The imposition of the Fiscal Oversight Board on Puerto Rico constitutes a wholly undemocratic re-colonization of what was once known as the Commonwealth, one that should immediately compel all Americans to take to the street to denounce this hideous betrayal of their country’s imagined role as the leader of the free world. But the most […]
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“There are certainly better voices than mine to speak on behalf of Puerto Rico” -John Oliver Can’t argue with that. Oliver’s awkward tittering about vejigante masks and sex at Loiza’s annual carnival notwithstanding, the debt crisis is no joke, and resisting the Republican Congress’s attempt to impose a fiscal oversight board—as well as a raft […]
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Looks like there’s clearly been a problem with postcolonial representation. Some times you gotta put on the mask to take off the mask.
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There is a moment in Dear White People, a film that is drawing a lot of attention for its frank treatment of “post-racial” America–particularly in Ivy League universities–that made me laugh, although I felt not many in the theater got the joke the way I did. It was during a voiceover dialog during which the protagonist […]
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Hispanic Heritage month is coming in just a couple of weeks, and maybe I’m being unfair, but given the major media’s track record I’m not expecting much from NBC/ Telemundo’s’ “Viva Today” programming. Undoubtedly there will be much huffing and puffing dedicated to just how unthreatening and willing to fit in Hispanics are, and how […]
Read moreThe mass media of news and entertainment is ideally a reflecting pool where society can revel in its own image, but Latinos in the US have to look long and hard to see themselves, and when they do, it’s a distorted picture. The lack of consistent and accurate portrayals of Latinos and their lives on […]
Read moreWhen I got wind last month of the unexpected passing of Phillip Seymour Hoffman, I was of course, saddened, and then contemplated it as another New York tragedy about a Downtown artist with great talent whose death garnered headlines because he had managed to break thorough into Hollywood celebrity. In other words, a story close […]
Read more200 Cartas, a film about the Nuyorican/Puerto Rican experience, is coming this September! You’ve probably already read this feature about the clever way the producers raised money to make the film through “product placement and brand partnerships.” Let’s not kid ourselves–bringing in corporate partners to support “the arts” is an essential strategy in today’s globalized […]
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The farcical furor over Anthony Weiner’s candidacy for the mayor of New York has opened up another Pandora’s box containing the tortured narrative of American sexuality, as well as the problematic world of machismo and Latino masculinity, my tenuous relation to them, and the way sexism and racism keep vying to remain at the top […]
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By now you’ve heard about the controversy over Devious Maids, a pastiche of a Mexican telenovela and Desperate Housewives, the primary vehicle for executive producer Eva Longoria, emerging Latina venture philanthropist. Clearly the set-up is problematic, since it involves a cast of five Latina maids, and domestic work is obviously a way that Latin@s are stereotyped. One […]
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ED MORALES 