La Raza

La Raza translates literally to “the race,” but a more accurate or colloquial translation is “the people.” The term la raza cósmica (the cosmic race) was coined by Mexican scholar and politician José Vasconcelos to refer to the mixing of the races and, consequently, to the birth of a new race, latinoamericanos (Latin Americans). According to Vasconcelos, over time various races mix with one another to form a new type of human.

La Raza was used sparingly prior to the 1960s, but during the 1960s political activists, especially Chicano movement activists, used the term increasingly to refer to themselves and other people of Latin American descent who shared the cultural and political legacies of Spanish conquest and colonialism and U.S. imperialism and internal colonialism. The term is similar to the panethnic terms Latino and Hispanic insofar as all three refer to the same group, although raza has been used, and continues to be used, more narrowly by some to refer solely to people of Mexican descent. The term retains some of the racial significance associated with Vasconcelos's use of the term in that it captures the “mestizo” character of Latinos—a people of indigenous, African, and European descent.

Criticized by some as a term that promotes separatism or even racism, La Raza was employed, and continues to be employed, by political and community activists principally to promote political unity and cultural pride among Latinas/os. La Raza harkens back to and acknowledges the contributions of advanced pre-Columbian civilizations to the Americas and the indigenous roots of present-day Latinas/os, or la raza. The concept places as much importance on these indigenous and African roots as it does on the European roots of Latin Americans, thereby celebrating, rather than denigrating, the mixed origins and identity of Latinas/os in the United States. It is a form of “Brown pride,” similar to the “Black is beautiful” slogan of the Black Power movement in the United States, and like the Black Power slogan, it has been used to mobilize people into collective action. A common placard among protesters reads El Pueblo Unido, Jamas Sera Vencido (“The People United Will Never Be Defeated”). Often La Raza Unida is substituted for El Pueblo Unido.

Columbus Day is celebrated on the second Monday in October in the United States, but El Dia de la Raza, either combined with or in place of Columbus Day, is celebrated on October 12 in most of Latin America, principally as a celebration of the birth of a new people, or raza, and not as a tribute to the explorer. The history of the conquest or “discovery” and the subsequent centuries of exploitation and bloodshed are well known, and for this reason many Latin Americans and Latinas/os in the United States do not celebrate Columbus Day as a day of discovery. For many indigenous people, it is a day of mourning. Millions of their ancestors were slaughtered or died from diseases borne by the European conquerors. But despite this history and distortions of this history, Latin Americans and Latinas/os are a product of that history, and they and their cultures reflect the fusing of these populations. This is what is celebrated on El Dia de la Raza.

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