HUNTINGTON BEACH : Latino Celebration Has Serious Message

Chicano Movement Week, a four-day celebration complete with Aztec dances, authentic cuisine and a mariachi band, gets underway next Monday at Golden West College. But organizers hope a serious message will get across amid the music and fun.

With the Los Angeles riots, severe cuts in education funding and the controversial 500th anniversary of Columbus’ landing in America as its backdrop, the program is designed to expose students to Latino culture while at the same time encouraging Latinos themselves to pursue an education.

“We see people putting us down and (creating) stereotypes,” said Lupe Lopez, a Golden West student who helped organize the event through MEChA, a national Latino student organization. “We want to make people aware of the issues we care about and dispel the stereotypes.”

Among the topics scheduled for discussion are Latino-police relations, racism and the California grape boycott over pesticides that labor and environmental activists say are dangerous. Another hot issue is what Lopez described as Christopher Columbus’ “invasion” and “degradation” of America.

The discussions promise to be different from what one might find in the classroom, she said. “Our history is not mentioned in the history books,” Lopez said. “Our history needs to be taught.”

On the second day of celebrations, students plan to present a program on the 1943 clashes between Latinos and Navy personnel in Los Angeles known as the Zoot Suit riots. Lopez sees parallels between the spring’s civil unrest in Los Angeles and the 1940s violence.

Chicano Movement Week comes at a time when educators are encouraging more Latino youths to seek a college education. Yet recent state budget cuts make that goal more difficult, program organizers said. Besides fee hikes for the state’s public university and college systems, people who are not legal California residents must pay even higher fees.

The state cuts “are going to affect us all, but especially minorities,” said Dr. Americo Lopez-Rodriguez, the event adviser. “It seems like we’re going in reverse. We’re walking backward instead of forward.”