Documenting the Chicana and Chicano Experience

Jesús Manuel Mena Garza Photography

One exciting project Jesús Garza has undertaken is photographing Chicana and Chicano artists and academics. Since 1967, Jesús Garza has made it his mission to photograph the Chicana and Chicano experience. He focuses his camera on activists, workers, academics and artists in communities as diverse as Los Angeles, San Antonio, Tucson, Albuquerque, Fort Worth and San José. 

From experience Garza understands that the incredible accomplishments of Latinos are often dismissed by the dominant culture. So for 50 years, he has taken on the role of outside observer and chronicler of Chicana/o history. 

Feel free to contact Jesús Garza. Send your suggestions, questions or comments by calling or texting (682) 365-8702. Please understand that these are documentary photographs. Not glamour shots. The photographs have not been retouched. 

Click photos to enlarge

The President

The Academic

The Poet

The Sculptor

The Painter

The Academic

The Photographer

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Roberto Rodriguez, PhD – Write in Candidacy for the National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies (NACCS) Chair-elect 2015

It’s not that I am declaring my write-in candidacy, but rather, this is at least the second time I’ve been nominated, but have been deemed to be ineligible by the NACCS board and its leadership. As a result, I have chosen to contest those rulings via the only recourse available: a write-in candidacy for Chair-elect for 2015. The following reasons are why I accepted the nomination from Josie Mendez-Negrete, past NACCS chair and professor at UTSA.

I have been committed to Raza Studies virtually since its beginnings. I was a member of MEChA since high school (1969-1972) and a member of MEChA and La Gente Newspaper at UCLA from 1972-1976. I attended my first NACCS conference as a 3^rdyear UCLA student at UT Austin in 1975. As a student, writer and scholar, I have been involved with the movement and discipline virtually since its inception. In the movement to defend and spread Ethnic Studies nationwide, I have been active in supporting our community’s right to our Culture, History, Identity, Language and Education (CHILE), including getting arrested, receiving death threats, testifying at the local school board, plus speaking before a  UN Forum. Additionally, I have been an active member of Raza Studies Now and Ethnic Studies Now: http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/29026-indigenous-knowledge-on-trial-defending-and-defining-mexican-american-studies

• I believe the focus of next year’s NACCS conference should examine the relationship between the organization, our communities and Indigeneity. We should do this not simply within ourselves but in relationship to other Indigenous peoples of the continent. The organization has examined everything else, and it has become the better for it. It is time to do this on an issue that is close to many of us within the organization and our communities. In part, that is why I took part in co-founding the Indigenous foco within NACCS several years ago. 2016 is critical. I believe NACCS, along with MEChA, MALCS and all the Calpolis (Kalpulis) and Peace and Dignity should meet together to examine the Census Bureau’s attempt to once again force an Hispanic [racial] identity upon us. If as a community we do not deal with this now, it will be too late for the 2020 Census.
• I believe that NACCS should be a full-fledged human rights organization, at the service of our communities. With our communities being slaughtered virtually daily throughout the country and on the border, we as a body should be at the forefront, as human rights scholar activists in producing the research that will be helpful in assisting with creating solutions via studies and going to court, whether at the local, state, federal or international levels: (http://truth-out.org/news/item/28921-not-counting-mexicans-or-indians-the-many-tentacles-of-state-violence-against-black-brown-indigenous-communities)
• I believe that NACCS should be at the forefront of expanding Raza Studies at colleges and universities nationwide and also at community colleges and K-12 schools also, and widening its scope, akin to what Tucson’s UNIDOS youth organization proposed in 2013; that we should teach Mexican American Indigenous Studies, and within it, all the other Ethnic Studies disciplines, including Gender and Women’s Studies, LGBT Studies and Middle Eastern Studies…. so that we can learn about each other as we struggle together: (http://drcintli.blogspot.com/2012/11/a-call-for-mexican-american-indigenous.html)
• I believe that NACCS should always be a democratic organization and should always have open and competitive elections, always with choices as opposed to elections with unopposed candidates. I believe the organization should be moved in this direction, beginning this year.

This is the BIO, with minor corrections, that was submitted by Josie Mendez-Negrete to the NACCS Board when she submitted my nomination.

