‘The Problem with Latinidad’
ID: Flyer for the event. Beige background with black text. Main text (title and subtitle) are inside an orange rectangular outline with arched top.
We Here is excited to open registration for We Here members and folks who identify as Black, Indigenous, or People of Color outside of our private spaces to “‘The Problem with Latinidad’: A critical discussion on the single narrative of Latinidad, anti-Blackness & white privilege within Latine communities, US imperialism, and Indigenous erasure from the perspectives of library & archives workers.”
This event is based on the Miguel Salazar article “The Problem with Latinidad” (The Nation, 2019). We Here members and folks who identify as Black, Indigenous, or People of Color outside of our private spaces can register here. An edited transcript will be published publicly following the event.
Speakers include:
Cristina Fontánez Rodríguez. Cristina Fontánez Rodríguez is the Virginia Thoren and Institute Archivist at Pratt Institute where she also teaches a course on management of archives. Cristina’s work is focused on participatory and non-hierarchical ways of knowledge-seeking and making through archival practice. She is a founding member of Archivistas en Espanglish, a collective dedicated to amplifying spaces of memory-building between Latin America and Latine communities in the US, and is an editor for Archivoz International Archives Magazine. She is the Director of Outreach for the Archivists Roundtable of Metropolitan NY and currently co-runs Barchives, an independent outreach initiative that brings archivists to bars to talk about New York City’s archival collections and local history. Cristina holds a BA in Geography from Universidad de Puerto Rico Recinto de Río Piedras and an MLS with a certificate in Archives and Preservation of Cultural Materials from CUNY Queens College.
Mario Macías. Mario graduated from the MLIS program of the U of Washington in 2014; he studied Literature for his undergraduate degree from Grinnell College, thanks to the Posse Foundation. Mario emigrated from Jalisco, Mexico to California when he was ten years old. He is the first Latino librarian to receive tenure in the Library Department of Pierce College, part of the Los Angeles Community College District.
Obden Mondésir. Obden Mondésir is an Outreach Archivist and Adjunct Lecturer at Queens College, City University of New York, and an Oral History Manager at the Weeksville Heritage Center where he developed public programming and he has conducted and presented on several community-based oral history projects that have focused on education, Black joy, and Black-owned restaurants in Central Brooklyn. At Queens College, he helps develop curriculum and collect interviews on the SEEK program. Obden has a dual M.A. in Library Science and History from Queens College and is the recipient of a West African Research Center Library Fellowship and the Citi Center for Culture + Queens Library Fellowship.
Yvette Ramírez. Yvette Ramírez is an arts administrator, oral-historian, and archivist from Queens, NY - the land of the Munsee-Lenape peoples. She is inspired by the power of community-centered archives to further explore the complexities of information transmission and memory within Andean and other diasporic Latinx communities of Indigenous descent. Her archival practice is rooted in recordkeeping practices that embrace a hyperlocal and liberatory praxis especially when working with identity-related collections. With nearly a decade of experience as a cultural producer, Yvette has worked alongside community-based and cultural organizations such as The Laundromat Project, PEN America, Make The Road New York and New Immigrant Community Empowerment. Currently, she is an MSI candidate in Digital Curation and Archives at the School of Information at The University of Michigan and currently works at the University of Michigan Library's Digital Preservation Unit. Yvette is also a co-founding member of the collective Archivistas en Espanglish. You can find her on Twitter @YvetteGRamirez and on IG @yvettegramirez.
Amanda Toledo. Amanda Toledo (She/Her/Ella) is a writer and library assistant with a focus in youth and family services. A first generation daughter of Cuban immigrants, she grew up on a steady stream of books and croquetas. In her public library work, her focus is in social justice, equity, and emotional intelligence and how to implement those values for systemic changes. She lives, works, and dreams in Southern California.
Gabby Womack. Gabby Womack (she/her) is a Reference/Access Librarian, archivist, and historian specializing in nineteenth and twentieth-century African American history. Her grandparents from Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic and her large family helped raise her. Gabby’s work analyzes personal and societal racial identities, particularly among descendants of the African diaspora, and their effects on policy in the United States. Her research interests include the intersections of race, ethnicity, immigration, eugenics/race science, and policy in the United States. Gabby loves inspiring folks to read books by underrepresented populations on her Instagram and Facebook pages. Web/social: bookishafrolatina.com @bookish_afrolatina.