1-065 - Latinx or Latino?: Considerations and Future Directions in the Use of Terminology

Session Type: Conversation Roundtable

Integrative Statement

For decades, the terminology used to refer to individuals of Latin American descent has undergone transformations. In 1980, under the Nixon administration, the term Hispanic was implemented in the U.S. Census. Hispanic refers to people who are from countries where the primary language is Spanish. The use of the ethnic term Latino followed to include individuals from countries that do not speak Spanish such as those from Brazil, Belize, French Guiana, Guyana, as well as those from the Caribbean, Mexico, and Central and South American. Later, modifications such as Latino/a and Latin@ were added to include both feminine and masculine genders. While this was an effort to step away from the traditional, masculine-centric language ingrained in the Spanish language, these terms still encourage a gender binary and exclude various intersections of gender and sexual identity. In 2014, the term Latinx [pronounced: la-teen-ex] emerged as a gender-neutral label for Latino/a and by 2016 the number of times it was used spiked (Salinas & Lozano, 2017; Santos, 2017). Since then, research-related entities, such as the National Latinx Psychological Association, and the Journal of Latinx Psychology, have adopted the “x.” This roundtable will provide opportunities for the audience to discuss and learn from inter/national expert researchers about the pros and cons of using social identifiers such as Latinx in research with individuals from Latin American and indigenous backgrounds.

Moderator: Linda C. Halgunseth, Chair of SRCD Latino Caucus

Sub Unit

• Diversity, Equity & Social Justice

Moderator

• Linda Citlali Halgunseth, UConn

Panelists

• Lucía Alcalá, California State University, Fullerton

• Mayra Y Bamaca-Colbert, The Pennsylvania State University

• Melissa Y. Delgado, University of Arizona

• Carlos E. Santos, University of California Los Angeles