College’s Chicano Studies Conference Is Today
A conference commemorating the 25th anniversary of the foundation of Chicano studies departments at colleges and universities throughout the state will take place today at Rancho Santiago College.
Highlighting the event will be workshops on Chicano studies in the past and future, discussion on the aftermath of Proposition 187 and presentations on community organizing and how to start Chicano clubs on high school and college campuses.
“We have struggled for 25 years to implement Chicano studies at colleges and universities and the conference is a celebration and reminder to keep struggling,” said Seferino Garcia, executive director of Solevar Community Development Corp., a nonprofit Latino empowerment group helping to organize the conference. “The true history of this land must be taught in schools and it can be done by learning Chicano” literature, art and other disciplines, he said.
Among the speakers addressing the conference: Rancho Santiago Community College District Trustee Enriqueta Ramos, author Rudy Acuna, historian Ernesto Vigil, Chicano studies professors Adolfo Ortega, Jose Lopez and Susie Rodriguez and high school and college MEChA (Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan) members.
The conference, free and open to the public, begins at 3 p.m. The college campus is at 1530 W. 17th St., Santa Ana. A dance, from 9 p.m. to midnight in the Johnson Center building, will conclude the event.
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