Arizona Court to Decide What We Can Learn

by Roberto Rodriguez

Not sure that most people know that as a result of draconian legislation, it has been in effect “illegal” to teach ethnic studies in Arizona since 2010. It is one of the twin laws that we in Arizona will never recognize as laws, regardless of what anyone says or however the courts rule.

However, in about a month (June 26-30 and July 17-21), the constitutionality of the anti-ethnic studies HB 2281 legislation will be put to a test. At that time, the long-anticipated trial will be held to determine whether there were racial motivations in terminating Tucson Unified School District’s highly effective Raza Studies Department. For rest of column, please go to: http://diverseeducation.com/article/96870/

Diaz Epitomizes Education and Responsibilty

by Roberto Rodriguez

How time flies. Watching Cynthia Diaz at this year’s Centro Guerrero convocation at the University of Arizona brought back memories of when I first saw her. I did not actually meet her at the time. I first saw her on an “I miss my mom” poster when she was 15 and fighting in Phoenix to bring her mother back from Mexico as she had been inhumanely deported (whisked away from her home under false pretenses at the crack of dawn) by the migra that year.

The next time I saw her was at UA. She told me that a mutual friend had sent her my way. This was the fall of 2013. At the time, she still looked the same age as the young girl in the poster.

For the rest of the column, please go to:http://diverseeducation.com/article/96400/

HEMISPHERIC INDIGENOUS CONSCIOUSNESS SUMMER CLASS: University of Arizona graduate students can enroll themselves in the class. For everyone else, anyone in the country can take classes at the UA so as long as you apply to become a non-degree seeking student. You would need to apply for that (quick application), then once accepted you can enroll in classes. For more info, please contact Indira Arce at UA-Mexican American Studies: iarce@email.arizona.edu or (520) 626-8103 Please share/post, forward, etc. to any prospective graduate student who may be interested.

Teaching, Selling or Consuming Cinco de Mayo

It is that time of year: it is either time to teach, sell or consume Cinco de Mayo.

If one decides to teach it, then people come to learn of a great anti-imperialist struggle (1861-67) fought by poor peoples, and a day that memorializes a heroic battle in Puebla on May 5, 1862, that eventually culminated with the kicking out of the French from Mexico in 1867.

If one decides to sell it or consume it, then one becomes part of that capitalistic practice of debasing anything sacred and turning it into a tragicomic holiday where drinking and white sales become the norm.

It is a time when the media will go to the local bar and then ask drunk gringos (and nowadays even drunk Mexicans,) the meaning of Cinco de Mayo and the response is usually: “It’s Mexican Independence Day” or “who cares … it’s just a time to party.

For the rest of the column, go to: http://diverseeducation.com/article/95976/

LIBERATION OR SOCIAL JUSTICE:

LIBERATION OR SOCIAL JUSTICE: Was the early Chicano Movement of the 1960s and 1970s involved with social justice issues? That is what one of my students excitedly wanted to know, after returning from a national conference in which the primary theme was social justice.

http://diverseeducation.com/article/95703/

RESISTANCE OR A PERMANENT STATE OF INSURRECTION:

I have long wanted to have this debate... so on my part, here is the opening salvo. Comments are welcome:

In Chicano Manifesto (1971), Armando Rendon made the radical claim that the United States and Mexico were technically still in a state of war (1846-1848) because the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo was violated prior to even its signing, and that therefore, a state of war continues to this day.

Rendon’s claim was based on war having been waged against Mexico; half of its territories were illegally seized via war or threat of war during the 1830s through the 1850s; and several of the articles (Article VIII and XI) from the treaty were altered and one (Article X) was outright deleted​. These articles had to do with land rights and the human rights of the peoples that remained in the former Mexican territories.

Here, I am not agreeing or disagreeing, but actually positing something even more radical: that people of Mexican descent (including Chicanos/as) that live in this country, live in a permanent state of dehumanization and thus also part of a permanent state of insurrection that has been ongoing since the days of Columbus, Cortez and Pizarro and other “conquistadors,” one that never ended, and technically, can never end.

For rest of the column,please go to: http://diverseeducation.com/article/95340/

Do All Lives Matter? inShare Email

by Roberto Rodriguez
April 10, 2017

The question at the Cesar Chavez lecture at a packed auditorium at Sierra College was, do all lives matter?

It was a great forum and a great dialogue, but in a sense, it was the wrong question. The reason is that each time the answer will invariably mischaracterize, misdirect, or at best, deflect. In case there is any doubt regarding this answer, one only need examine Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ recent ordering of a review of dozens of existing consent decrees between the Justice Department and police departments nationwide. For the rest of column, go to: http://diverseeducation.com/article/95080/