Urban/Global Politics

Originally published in The Nation August 2, 2019 On July 26, still giddy after the massive mobilization of Puerto Ricans that played a major role in forcing Governor Ricardo Rosselló to resign, plena musician Tito Matos and street-theater activist/music video director Israel Lugo were in the Hato Rey business district of San Juan, walking together […]

What has happened on the streets of old San Juan and the distant west coast and mountain towns of Puerto Rico has been stunning, a hauntingly beautiful display of people power — a full-on awakening augured by the decades-invoked “Despierta Boricua” slogan, one that allows islanders to say things like “ya no es el mismo […]

This week has been unlike any other in Puerto Rican history. An estimated 500,000 demonstrators filled Old San Juan’s cobblestone streets on Wednesday to demand the resignation of Governor Ricardo Rosselló. He has lost public confidence because of mounting scandals in his government and damning revelations from a leaked trove of private chats, published on […]

A little over 20 minutes into Ava DuVernay’s “When They See Us,” her new Netflix miniseries about the Central Park Five case, the actress Felicity Huffman, who portrays prosecutor Linda Fairstein, captures the racial flash point that defined 1989 New York. “To think we were going to release these animals to family court,” she says […]

When comedic actress Yeka Rosales physically transformed into Yalitza Aparicio, the Oscar-nominated star of “Roma,” to promote her show on the Mexican network Televisa, she gave us a glimpse into one of Latin America’s best-kept secrets: a deep and abiding racism. In images she posted on Instagram last month, Rosales donned a wig of straight […]

By Julian Castro Nov. 14, 2018 LATINX The New Force in American Politics and Culture By Ed Morales 368 pp. Verso. $24.95. In September, just in time for Hispanic Heritage Month, the Merriam-Webster Dictionary recognized the word “Latinx,” which it defines as “of, relating to or marked by Latin American heritage — used as a […]

Several years ago, at the height of New York’s stop-and-frisk policing policy, two officers stopped me at West 125th Street and Broadway and insisted that I was carrying a knife. I was walking from Columbia University’s campus, where I’ve taught seminars on Latinx identity since 2010, after picking up a couple books at the library. Because I […]