Latinx Heritage Month celebrates the contributions, vibrant cultures, and resilience of Latinx communities in the U.S. and Latin America. This annual observance officially runs from September 15 to October 15, aligning with various Latin American independence celebrations. While Illinois State University’s Latin American and Latina/o Studies program celebrates the Latinx community beyond this month, we take this time to give extra recognition to community members, scholars, and artists in a lineup of thought-provoking events and activities. Join us this year in our Latinx Heritage Month celebration from September 17 to November 1.
Dr. Maura Toro-Morn, the director of the University’s Latin American and Latino/a/x Studies program, states the role of this event for us, “Our academic year of programming begins with Latinx Heritage Month. Every year we strive to bring new voices to campus to shed light on the issues and concerns that connect to the classes we teach and to student’s lives, families, and communities. This year is no different. We have worked hard to draw on the local perspectives and talent in our community. The community panel that we are hosting with the McLean County Museum of History is now the third year that we have gathered at the museum. These programs are recorded and kept at the museum archives for posterity. Similarly, the “conversando entre nosotros” series allows us to showcase the talent that we have in our program, from doctoral students to colleagues who have been founding members of the program.”
As we celebrate contributions, culture, and the resilience of Latinx people, we foster dialogue between local and international perspectives and critically engage with community, such as the experiences of those with migrant backgrounds. For more information and updates on these events, please visit our website or follow us on social media.
You can also contact Vanessa Hernandez-Gutierrez at vaherna@IllinoisState.edu and/or Dr. Maura Toro-Morn at mitmorn@IllinoisState.edu.
A month of enriching activities
Navegando una Nueva Comunidad: Recent Immigrant Arrivals in the Bloomington-Normal Community
Date Tuesday, September 17, 2024
Time 6 p.m.
Place McLean County Museum of History
This year, we will once again launch our Latinx Heritage Month celebration at the McLean County Museum of History. They will host an engaging discussion about the resilience and experiences of recent immigrant arrivals in Bloomington-Normal. Our panel, which consists of community members and activists, aims to shed light on the various factors that drive immigration to this community and the day-to-day realities of many Latinxs living around us.
Moderators
Dr. Maura Toro-Morn, Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program
Vanessa Hernandez-Gutierrez, ISU Anthropology
Panelists
Yolanda Alonso, Latinos in Blono
Miriam Padilla, Community member
Jesús Islas, Community member
Jair Bustos, The Immigration Project
Camila Graunke, The Immigration Project
Sponsored by: McLean County Museum of History, Organization of Latinx Employees (OLE), Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program
Art Exhibit: A moon, a peephole, an explosion, or a flashing memory by Rafael Soldi
Exhibition Open through September 29, 2024
Lecture Wednesday, September 17
Time 4-6 p.m.
Place University Galleries
Rafael Soldi’s A moon, a peephole, an explosion, or a flashing memory features photographs, a handwritten text installation, and an EKG made from 2009 through 2023. The exhibition’s title comes from a written piece called The Sun Will Set in the Same Place, from Soldi’s book, Imagined Futures, and a black-and-white photograph of what appears to be a brilliant, radiating orb. When Soldi witnessed the sunset over the Pacific Ocean in Seattle, he recalled regularly seeing the same sight as a child in Peru. This realization struck Soldi with a wave of nostalgia and a desire to reconcile his feelings about his home country. This exhibition draws from other elements of Soldi’s book, such as grief surrounding the futures abandoned after immigrating, social violence enacted on queer bodies, and the fluidity between Spanish and English. Driven by the artist’s queer and Peruvian identity, Soldi’s work explores “states of in-betweenness”, especially within language. His art offers insight into borderlands, immigrant identity, and a rich metaphor for queer experience.
Sponsored by: Illinois Art Station, Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program
Conversando Entre Nosotros: Mi Mama, Mis Amistades, Mi Comunidad: The Representation of Mental Health Support in Latinx/e Youth Literature & Culture with Edcel Cintron-Gonzalez
Date Tuesday, September 24, 2024
Time 4 p.m.
