OMA Hosts Last Lunch and Learn for Latinx Heritage Month
Thuy-Linh Dang, Staff Writer
In efforts to honor the last day of Latinx Heritage Month and to bring attention to LGBTQ History Month, Stephanie Molina, event coordinator at the Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA), hosted the Lunch and Learn event this past week.
The lunch meeting was held on Oct. 15 in Solms Hall and featured subjects relating to being LGBTQ within the Latinx community.
“[So] in Latin American households, language and just the culture [sic] we have is very important to us,” said Molina. She provided the audience with a brief explanation of the gender neutralization of Latina, which is Latinx.
“In the purpose of Latinx word and the Latinx word movement, [it] is of course to create a gender inclusive term for those who identify with it,” said Molina.
“It is also a way to reclaim our identity with this whole concept of colonization, coming into Latin America and us losing our truth. [It] also align us back to who we were before colonization.”
“Latinx is not synonymous with the word queer… If you want to be gender inclusive you can use Latinx,” Molina explained.
The Latinx movement surged following the shooting at LGBTQ nightclub Pulse in Orlando, FL in 2016.
However, not everyone in the Latinx community agrees with what the movement wants to accomplish.
“And of course, not everyone is on board with the Latinx movement… A lot of people say that it is a disgrace to the Spanish language, that it doesn’t roll as easily off the tongue, that it is sort of like an imperial takeover of the language when it comes to using the word Latinx,” Molina said.
Molina encourages the audience to respect a person’s identity and refer to them by what they would like to be referred as. “It is important to call people what it is that they want to be called,” said Molina.
For questions about the Latinx movement and future events on the Armstrong campus, please contact Stephanie Molina at smolina@georgiasouthern.edu.
