What This Hispanic Heritage Month Means to Me
By Dr. Gabriel Escontrías
Dr. Gabriel Escontrías, Jr., is the Director of Health Equity for the American Psychiatric Association. Over the span of his 20-year career, he has served in various higher education and public health professional capacities with a commitment to increase diverse, inclusive, and equitable pipelines to postsecondary education, health care, and workforce opportunities. From 2015 through 2017, he was a manager of the Center for Gender Equity in Science and Technology (CGEST) at Arizona State University. He developed and evolved the inaugural center in the areas of advocacy, capacity building, and knowledge.
What is National Hispanic American Heritage Month
September 15, 2022, marked the observational start of National Hispanic American Heritage Month that goes through October 15. As with all heritage months, it offers all of us as community members a time to learn and reflect on the contributions made by our ancestors to the United States of America and opportunities to celebrate rich cultures and traditions. There is not one way to celebrate this month as there are abundant possibilities. Our histories represent ancestry from Mexico, the Caribbean, Central America, South America, and Spain. According to hispanicheritagemonth.gov, “the observation started in 1968 as Hispanic Heritage Week under President Lyndon Johnson and was expanded by President Ronald Reagan in 1988 to cover a 30-day period starting on September 15 and ending on October 15. It was enacted into law on August 17, 1988, on the approval of Public Law 100-402.”
What this Heritage Month Means to Me
As a first-generation Mexican American born and raised in Arizona, National Hispanic American Heritage Month this year is a reminder of how important collaborating and coalition building is to dismantle and fight against the injustices affecting our Hispanic American communities. We are not monolithic but, in a time when fear tactics and misinformation run rampant and erode our democracy, we owe it to each other to unite. We cannot and should not normalize atrocities such as children being separated from their families and placed in cage-like detention facilities, or the recent asylum-seeking migrants being shuffled and used for political stunts from one state to another. According to UnidosUS “Latinos are the second-largest group of voters in the country.” Our political ideologies may differ, but I call on each of us (especially the 32 million eligible Latino Americans) to fight for every individual’s human rights.
Celebrate with "¡Presente! A Latino History of the United States" Molina Family Latino Gallery
I invite you to visit the inaugural exhibition by the Smithsonian’s newest museum—the National Museum of the American Latino at https://latino.si.edu/exhibitions/presente or in person at the National Museum of American History. Per their website “on December 27, 2020, legislation passed calling for the Smithsonian to establish the National Museum of the American Latino. The new museum will be the cornerstone for visitors to learn how Latinos have contributed and continue to contribute to U.S. art, history, culture, and science.” So, let’s celebrate during these 30 days and show our commitment year-round. As Cesar Chavez stated, “preservation of one’s own culture does not require contempt or disrespect for other cultures.”
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