A teenager once told me that, when he moved to Miami, he “thought everyone would look like Sofia Vergara.” He was surprised, and a little disappointed, to find that people here looked – normal. He was expecting all the hypersexualized Latinas he’d seen on TV. I didn’t have to ask what he meant. Miami, also […]
Obviously part of acting is portraying foreign identities but it’s easier to play familiar ones. So, it makes sense to hire Latinx actors to play Latinx roles, right? Those actors have the advantage of being familiar with the life experiences, verbiage, accents, and other nuances of the culture embedded into who they are, making the […]
Latinxs have long had a difficult relationship with Hollywood. We are constantly fighting to get representation on the silver screen, despite being 62.1 million strong in the U.S. When we are in films, our roles often perpetuate long-held Latinx stereotypes, such as women only being maids, men only being criminals, and everyone not knowing how […]
By making their stage names sound more “American” (aka what white people perceive as being from the US), Latinx actors often avoid getting pigeonholed as the stereotypical criminals, janitors, maids, etc., even if the practice contributes to our erasure.