CSRC Newsletter - October 2010

It is sometimes said that change is scary, but the recent announcement by Universal Studios Hollywood takes things to a new level. For the first time, Universal Studios is introducing a Latino character into its annual Halloween Horror Nights (September 24–October 31). After all, Los Angeles County—the largest county in the United States—is 48 percent Latino, and the percentage is even higher for the population under eighteen. And what will scare these niños more than anything? La Llorona! Cue horror music. Of course, Universal Studios, which calls itself “The Entertainment Capital of L.A.,” provides Angelenos of all ages with the chance to have their pictures taken with Dora the Explorer, Zorro, Lucy Ricardo, and other Latino characters. I know, Ricky is the Latino, not Lucy, but…. There is a need for role models, and also for a popular culture that engages our cultural diversity. So if this year we can encounter La Llorona, surely El Machete can’t be too far behind. Well, that is from another studio. But NBC Universal—the parent company—does have another Latino character in its vaults that was so frightening that it brought a successful TV series to an abrupt end: U.S. President Matthew Santos ¡Qué susto!

 

 

Two new research videos produced by the CSRC are now available on the center’s iTunes U webpage. The Queer Archive or Queering the Archive presents the proceedings of the CSRC’s November 2006 conference, which explored critical issues in archival research into Chicana/o and Latina/o queer histories. Conference participants included James Schultz, Yolanda Retter Vargas, Richard T. Rodríguez, Deborah R. Vargas, David Roman, C. Ondine Chavoya, Ellie D. Hernandez, Horacio N. Roque Ramírez, and Maylei Blackwell; the moderator was Chon A. Noriega. In An Interview with Carlos M. Haro, filmed earlier this year, Dr. Haro, a CSRC fellow and former CSRC assistant director, reflects on the history of Chicano studies at UCLA and the founding of the CSRC.

 

The CSRC, through its partner the Mexican American Legal and Education Fund (MALDEF), provided nearly 200 UCLA students with tickets to the MALDEF Truth in Immigration concert at the Gibson Amphitheater on September 28. The concert, which featured Los Lobos and Los Tigres del Norte, was part of MALDEF’s campaign to raise awareness about immigration issues. CSRC thanks MALDEF and the Los Tigres del Norte Foundation for their ongoing support and the bands for not only an amazing concert but also their commitment to increasing public awareness on this important topic.

 

Members of Save Ethnic Studies discussed the organization and its goals in a presentation in the CSRC Library on September 30. Save Ethnic Studies, which includes educators, students, and community members, was formed to protect ethnic studies courses in Arizona following the passage of Arizona House Bill 2281. Moderated by Professor Reynaldo Macias, presenters discussed the legislative efforts that threaten the Tucson Unified School District’s Mexican American/Raza Studies Department (MA/RSD) and the organization’s plans to challenge HB 2281 in court. The lecture will be available on the CSRC’s iTunes U webpage. For more information about Save Ethnic Studies, visit the organization’s website.

 

A presentation by CSRC collaborator Mari Carmen Ramirez at the Aspen Ideas Festival was the topic of “The State of Latin American Art,” which appeared on the website of The Atlantic on September 27. Dr. Ramirez is the director of the International Center for the Arts of the Americas (ICAA) and the Wortham Curator of Latin American Art at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston. Dr. Ramirez discussed ICAA’s efforts to recover and digitize documentation of twentieth-century Latin American and Latino art and to make these resources available through printed publications and online access. 

 

An essay by Alvaro Huerta, CSRC visiting scholar and PhD candidate in city and regional planning at UC Berkeley, appeared in the September 23 issue of CounterPunch. In “The Curious Case of Latino Republicans” Mr. Huerta discusses Latino support for the Republican Party in light of its campaign against Latino immigrants. Mr. Huerta and Abel Valenzuela, professor of Chicano studies and a CSRC affiliate, were featured in “On the Record,” an article in the Daily Bruin that discussed academic quality at UCLA.

 

CSRC Director Chon A. Noriega and CSRC Librarian Lizette Guerra will give presentations at the SACNAS annual national conference, “Science, Technology, and Diversity for a Sustainable Future,” which will be held at the Anaheim Convention Center on September 30–October 3. SACNAS (Society for Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science) is a national organization of professional scientists, science educators, policymakers, and students. An important part of its mission is to encourage Chicano, Latino, and Native American students to pursue graduate education and obtain the advanced degrees necessary for scientific research, leadership positions, and teaching careers at all levels. The CSRC Library serves as the archival repository for the SACNAS papers. Conference sessions will explore the multifaceted world of sustainability research from interdisciplinary and subject-specific perspectives. The conference agenda and registration information is available on the SACNAS website.

 

Pilar Tompkins Rivas, an independent curator and a CSRC arts project coordinator, is one of four curators who will be featured at Big City Forum #20 on Saturday, October 2, 5:00–7:00 p.m., at the Honor Fraser gallery, 2622 S. La Cienega Blvd., Los Angeles. Big City Forum is a project that focuses on urban planning, economic development, education, architecture, art and design, cultural exchange, and community activism in Los Angeles. Participants include local museums, art galleries, design studios, and other cultural organizations. Ms. Tompkins Rivas is working with the CSRC as a co-curator for the center’s four L.A. Xicano exhibitions, which will be held at the Fowler Museum at UCLA, LACMA, and the Autry National Center. She is also the curator for an exhibition focusing on the institutional histories of the Los Angeles Municipal Gallery and the Watts Towers Arts Center, which is sponsored by the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs. These exhibitions are elements of the Getty Foundation’s Pacific Standard Time initiative.

