I was curious which parts of Brown made Leanne (Sophie's mom) say "gotcha"--where Rodriguez had made a comment and she'd thought "hm, I'm guilty of that." I was also thinking about the intent of Nixon (?) who coined the word "hispanic," an intent to meld many people from many places into one large group with an eye to assimilating them more readily into US culture. I was thinking about the young Bolivian woman in the US that Rodriguez mentions and how she resists the "hispanic" label, preferring to identify herself as Bolivian. I was also thinking about how in the assimilation process the newcomer's culture has an effect on the culture of the country to which he's come--Rodriguez talks about his nephew (?) who has the authentic Mexican restaurant which is frequented by many people who are not of Mexican heritage. Rodriguez suggests that Nixon hadn't anticipated that the assimilation process works two ways.

Brown Discussion - 6/22 Meeting

It looks like things are working smoothly as I see the discussion continuing below. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me. Also, to start a NEW discussion (post a blog session), you need to be registered as a contributor. You probably want to title your post (like I did above) as it will be archived by title on the right hand side. However, you can continue to comment without becoming a contributor. If you click on the title of the discussion topic that you wish to comment to listed on the right hand side of the main blog page, it will show the post and all of the comments so far posted to it in a nice, neat column. Enjoy!