” and continues to be used in (virtually all-white) University High School, TUSD’s quasi-private and exclusive high school for “gifted” students. So, according to Pedicone and Stegeman, the nature and quality of “Bless Me Última” are different — depending on what, the color of the eyes reading it?

Thoreau’s “Civil Disobedience (Resistance to Civil Government)” essay is used extensively at (virtually all-white) University High School — but that same essay is banned from Mexican American Studies (Literature and History) classes at predominantly Latino Pueblo and Tucson High Schools. As I’m sure you remember, in his classic essay (published in 1849) Thoreau argues that: 1.) individuals should not permit governments to overrule or chip away at their consciences; and 2.) it is the civic duty of citizens to fight against the government’s attempts to make them the agents of injustice. Thoreau was motivated in part by his disgust with slavery and the Mexican–American War.

So, according to Pedicone and Stegeman, Thoreau’s essay is intellectually stimulating when read by white students but subversive and “un-American” if read by Mexican American students? That TUSD board members Stegeman and Alexandre Sugiyama, as well as Superintendent Pedicone, all teach at the University of Arizona — a scholarly space dedicated to the free exchange of ideas — willingly and with gusto participate in the banning of books and ideas is mind boggling. If the concept of malpractice applied to educators as it does to attorneys and physicians, the banning of books would be a textbook case of such malpractice. Yet, University of Arizona professors ordered the purge. Incredible!

TUSD had a choice: to go along with the Horne and Huppenthal, or appeal Huppenthal’s decision, which would have put a hold on the threatened financial penalties on TUSD until the issue was resolved in court. TUSD made the conscious and deliberate choice to support Huppenthal. If any other award-winning books used in university classes were declared “illegal” because they might stimulate forbidden discussions and banned them and sent officials to go into classrooms to seize the offending books — the Faculty Senate and every other university official would, after recovering from their apoplectic shock, scream loud and incessantly about academic freedom, etc.

Despite all of it, this I can and will say: We are going to win this fight. As our history clearly details — we always do. Which is precisely why the haters and their allies do not want our children, or anyone else, to study our history.

Salomón Baldenegro is a lifelong Tucsonan, a veteran of the Chicano Movement, civil rights activist and a retired Assistant Dean of Students and Instructor at the University of Arizona very much involved in the ethnic studies campaign.

[Photo By National Portrait Gallery London]

Hi there, this week I wanted to point out that NewsTaco snagged the only exclusive interview with @MexicanMitt, a character mocking the presidential candidate on Twitter. That’s my top pick this week, although we had a bunch of awesome stories that I wanted to draw your attention to.

Fun stuff included reminiscing about how Latinas have to have a good sense of humor to survive the barrage of nicknames slung their way growing up. News that 1 in 10 Hawaiians is a Latino was also interesting. Then there was some news about the KKK from Oklahoma, Tucson’s Mexican American Studies was shut down and Mitt Romney said he was “proud” to be endorsed by the author of SB 1070.

So check out our video and our stories and we’ll see you here next week!

Sara’s Top Pick:

• An Interview With Mitt Romney Twitter Parody “Mexican Mitt”

Culture:

• Being A Latina Means Having A Good Sense Of Humor
• KKK Recruiting In Oklahoma Doesn’t Go So Well
• I’m 32 And All My Friends Are Married But Me
• 1  In 10 Hawaiians Is Latino
• 6% Of Latinos In The U.S. Don’t Identify As “Latino”

Politics:

• Tucson’s Ethnic Studies Program Officially Shut Down
• Romney “Proud” Of Endorsement From SB 1070 Author
• Cecilia Muñoz Appointed Director Of The White House Domestic Policy Council
• Latino Immigration To U.S. Has Fallen To “Net Zero”

[Video And Screenshot By NewsTaco]

The Tucson Unified School District’s governing board shut down the ethnic studies program —  or Mexican American studies — in a meeting Tuesday night.

Only one of the five board members voted against eliminating the program when the board faced two choices: shut it down or appeal to the Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction John Huppenthal, who decided to withhold 10% of that district’s budget until the ethnic studies program was brought into compliance. This represents about $1 million a month.

“Compliance” in this scenario means that the program is in violation of the state law banning instruction that promotes “resentment” or “the overthrow of the U.S. government.” Even while a state audit that found that Tucson’s ethnic studies program did not violate state law, Huppenthal ruled that it did, and subsequently cut the district’s budget.

While the school board meeting was taking place in Tucson, U.S. Circuit Court Judge A. Wallace Tashima in the same town decided that students could challenge this law on First Amendment grounds. The judge refused to issue an injunction against the law, citing the fact that the teachers who brought the case had no standing to challenge the law.

The next step will likely be more lawsuits, more organization, more protests like the one that preceded the ruling, and generally a strengthening of the Latino grassroots movement in Arizona, from what we hear. What makes this more confusing is that the University of Arizona in Tucson recently announced a doctoral program in Mexican American Studies —  only the third of its kind in the country.

We’ll keep you in the loop.

[Photo By Wing Chi-Poon]

The University of Arizona in Tucson has announced a doctoral program in Mexican American Studies —  only the third of its kind in the country.  The University will begin accepting students into the program in the fall 2013 and be administered by the university’s  Department of Mexican American Studies.

The interdisciplinary program includes anthropology, history, sociology, education, and takes into account cultural, gender, ethnic, sexual, indigenous, immigration, and global perspectives.  According to the University:

the program will challenge students to create and enhance research paradigms to further the knowledge base in Mexican American and Chicana/o studies by linking theory with practice, scholarship with instruction and the academy with the community.

To some, it may seem somewhat strange that in the same state — and city — where a lawsuit is underway to keep Mexican American Studies high schools, a new program to celebrate the same is being launched. The Tucson program  seems to be part of a trend, that we have reported here previously, of the expansion of Mexican American Studies programs —  most recently with the creation of an entirely online program in South Texas.