Roberto Rodriguez (Dr. Cintli) is an assistant professor at the Mexican American & Raza Studies Department at the University of Arizona. He is a longtime-award-winning journalist/columnist who received his Ph.D. in Mass Communications in 2008 from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. He is the author of "Justice: A Question of Race," a book that chronicles his two police brutality trials, and, with Dr. Patricia Gonzales, he co-produced "Amoxtli San Ce Tojuan: a documentary on origins and migrations." He returned to the university as a result of a research interest that developed pursuant to his column writing concerning origins and migration stories of Indigenous peoples of the Americas. His current field of study is the examination of maiz culture, migration, and the role of stories and oral traditions among Indigenous peoples, including Mexican and Central American peoples. His book, "Our Sacred Maíz is Our Mother," was recently published (Fall, 2014) by the University of Arizona Press. 

He teaches classes on the history of maiz, Mexican/Chicano Culture and politics, and the history of red-brown journalism. Based on a class he co-created in 2003, a major digitized collection was inaugurated by the University Arizona Libraries: The History of Red-Brown Journalism. He currently writes for Truthout’s Public Intellectual Project and is working on a project, titled: "Smiling Brown: Gente de Bronce – People the Color of the Earth." It is a collaborative project on the topic of color and color consciousness. He is also writing a memoir on the topic of police abuse, torture and political violence: "Yolqui: A warrior summonsed from the spirit world." This book examines the history of official violence against Black-Brown-Indigenous peoples, tracing it back to 1492. His last major award was in 2013, receiving the national Baker-Clarke Human Rights Award from the American Educational Research Association, for his work in defense of Ethnic Studies.

NACCS has a procedure for write-in candidates. As in any election, a write in candidate starts at a decided disadvantage, but minimally this year, there will be a second candidate for chair-elect – a first in recent memory. To vote, you must have paid membership dues by March 22, 2015. Voting beginsMarch 31, 2015.

Thanks & Sincerely

Roberto Dr. Cintli Rodriguez

UA-MAS

Truthout: Public Intellectual Project:

http://truth-out.org/news/item/6613-the-public-intellectual-roberto-cintli-rodriguez

1303 E. University Blvd # 20756

Tucson, AZ 85719--0521

520-271-6796

Civility or Social Control

By Rodolfo F. Acuña

September 17, 2014

There has been a lot of talk as of late about “civility.” Indeed there are academicians who are doing a thriving business conducting workshops with the full support of administration and its cheerleaders who equate the lack of civility to school yard bullying, mixing the proverbial apples and oranges.

However, the meaning of civility is much deeper; it involves much more than politeness. The intent of the campaign is to silence dissent. The frivolous finger wagging distracts from the important role of power in bullying and trivializes its viciousness and seriousness.

Proponents rationalize that politeness is necessary for collegial communication and to lay down the ground rules for disagreeing in a civil matter. According to them, civility is essential to finding common ground. This sounds great but it assumes that both sides want to listen to each other as equals and that there is the possibility of common ground. The truth be told, the hierarchical nature of academe makes this sort of communication impossible.

After listening to the dialogue on civility at California State University Northridge, I have come to the conclusion that there is not very much analysis or thought on the topic and that the narrative is being spun by administrators and partisans who do not want to deal with criticism. A major issue at CSUN is a lack of racial diversity on the faculty.

It is a crude effort at social control – an attempt to regulate behavior and feed the ambitions of those at the top. At its most basic level culture controls us; in turn popular opinion defines what is right and wrong. The present campaign on civility is part of an effort to impose conformity and silence dissent.

In order for civility to exist it must begin from the bottom. If not the university becomes a caste system with students subservient to professors, professors to the dean and up the line to the president. At each step, power is controlled by those at the higher level with students and professors, according to their category, on the bottom.

From my perspective, an analysis of the term civility has to be examined in context. Like racism and sexism civility depends on power. Moreover, we are supposed to be scholars and the current debate ignores tons of literature on racism and sexism. Bandied around by pseudo scholars it diminishes the moral authority and meaning of the word civility.

Recently the issue surfaced at the National Association of Chicana and Chicano Studies’ call for papers. The conference theme was “Exploring Civility within the Chicana & Chicano Studies Discipline.” The pushback came as a surprise to many members since these conferences are usually innocuous.

Sandra K. Soto, an Associate Professor of Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Arizona wrote an open letter to the leadership of NACCS in which she recounted her twenty-five year involvement and attacked the theme of “Exploring Civility” –saying the call made “clear that the theme is not only promoting civility, but that it is blaming human suffering, greed, union busting, and other forms of oppression on a general sense of incivility, rather than say…capitalism, imperialism, colonialism, genocide… or say—in this historical moment—that ‘disrespect for authority has decreased the ability of individuals to follow laws’ is to verge into the terrain of anti-Blackness.’”