Place Williams 314
Edcel Cintron-Gonzalez is a Ph.D. candidate within the Department of English whose interests include children’s and young adult literature, children’s literature; young adult; sea literature; animals in fairy tales, folklore, and myth. His presentation will focus on how Latinx/e youth literature & media are opening and providing a safe space to talk about mental health issues within the Latinx/e community. He considers how authors like Andrea Beatriz Arango, Claribel A. Ortega, Kat Fajardo, and Alexis Castellanos, demonstrate how a Latinx/e youth protagonist engage in topics of mental health in explicit and implicit ways by exploring themes such as generational trauma, migrations and displacement, and redefining the concept of home.
Sponsored by: Organization of Latinx Employees (OLE), Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program
Conversando Entre Nosotros: Creando nuestra Revolución/Juntas en la Lucha – Transformando la Biblioteca Académica for Latinas in Grad School with María Tudela
Date Tuesday, October 1, 2024
Time 4 p.m.
Place Williams 314
Maria Tudela is a librarian at Milner Library and assistant professor at ISU who engages with critical librarianship by sustaining diversity, equity, and accessibility practices for library staff, and trauma informed librarianship. Her interests heavily inform this discussion as she notes how, oftentimes, Latinas in grad school are forced to navigate higher education alone, without guidance, and in survival mode. This presentation will identify locations for transformation in the academic library to center the Latina graduate student while considering the various histories, backgrounds, and areas of study that make up these experiences, and speculate on how we can go about creating safe and inclusive spaces for Latinas in higher education.
Sponsored by: Organization of Latinx Employees (OLE), Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program, Milner Library
Conversando entre fronteras: La cultura de San Sebastián del Monte desde una perspectiva interdisciplinaria
Date Friday, October 1, 2024
Time 4 p.m.
Place Williams Hall 314
This event is centered around the three-year interdisciplinary project that aims to describe, collect, and revitalize knowledge related to local plants, culture, and language of the community in San Sebastian del Monte. The first year was centered on botany and the description of native plants, community trainings on the project, the propagation of cactus plants, video recording, and interview techniques. In this year, the second year, the main focus is on the creation of documentaries and the beginning of linguistic analysis. The third year will focus mainly on linguistic analysis and the preparation of pedagogical material based on the information collected. Having just completed the first year of this project, participants will come together to reflect on year one and address the expectations for the next two.
Presenters
Félix Cortés, Linguist and Language Teacher, member of the community of San Sebastián del Monte
Dr. Eder Ortiz Martínez, Independent Scholar
Dr. Fernando Severino
Dr. Iara Mantenuto, Associate Professor of Linguistics, California State University Dominguez Hills, CA
Sponsored by: Organization of Latinx Employees (OLE), Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program
Haunting the Sonoran Desert: How the Migrant Dead Escape Capture with Dr. Babara Sostaita
Date Thursday, October 10, 2024
Time 6 p.m.
Place CVA 149
Join us in welcoming our keynote speaker Assistant Professor in Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of Illinois, Dr. Barbara Sostaita. Sostaita is a scholar of migration and religion whose work traces sacred mobilities and fugitive routes that yearn for “connection in the face of utter disconnection.” She currently serves as the Higher Education Director for Migrant Roots Media—a platform that centers the voices of migrants, children of migrants, and people struggling to stay and thrive in their homelands.
Her work has been featured in several publications, such as The Nation, Bitch, Teen Vogue, and Remezcla. A passionate writer, she currently is in the process of developing her second book, An Infinity of Traces. Elements of her first book, Sanctuary Everywhere: The Fugitive Sacred in the Sonoran Desert, will overlap with her presentation here at ISU. In this lecture, Sostaita traces the work of Álvaro Enciso, who makes and plants crosses to honor migrants who died attempting to cross the Sonoran Desert and highlights the tensions between the living’s urge to offer the dead rest and the dead’s desire to resist closure. In their haunting, they prompt volunteers to deal with the violence in the borderlands and unfinished losses in our personal lives.
