Hispanic or Latino: the use of politicized terms for the Hispanic minority in US official documents and quality news outlets

Abstract

In the 1970s, the American Census Bureau first used the term Hispanic to refer to individuals residing in the USA although born in or descending from Spanish-speaking countries. This paper explores the use of Hispanic and Latino (and to a lesser extent Latin American) in US official documents and quality news outlets within the framework of narrative theory. The Census Office documents and seven national newspapers, namely, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The Miami Herald, The Arizona Republic, San Francisco Chronicle and Los Angeles Times will be analysed. They represent the areas with large immigrant populations, on the one hand, and with descendants of Spanish-speaking peoples on the other. The paper will explore (1) the evolution of these terms in official use, that is, the US Census Office reports, (2) whether quality news media use of the terms has evolved in a similar way to official use or whether there is some degree of divergence between the two, (3) whether we can talk about regional variation and, finally, (4) whether the representation of the Hispanic minority in quality news media is largely negative, as it has been claimed for the media in general. The findings suggest that while official use is relatively stable, quality media use of the terms is largely unpredictable, although they do not seem to project a negative image of the minority.

En la década de los setenta la Oficina del Censo de los Estados Unidos estableció el uso del término Hispanic para referirse a ciudadanos procedentes de países de habla española. Este artículo estudiará el uso de Hispanic y Latino (y en menor medida Latin American) en documentos oficiales y medios de noticias estadounidenses a partir de teoría de la narrativa. Se trata de los documentos de la Oficina del Censo así como de siete periódicos, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The Miami Herald, The Arizona Republic, San Francisco Chronicle y Los Angeles Times. Estos periódicos representan las zonas de inmigración reciente y las zonas históricas de mayor población hispana. El artículo estudiará (1) la evolución de estas palabras en su uso oficial, (2) su evolución en los medios de noticias de calidad y si existen diferencias con respecto al uso oficial, (3) si existe diferencia regional en el uso de las mismas, y finalmente (4) si la imagen de la minoría hispana es mayoritariamente negativa, como aseguran algunos autores para los medios de comunicación en general. Los resultados sugieren que el uso de estos términos en documentos oficiales es relativamente estable mientras que resulta impredecible en los medios de comunicación de calidad. No obstante, estos no parecen ofrecer una imagen negativa de la minoría hispana.

Keywords:

• Hispanic
• Latino
• Latin American
• American media
• US Census reports

Acknowledgements

I would like to acknowledge the funding of the Spanish Ministry of Education for a research stay through the programme ‘Estancias de profesores e investigadores séniores en centros extranjeros de enseñanza superior e investigación’ (PR2010-511) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. I would also like to express my gratitude to Dr Juan Caban, from UMass, and his wife Braulia, for their hospitality and many interesting discussions about some of the issues dealt with in this paper, and to Edwin Gentzler for his invitation to join the UMass Translation Center during that period.

Notes on contributor

Roberto A. Valdeón was awarded a Master's degree in English Literature and Translation Studies from the University of Glasgow, and obtained his PhD in English Studies from the University of Oviedo. He has published extensively on EFL and translation, including contributions to international journals such as Perspectives, Across Languages and Cultures, Meta, Linguistica Antverpiensia, Target, International Journal of Applied Linguistics, Babel, Forum, The Translator, Languages in Contrast, Bulletin of Spanish Studies and Translating and Interpreting Studies. He is a member of the international advisory board of Vigo International Journal of Applied Linguistics (University of Vigo) and John Benjamins’ Handbook of Translation Studies. He is the editor of Translating Information (2010) and has guest edited special issues of Vigo International Journal of Applied Linguistics, Perspectives, Meta and Across Languages and Cultures. Since July 2011, he serves as Editor-in-Chief of Perspectives Studies in Translatology. During the academic session 2011–12, he joined the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He has also been appointed Senior Research Fellow at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven to work on a project on the use of translation in the creation of national images.