Professor Soto went on to re-call the history of the lack of civility in NACCS and how the militant conduct of the Lesbian contingent forced changes and the formation of the Lesbian Caucus in the 1980s. If “we had been ‘well-behaved, cultured, refined, enlightened, polite, and developed’ (ser educado)—we probably wouldn’t even have had the audacity to be out lesbians much less angry Chicana dykes demanding of space. Thankfully we didn’t give into that ideology then. And I certainly don’t want to now.”

The tempest sent some members back to redrafting their papers to include the lack of civility of the U.S.’s quest for global domination and the privatization of public institutions here and in Latin America. More important critics criticized the call’s distortion of civility by defining it as “ser educado” “[that] in Spanish means being well-behaved, cultured, refined, enlightened, polite, and developed” – which has always been definition of gente de razón.

What concerned me was not the tempest, but that an organization that was founded on the burning ashes of the 1960s would resurrect this Porfirian notion. As scholars, members have the responsibility of putting definitions into context. Language underlies socialization and it is rooted in culture, and based on our learned experiences that form our social and cultural identity.

As Michel Foucault wrote, “Neither power nor knowledge nor any other reality is anything but a mere linguistic construct.” In order to define civility Chicana/o scholars must deconstruct the academy and its motives when using those words. Like the old colonial Mexican casta system civility fixes everyone in their place.

In academe everything is advisory to the president – who for all intents and purposes owns the plantation. The overseer is the provost; he and his/her staff run the plantation often using pan or palo, but more often through benevolence. On Mexican haciendas the overseer became compadre to the peones establishing a fictional relationship with them. In academe control is based on this pecking order of associates, deans and lackeys. The lowest rung is occupied by students who don’t have anyone to peck down on.

Like on the plantation the illusion exists that everyone is part of a family or team. Their limited power is based on how many they can peck down on. Students have few illusions whereas professors are called “doctor”. They can grieve but they lack the deep pockets of an institutional remedy.

Even if you want a simple audience with those above you, access is limited by the one on the top. Nevertheless, faculty is under the illusion that they are part of a governance process. Similarly student government is controlled by the administration; only about 5 percent of the students vote in student government elections. They routinely vote for university projects rubber stamping the administration’s wishes. The only hope of breaking this cycle is to be uncivil.

Wanting to maintain this control, administrators red-bait dissidents and shut them out. For over six months we have been trying to get our side of the UNAM argument in print only to be shut out of the student newspaper and faculty forums.

I have been in the Civil Rights Movement for some sixty years. The principle of civil disobedience is part of my vernacular. For me, it is the cornerstone of democracy. Many faculty members and students went to jail resisting civility and those controlling the institution. One of the lessons we learned was that the lack of communication produced frustration and forced dissidents to be uncivil. Our life experiences inform us that change cannot come about without vigorous dissent.

Like they say on the street “no justice no peace.” As long as there is injustice civil behavior will be impossible. Civility only occurs when those on top listen to those with less power. The hyperbole of the administration hides the fact that there is already a procedure in place to deal with abusive conduct. However, charging someone with unprofessional conduct would require the accusers to give the dissidents due process instead of slandering or red-baiting them. 

Photo by Jesús Manuel Mena Garza

Fort Worth Chicano Documentary Photographer Jesús Manuel Mena Garza to Talk About His Work from 1970 to the Present at SJSU

Click photos to enlarge

Texas documentary photographer Jesús Manuel Mena Garza will present an hour-long photo show and lecture, A Chicano Photographer’s Journey: 1970 to the Present, on Sept. 25 at 3 pm at San José State University. The event is free and open to the public at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library, Room 225/229.

Midwestern State University Professor Dr. Ann Marie Leimer said, “This new presentation illuminates why Garza pursued his role of critical observer. He explains the various influences in his artistic life and details the process that helped him evolve into a prominent documentary photographer.” Garza’s new work is quite diverse – from intimate portraits of Chicana and Chicano academics to issues of abandonment and loss in Texoma.

Professor Leimer adds, “During the past decades, Garza has extensively published and exhibited several documentary photographic series. His Chicano Photographer series explores important aspects of the American experience, historic events and cultural practices often marginalized by the dominant culture.”

The presentation occurs in conjunction with Garza’s current exhibition at the library. A panel discussion on the 40th Anniversary of El Centro Cultural de la Gente (Garza was a member) will take place in the same room from 6 to 7:30 pm. There will be a reception following in the Cultural Heritage Center (Fifth Floor).