 

Visit the CSRC Press at the 14th Annual Los Angeles Latino Book and Family Festival, Saturday and Sunday, October 9–10, 10:00 a.m.–6:00 p.m., at Greenlee Plaza on the campus of Cal State University, Los Angeles. This is an excellent opportunity to see our selection of award-winning books, DVDs, and the latest issue of Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies. The press will be in booth 513.

 

The CSRC will present a screening of The Purepecha: Poorest of the Poor on Wednesday, October 13, 3:00–5:00 p.m., in the CSRC Library. The thirty-minute documentary, produced and directed by Cheryl Quintana Leader, traces the struggle of the Purepecha, a group of Mesoamerican people from Michoacán, Mexico, who settled in a dilapidated trailer park, known as Duroville, east of Palm Springs. The film shows Stephanie Maldonado, a sixth grader from Long Beach, as she explores the world of migrant farm-harvesting families in the Coachella Valley. A Q&A session with Ms. Quintana Leader will follow the screening.

 

The CSRC Library will participate in the fifth annual Los Angeles Archives Bazaar on Saturday, October 23, 9:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m., at the USC Davidson Conference Center. The bazaar will feature educational programs, author book signings, and film screenings on the history of Los Angeles neighborhoods. The event is presented by L.A. as Subject, an association of research archives, libraries, and historical societies dedicated to preserving the history of Los Angeles as it is reflected in the archival record. Admission is free, and parking is available at USC Parking Structure D for $8.00. For more information visit the L.A. as Subject website.

 

Save the date … “Latino Art Now! The New Wave/La Nueva Ola” will take place November 10–13 at The Plaza de la Raza. The four-day conference will explore the status of Latino art in the United States. Roundtables and workshops will focus on a range of topics, including current opportunities and challenges for artists, new institutional developments, and technological trends. For more information and to register, visit the IUPLR website. Latino Art Now! is a biennial conference; this year’s meeting is sponsored by The Inter-University Program for Latino Research at the University of Notre Dame, the Center for Puerto Rican Studies at Hunter College, and the CSRC.

 

The CSRC Library would like to thank Jain Fletcher, UCLA special collections cataloger, for processing fifteen of CSRC’s archival collections, which are now stored at the Southern Regional Library Facility (SRLF). These collections are:

The Homeboy Industries Papers, a collection of administrative documents, documentary video tapes, and Father Gregory Boyle’s personal papers, was also recently moved to SRLF. If you are interested in researching CSRC collections, please contact the CSRC archivist at lguerra@chicano.ucla.edu.

 

The CSRC would like to thank Linda Vera Rivas for her hard work and dedication to processing collections. Ms. Rivas is a recent graduate of the UCLA Department of Information Studies. She began her internship at the CSRC during the 2010 spring quarter and has continued to volunteer her time. She is currently working on finding aids that will be available through the Online Archive of California.

 

Several CSRC collections have newly published or republished finding aids available through the Online Archive of California:

To access these findings aids, visit the CSRC website.

 

Watch for new books from the CSRC Press in the coming months. Tere Romo’s Malaquias Montoya, volume 6 of the A Ver series, is in production, as is volume 4 of the Chicano Archives series, The Center Theatre Group Latino Theater Initiative Papers, which features an essay by Chantal Rodriguez. Oral History and Communities of Color contains essays by Felicia Hodge, Karen Ishizuka and Robert Nakamura, Nancy Mirabal, Susan Rose, and Irum Shiekh, interviews with Karen Mary Davalos and Horacio N. Roque Ramírez, and an introduction by the volume’s editors, Chon A. Noriega and Teresa Barnett. For more information about these and other CSRC Press publications, visit the CSRC website.
 
CSRC Visiting Scholars for 2010–11

The CSRC supports a visiting scholars program that attracts scholars from institutions throughout the country and from abroad. Grant recipients conduct research on a wide variety of subjects during their residency at the CSRC. We are pleased to announce the scholars for the 2010-11 academic year.

 

Jennifer Rose Najera, Institute of American Cultures (IAC) Post-Doctoral Fellowship recipient. Dr. Najera is an assistant professor in the Department of Ethnic Studies at University of California, Riverside.

 

Deborah Vargas, Los Tigres del Norte Fund/IAC Visiting Scholar. Dr. Vargas is an assistant professor in the Department of Chicano/Latino Studies at University of California, Irvine.

 

Jessica M. Vasquez, professor, Department of Sociology, University of Kansas.

Karen Mary Davalos, associate professor, Chicana/o Studies Department, Loyola Marymount University.

Ramon Garcia, associate professor, Chicana/o Studies Department, California State University, Northridge.

Sandra de la Loza, artist, Los Angeles.

Raul Pacheco, musician and co-founder of Ozomatli.

Alvaro Huerta, PhD candidate in city and regional planning, University of California, Berkeley.