Thursday, July 11, 2013

Spanish Day in Φ-ville

Here are some slides from my 3rd grader’s school program.  The point, I think, was to call attention to famous Hispanics.

Simon Bolivar

Simón Bolívar died in 1830, which means, um, he never used Twitter.  Ditto the entries for Benito Juárez, Celia Cruz, Roberto Clemente, Tito Puente (who was born in New York City), and of course Diego Rivera, Salvador Dali and Pablo Picasso.

File:Ellen Ochoa.jpgEllen Ochoa, presently the director of the Johnson Space Center, may very well use Twitter.  She was born in Los Angeles, although her slide neglects to mention that, saying simply, “I am from Mexico”.

 

 

 

 

Jessica Alba was born in Beverly Hills.   Jessica Alba

The slides for Selena Gomez and Eva Longoria showed similar incoherence.  What does it mean to be “from” someplace you weren’t actually born and to which you have no intention of going?

In the category of living Hispanics of non-U.S. births, we were shown slides for Carlos Santana (Mexico), Rita Moreno (Puero Rico), Shakira (Columbia), Enrique Iglesias (Spain), Penélope Cruz (Spain), Salma Hayek (Mexico), Antonio Banderas (Spain), Jennifer Lopez (Puero Rico), and Gloria Estefan (Cuba).  All singers and actors.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Colombia, man. Colombia.

heresolong said...

Does Jessica Alba herself claim to be "from" Mexico or is that just the wishful thinking of a race hustler trying to come up with examples that the kids will relate to?

Dr. Φ said...

Heresolong: Good question. The slide was as I reproduced it; I don't know whether it's an accurate representation of her self-identity, but I assume it probably is.