Location and Time:
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library, SJSU
Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2013, Room 225/229, Second Floor
150 East San Fernando Street, San José, CA 95112
3 to 4:20 pm with a reception at 7:30 pm
Free and open to the Public

Jesús Garza’s Portrait and Press Kit:
http://www.jmmgarza.com/html/00press_kit.html

Sponsored by the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library; San José State University School of Journalism and Mass Communication; the César E. Chávez Community Action Center – SJSU Associated Students; Department of Mexican American Studies; and SJSU’s Chicano/Latino Faculty & Staff Association.

September 25, 2013 SJSU Photography Show and Lecture

Photos from the 2013 National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies (NACCS) Conference

Photos taken by Jesús Manuel Mena Garza during the 2013 National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies (NACCS) conference in San Antonio, Tejas. Click photos to enlarge. 

The next NACCS conference will be in Salt Lake City April 9 - 12, 2014. Here is a link for more information.

 

Copyright 2013 Jesús Manuel Mena Garza. All rights reserved. 

Pasadena NACCS Conference Photos

Sample photographs taken during the 2011 NACCS conference in Pasadena, California. It was great to see so many Chicana and Chicano Studies academics and artists in one venue. Please click the photos to enlarge. All photos are by Jesus Garza.

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NACCS Pasadena

National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies XXXVIII, Pasadena, California, March 30-April 2, 2011

[Click header to got to NACCS website]

Going to NACCS? March 5th is the final day for Pre-registration.

http://www.naccs.org/Registration

Presenters: remember that membership and registration are both required. Complete Membership first before Registeration. www.naccs.org/Membership

Haven't booked a hotel room? March 10th will be the last day to get the conference discount rate.

http://www.naccs.org/naccs/Hotel_EN.asp Book online.

Still undecided if you want to attend? Let's help convience you. We have one of our most packed conferences ever! Here is just a very, very small sampling of panels scheduled/events happening at the conference.

Wednesday Night

Welcome Reception

Thursday

NACCS Plenary: Sites of Education for Social Justice

Daniel Solorzano, UCLA. "Critical Race Theory and the Role of Education in the Struggle for Social Justice."
Jorge Huerta, NACCS Scholar 1997. "Teatro Chicana/o: Performing Social Justice Beyond the Classroom."
Rhonda Rios Kravitz, Sacramento City College. "Removing the Veil: Maintaining 'Open Access' for the Privileged."

Panel: The State of Exception and the Right of Resistance

Tezozomoc. South Central Farmers Feeding Families. “States of Exception and the Limits of Identity Politics.”

Peña, Devon. University of Washington. “The Strategy of Refusal and the State of Exception.”

Gonzalez, Rosalee. Arizona State University. “Militant Women and Resistance to the State of Exception.”

Discussant: Diaz, David R. California State University, Los Angeles

Panel: Chicana Art as Site of Critical Education

López, Tiffany Ana. University of California, Riverside. “Chicana Art as Public Pedagogy: Motherhood and the Curriculum of Defiance in the Work of Barbara Carrasco.”

Leimer, Ann Marie. University of Redlands. “Quilting Knowledge, Weaving Justice: Sites of Struggle and Survival in the Work of Consuelo Jiménez Underwood.”

Davalos, Karen Mary. Loyola Marymount University. “Art as Education for Social Justice: The Indigenous Spirituality of Linda Vallejo.”

Chair: Davalos, Karen Mary. Loyola Marymount University.

Friday

NACCS Luncheon

NACCS Scholar: Norma Alarcon, University of California, Berkeley.

Cervantes Recipients:

Israel Pastrana. University of California, San Diego. Graduate.

Arnold Farias. California State University, Northridge. Undergraduate.

Book Award: Richard T. Rodriguez. Next of Kin: the family in Chicano/a cultural politics. Duke University Press, 2009.

Panel: Performing the Latin@ Borderlands: Towards a Decolonial Performatics.

Pérez, Daniel Enrique. University of Nevada, Reno-Spanish/Latina Studies. “(Re)Examining the Latin Lover: Screening Chicano/Latino Sexualities.”

Sandoval, Chela. University of California, Santa Barbara. “Towards a Decolonial Performatics.”

Garcia, Peter J. California State University, Northridge. “Te Amo, Te Amo, Te Amo”: Lorenzo Antonio and Sparx Performing Nuevo Mexico music.”

Aldama, Arturo J. Univ. of Colorado, Boulder. “No Somos Criminales: Border Musics talk back to Nativist Racism and Sexism.”

