At chapter this week, Chris Hernandez presented to everybody about how his lineage affects him. Chris is an American with a white mother and a Cuban father, which sometimes can cause ambiguity with how he identifies. The one way he does not identify is as “Hispanic”. Saying that somebody is Hispanic denotes that they are of Spanish decent. Chris’s father is from Cuba, which was colonized by Spain. Calling a Cuban person “Hispanic” simply because they speak Spanish is like calling an American person “English” simply because they speak English. It just does not make sense. Chris also emphasized that it is not rude to refer to somebody by their national origin. For example, it is not rude to refer to him as Cuban. In fact, most non-Americans are proud of their country and are happy to reference it. If somebody did not know Chris’s country of origin, he says that the more appropriate term to refer to him is “Latino” rather than Hispanic. Chris concluded his presentation by reminding everybody that they are not bound by what race/ethnicity they put on their job application. You are more than your heritage, although many take pride in learning from their own personal heritage. 

Chris set an excellent example tonight on sharing the pride he takes in his cultural background, and helped clarify some aspects of it that many were not aware of. We hope that others may take the same steps in sharing their culture, so that we may all learn to grow and appreciate everybody’s unique backgrounds.