By Rodolfo
F. Acuña
When César Chávez was asked what he thought about
the term la raza, he answered the question with a question, asking, what was
wrong with the indigenous race?
The word raza was popularized by José Vasconselos who
in 1925 wrote an essay titled “La Raza Cósmica” (The Cosmic Race). Vasconcelos
was an intellectual and intellectuals at the time took it to mean that Latin
American was comprised of races from all over the world, and that the mixture
had produced a new people who would transcend the "old world".
