When I was a kid, I was taught that Latinos were people whose primary language was derived from Latin, which is a pretty wide net...
Latins by definition are natives or inhabitans of a country whose language developed from Latin. The French language developed from vulgar Latin... would you call a Frenchman Latino?
Because only Hispanics speak latin???
Interesting...
The question often asked here as well; tied with the question: who first found himself brave enough eat the ‘things’ deposited by that feathered animal (eggs)?
Regular European Spaniards and Portuguese aren’t considered “Latino” either. I know, I’ve checked.
For that matter Cubans don’t really count it seems. The term, for all practical purposes as relates to politics and bureaucracy, is limited to Mexicans, Puerto Ricans
We Italians are Latinos but the entire ethnic identification thing should be rejected.
It’s a liberal construct designed to divide.
100% with you. The reason is that the goal is to create a victim group with all the privileges that that entails. It is already overly broad, including anyone from a country where Spanish is the predominant language.
A subgoal is to cast anyone of Italian descent as an “oppressor”, since Columbus is generally accepted as Italian.
None of this has anything to do with reality. It’s all about establishing as many victim/oppressor divisions as possible.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Latino
The real definition of Latino is “a person who comes from a country where they speak a derivative of Latin”. Latin is right there in LATINo. Anyone of Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian decent or who comes from one of their derivative countries ( IE, any Latin American country, including Brazil) is Latino.
The term “latino” means someone born in the Americas south of the US or their descendant.
The term “hispanic” means someone born in a Spanish (sometimes Portugese) speaking country or their descendant.
So the terms aren’t applicable to Italians unless you completely redefine the terms.
My first hearing of it was it's usage in leftist political cant as a wedge to splinter society, about the same time period as the emergence of the various "Latino/Hispanic" racist organizations.
Latino "male Latin-American inhabitant of the United States" (fem. Latina), 1946, American English, from American Spanish,
a shortening of Latinoamericano "Latin-American" (see Latin America).
As an adjective, attested from 1974.
source:
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Perhaps there has been a declaration that their language is not Latin based. As far as I know Rumanians are not officially Latinos, either, even with their Latinate language. Latinos officially only designates Spanish speakers, and not usually even Spanish people.Latino is the chosen Euphemism to get around the former “wetbacks,” “Spicks,” and some others.
If you really want to piss off the la raza crowd, ask them how they like speaking the language of a conquering European army.
Hispanic? Not really. Mayan or whatever variation of sub 5’ local variation.
And oh boy do they like to claim to be high bred “Spanish”.
Read the book “Are Italians White?” Once not considered white.
And Joe DiMaggio’s mother was deported back to Italy in WW2.
If I move to MEXICO, am I an American Mexican? If I move to AFRICA, am I an American African?, heh heh
I’m Italian, Sicilian, and Spanish, and I’ve never looked at myself as “hispanic” or “Latin”. I also don’t see myself as a hyphenated American. I bleed Red, White, and Blue, and resent those who attempt to Balkanize themselves with the hyphen.