What comes to mind when you hear “Latinx”? A language? A flag? A certain kind of music or food?
Here is the truth: there is no single “Latinx culture.”
The word Latinx is meant to be inclusive. An English neologism, it is a gender neutral term that refers to individuals with Latin American descent. But in reality, this single label covers over 400 million people across more than 20 countries. Yet, they are not just one community, one language, one race, or one story. When we flatten the Latinx identity into one set of foods, rhythms, or aesthetics, we erase complexity. We erase people.
To start, Latinx identity has its roots in colonization. When Spanish and Portuguese empires claimed land and people across the Americas, they imposed European culture, language, and religion on Indigenous and African populations. The colonial obsession with limpieza de sangre—purity of blood– created the rigid racial and social hierarchy. To organize society, Spanish authorities developed the casta system which ranked individuals based on their ancestry or blood purity. Hence, terms like mestizos (a person of mixed European and Indigenous descent) and mulattoes (mixed European and African ancestry) didn’t just describe identity, they assigned social status and values. These classifications dictated who could own land, receive education, or avoid enslavement. The system elevated proximity to whiteness and suppressed Black and Indigenous peoples, and it is from these racial hierarchies that the modern concept of “Latinx” began to form.
While the term “Latinx” was an attempt at inclusivity, it soon became a catchall used in mainstream culture that overlooks the diverse and rich identities.
Senior Juan Torres challenges this oversimplification. “We’re not a monolith. And all of those countries have so many different histories. They have a different culture. They speak different languages. Brazil doesn’t speak Spanish or Arabic or Portuguese, but they’re still Latino. There are a lot of similarities between our countries, but each one is so individual and so specific that it is very hard to put everything together into one term and say, you’re Latinx, therefore you think x y z.”
The erasure spans more than just in language. In politics, entertainment, and everyday assumptions, we see this diverse community suppressed under a dominant single narrative. Stories are reduced to stereotypes, and this invisibility can be deeply isolating, especially for young people who grow up without seeing their full selves reflected in the stories around them.
The term Latinx itself is also contested. For some, it challenges the gendered structure of the Spanish language. For others, especially ones outside the US, it feels foreign or imposed. As Torres describes, “Some people had problems with it because the term was catering to English standards and we’re again imposing English standards on the Spanish language.”
Still, within this tension there’s also potential. Latinx may not capture everything, but it opens a conversation. And when that conversation includes critiques, diverse voices and recognition of the rich cultures, the term gains more meaning and holds more weight.
As Torres reminds us, “we’re not a monolith.”
Perhaps, the most powerful expression of identity is not sameness. It is our solidarity through differences.