Panel: The Classroom and Community as Sites for Social Justice

Calderon, Jose. Pitzer College. "Building the Future as It Emerges in the Classroom and in the Community.”

Sanbrano, Angela. Pomona Habla and Latina/o Roundtable of the San Ga. "Pushing Back Immigration Enforcement on a Local Level.”

Cadena, Gilbert. California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. "University Service Learning for Social Justice.”

Roundtable: Tejan@ Rocks!: Examining Cultural Sites of Social and Political Praxis

Miranda, Marie “Keta”. University of Texas, San Antonio.

Habell-Pallan, Michelle. University of Washington, Seattle.

Cervantes, Marco. University of Texas, San Antonio.

Urquijo-Ruiz, Rita. Trinity University.

Cardenas, Jaime. Seattle Central Community College.

Panel: The Arts as Sites of Education for Social Justice

Carlos Manuel, Bellarmine University. "Theatre for Social Change and Awareness: Funny About Serious Matters."

Alma Lopez, Independent Artist. "Controversial Art."

Lorenzo Herrera y Lozano, Poet. "Tragedies, Codices & Joterías: Poetic Artifacts at the Junctures of Desire, Survival and Envisagement."

Film: Danza Folklorica Escénica: El Sello Artístico de Rafael Zamarripa(Mexican Folkloric Dance: Rafael Zamarripa's Artistic Trademark). 50 min.

Presenter: Olga Najera-Ramirez, University of California, Santa Cruz.

Saturday

Panel: Marching Students: Chicana/o Activism in Education, 1968 to the Present

Revilla, Anita. University of Nevada, Las Vegas. “Las Vegas Activist Crew and the Im/migrant Rights Movement: How We Collaboratively Transformed 'Sin City'."

Berta Avila, Margarita. Sacramento State University. “Educational Justice and Access: Conversations from Chicana/o Teachers Teaching in La Academia del Barrio Telpochcalli.”

Solorzano, Daniel. UCLA. “Racism, White Supremacy, and Racial Hierarchies: A Case Study of African American and Latina/o High School Student Activism.”

Covarrubias, Alejandro. UCLA. “Latino Critical Race Theory (LatCrit) and Agencies of Transformational Resistance.”

Lopez Figueroa, Julie. Sacramento State University. “Marching Students: Chicana/o Activism in Education, 1968 to the Present.”

Panel/Discussion: U.S. Birthright Citizenship & Arizona's SB1070 and other Anit-Immigrant 'Copy Cat' State Laws

Thomas A. Saenz, President and General Counsel of MALDEF

Eva Longoria, activist and MALDEF Board Member

Panel: Adaljiza Sosa-Riddell: scholar, intellectual, mentor, activist and friend

Gradilla, Alexandro Jose. California State University, Fullerton. “Towards a critical cultural competency and bioethics:

Adaljiza Sosa-Riddell' social justice perspective on health politics.”

Facio, Elisa. CU Boulder. “Honoring Dr. Adaljiza Sosa Riddell: “Naci para ser Rebelde

Davalos, Karen Mary. Loyola Marymount University. “Publishing as Transformative Education: the legacy of Adaljiza Sosa-Riddell.”

Casillas, Dolores Ines. UC Santa Barbara.

Roundtable: Battle of the Virgins: A Presentation of the Book, OUR LADY OF CONTROVERSY: ALMA LOPEZ'S “IRREVERENT APPARITION” (featuring Knockout Performers Monica Palacios as la Virgen de Guadalupe and Adelina Anthony as Our Lady of Controversy)

Gaspar de Alba, Alicia. UCLA. “Announcing Our Knockout Performance...”

Lopez, Alma. Independent Artist. “Alma Lopez's ‘Nican Mopuha’.”

Gonzalez, Deena. ACE Fellow/University of California at Irvine. “Making Privates Public: It's not about the Virgen of the Conquest, it's about the Conquest of the Virgen.”

Perez, Emma. University of Colorado, Boulder. “The De-Colonial Virgin in a Colonial Site.”

Roman-Odio, Clara. Kenyon College. “Queering the Sacred: Love as Oppositional Consciousness in Alma Lopez's Visual Art.”

Save Ethnic Studies Fundraiser

Exhibits:

University of Texas Press

Arizona University Press

Bilingual Review Press

University of Nevada Press

Ethnic Studies Library, UCB

Chicano Studies Research Center, UCLA

Crafts by Amistad

art2graf creations

Chicana & Chicano Studies, UCSB

Mujeres Activas en Letras y Cambio Social

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