Sponsored by: Organization of Latinx Employees (OLE), Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program, Women’s Gender and Sexuality studies, Milner Library, and the President’s office EDI
Book Launch: Puerto Ricans in Illinois by Maura Toro-Morn and Ivis Garcia
Date Wednesday, October 16, 2024
Time 6 p.m.
Place Milner Library, floor 6, southwest corner
This year, we take great pleasure in recognizing the work of our program director Dr. Maura Toro-Morn and Dr. Ivis Garcia, associate professor at Texas A&M University. This event is centered around their very recent publication, Puerto Ricans in Illinois, which is the first book to document the experiences of Puerto Ricans in the state, illustrates the multiple paradoxes underlying the experience of Puerto Ricans, and the “pedacito de patria” they have carved in Illinois from the hardships they have faced. This book provides readers with a perspective developed from the voices of the people, such as the history of Puerto Rico, insights about the migration of Puerto Ricans to Illinois, and the cultural, economic, and political contributions that Puerto Rican women, men, and families have made.
Sponsored by: Organization of Latinx Employees (OLE), Milner Library, and the Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program
Latino Cultural Dinner: Xiuhtezcatl Martinez
Date Tuesday, October 22, 2024
Time 5 p.m.
Place Brown Ballroom in the Bone Student Center
Xiuhtezcatl Martinez is an activist, musician, and a prolific voice for his generation. Xiuhtezcatl grew up with deep ties to family and community in the U.S. and Mexico, lending him with the ability to smoothly incorporate Spanish, English, and Nahuatl in his musical stylings. His Xochimilca and Mexican roots anchor his thought-provoking lyrics that center around identity and environmental justice. His advocacy has taken him to serve on various panels with prominent figures such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Bernie Sanders, Shailene Woodley, Pharrell, and more. He has also delivered multiple keynote speeches to the General Assembly of the United Nations and was awarded the Community Service Award by President Barack Obama in 2013. His presence at our Latino and Sustainability Cultural Dinner will undoubtedly inspire and educate our campus community.
Tickets
Students with a meal plan can get a ticket for one meal swipe. Must purchase online in advance. Please visit Housing.Illinois.State.edu for more information. $25 for Illinois State University alumni, staff, and faculty without a meal plan and non-ISU community members. Tickets are non-transferrable.
Creating a Community of Belonging and Academic Success
Date Wednesday, October 23, 2024
Time 12:30-1:30 p.m.
Place Stevenson Hall 401A
The Latinx Heritage Month celebration will launch with an engaging discussion about the experiences of recent immigrant arrivals in Bloomington-Normal. Our panelists, which consists of community members and activists, aims to shed light on the factors that drive immigration to this community and the day-to-day realities of many Latinxs living around us.
Moderators
Rocio Rivadeneyra, associate dean for Academic Programs and Student Success, College of Arts and Sciences
Panelists
Dr. Maura Toro-Morn, Latin American and Latina/o Studies program
Fernando Severino, School of Communication
Marta Ascherio, Criminal Justice Sciences
Sponsored by: College of Arts and Sciences and the Latin American and Latina/o Studies program
Latinidad via Mediated Quinceaneras: The Status of Latinx Youth in Mainstream Media with Dr. Angharad Valdivia
Date Friday, November 1, 2024
Time 1 p.m.
Place Williams Hall 314
Dr. Angharad Valdivia is a professor emerita at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for Latina/Latino Studies and the Insitute of Communications Research. Her work combines the areas of gender studies, ethnic studies, and Latin American studies in the examination of contemporary mainstream popular culture, exploring the tension between agency and structure within a transnational setting. How she applies this interdisciplinary approach will be displayed in her presentation. In her lecture, Valdivia analyzes Quinceaneras in media. In particular, she notes how this coming-of-age tradition has become a trope of authenticity, signifying the presence of Latina girls and Latinidad as an ethnicity transitioning from emergent to mainstream status.
Sponsored by: Organization of Latinx Employees (OLE), Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, School of Communication, and the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures
Dia de los Muertos Celebración
Date Friday, November 1, 2024
Time 5 p.m.
Place McLean County History Museum
Sponsored by: McLean County Museum of History
