[FITZ]

Technically a Spaniard should be a "hispanic". You can call a pure-blood Mayan Indian, a pure African-Puerto-Rican a Hispanic, you can call a pure Spaniard from Mexico or Cuba a hispanic, or an Italian from Argentina a hispanic. You can call someone from New Mexico who speaks no Spanish a hispanic.

[norton]

Hispanic means only what you want it to mean.
Just find on Spaniard who wants that epithet and I'll buy you a coke.

It most correctly applies to spanish speaking, mixed race, people from the new world (Hispanola).

Latino, same thing; "Latin" means different things in Italy than it does in Honduras.

Chicano applies to US born of mexican/mestizo descent.

Mestizo ain't Castilian. (he said with a lisp)

Americans are generally hoodwinked into thinking in the broad sense when someone uses any of these terms: but Cubans & Puerto Ricans typically don't want to be considered with the rest, Spaniards and Portugese certainly don't because they are European. When you look at the literature or talk to the advocates, those groups are NOT included in the mix.