Yesterday on Twitter, the hashtag #101HispanicWaystoDie was trending and full of tweets poking fun at Latino culture. My friend Tracy alerted me to the hashtag and also wrote about it, and how she contributed with her own light-hearted tweets. Her Vicks VapoRub tweet brought back memories and had me laughing.

But, something I noticed as I initially took a peek at the hashtag and scrolled through the tweets, was the abundant commentary about Black people. It was something Tracy and I discussed a bit after reading various tweets. As Tracy mentioned in her post, one girl wrote “say you’re going out with a moreno” and countless more retweeted and favorited her tweet. Other similar tweets included, “Bringing a Black boyfriend home,” and “Changing your parents music in the car to ‘musica de negros’.” It seems that whether in English, Spanish, or even Spanglish, and regardless of the terminology (Black, moreno, negro), the sentiment of many was the same: their parents were not accepting of Black people or culture – or at least they felt this was true.

Now admittedly, many of the tweets came from young people (teens even?), judging solely by the tiny Twitter avatar. I know young kids can be overly dramatic, but were their words a sign of something bigger in Latino culture – something we should really discuss as a community?

I’ll be super honest and share that growing up, I did observe some of this behavior. Sadly, I heard comments similar to those tweeted and that included phrases like “esos morenos,” always from the older generation. It never sat right with me, even at a young age when I didn’t truly understand.

I’ve always wondered why comments and feelings like that existed, but then I would be called “negra linda” and complimented on my beautiful trigueño skin color. It didn’t, and still doesn’t, make sense. Of course, this was all part of my personal experience growing up. I cannot say this is a general occurrence in Latino culture, but do feel it’s worth exploring. Clearly, many in the newer generation still feel it’s a problem, even if they were jokingly tweeting out their feelings of #101HispanicWaystoDie.

Photo: John Steven Fernandez/Flickr

My daughter was excited to learn that it’s time for Hispanic Heritage Month again! She enjoyed “officially” celebrating our Latino culture during the nationally recognized month last year and wondered if I’d be coming in to her class to share with her classmates, something I did last year. We celebrate our culture at home every day, whether she realizes it or not, but National Hispanic Heritage Month gives us an extra opportunity to learn.

To celebrate the start of Hispanic Heritage Month, which goes from September 15 until October 15, let me share some of our past Hispanic Heritage Month activities, resources, and articles.

Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month and Latino Culture

• 29 Hispanic Heritage Month Articles with Activities, Recipes, and More!
• Hispanic Heritage Month Kid Activities
• Resources to Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month with Your Kids

Will you be talking about Latino culture in your home this next month? How do you teach your children about your own culture or others’ cultures?

Image copyright ModernMami.com

Hispanic (Latino) Heritage Month comes to an end in about a week, on October 15. This past week, we celebrated Hispanic Heritage Month and shared several posts on the topic, including a bilingual children’s show DVD giveaway. In case you missed any of our posts, here they all are:

Kid Activities for Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month

My daughter and I learned more about Latino history and heritage through a Hispanic Heritage Month kid-friendly project.

Sharing Heritage By Keeping Memories Alive and Creating New Ones

I shared how my father’s memories of growing up in Puerto Rico are kept alive despite him having dementia and reflected on how this helps in sharing Latino heritage with a younger generation.

Bilingual Learning with El Perro y El Gato {Giveaway}

We enjoy the bilingual children’s cartoon, El Perro y El Gato, in our home and now you can enjoy this fun show with your family as well. Enter this giveaway for a 4-DVD set of El Perro y El Gato! (P.S. There are a low number of entries on this one, so your chances are good!)

Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month

Find out how this whole week of Latino heritage began and why I feel it’s important to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month.

In addition to the articles I’ve shared this week, plenty of other sites celebrate Latino heritage and share their own stories, tips, and ideas for celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month. Through the links below, you can find lots of great information for more Hispanic Heritage Month fun!

Hispanic Heritage Month For Kids

Resources to Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month with Your Kids

Kids TV Programming for Hispanic Heritage Month

Latino-Themed Children’s Books

Craft Activities for Hispanic Heritage Month

10 Ways to Educate Kids About Hispanic Heritage Month

Tradiciones latinas divertidas para tus hijos (Fun Latino Traditions for Kids) – Spanish Article

Cómo incentivar la cultura en nuestros niños (How to Encourage Culture with Kids) – Spanish Article

Latino-Inspired Recipes for Hispanic Heritage Month

Puerto Rican Carne Guisada Meal

Puerto Rican Arroz con Gandules

Tortilla Española – Egg and Potato Omelette

Mexican Chicken Pasilla Tamales

Mexican Rice and Bean Salad

Chicken and Vegan Cheese Enchiladas

Barbacoa Using Cachete de Res

Prickly Pear Margarita

General Information on Hispanic Heritage Month

Resources for Learning More About Hispanic Heritage Month

¿Celebras nuestra Herencia Hispana? (Do You Celebrate Your Hispanic Heritage?) – Spanish Article

Hispanic Heritage Month Facts

Photo: Jose Oquendo

Latino Arts, Culture, and Inspiration

What Does Being Latina Mean to Me?

Latino Quinceañero (Quinceañera) Tradition

Aprender la cultura Latina a través de la música (Learning About Latino Culture Through Music) – Spanish Article

Remembering a Revolutionary Writer: Gloria Anzaldúa

Interview with Guatemalan Artist Jessica Lagunas

Latino Heritage in the City

Campaign to Help Open A Book Store In El Barrio (East Harlem, NY)

Latinos Across the U.S.: City Guides with Best Latino Spots

I hope you enjoy some of these articles and take the time to learn a bit more about Latino culture and history, in order to celebrate Latino heritage. Do you have a Hispanic (Latino) Heritage story to share?

All photos © ModernMami.com, except where noted

This year, in order to expose my daughter to Latino heritage more in-depth, I decided to do a small Hispanic Heritage Month project with her. My idea was that it would be fun, informative, and would allow her to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month and learn about different aspects of her Latino heritage. She has heard of Hispanic Heritage Month in past years, but it’s been a more casual approach of general awareness. With her being in Kindergarten now, I thought this would take it up a level and go beyond just knowing she is half Latina.

There are many ways you can expose your children to Latino history, música Latina (Latin music), Latino food, and of course, the Spanish language. I decided to explore famous Latinos in history, the various Latin American countries, and reinforce Spanish skills. With that in mind, I knew I could find a few supplies at Walmart, since our local store carries a lot of Hispanic food products, Spanish movies, música Latina, and even Spanish books. They used to carry a lot more children’s products in Spanish, as well, but seem to have cut back.

Below I share some ideas for you based on what my daughter and I did for our Latino heritage project.

Kid Activities for Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month

Making Up Stories with Spanish Flashcards

You can find Spanish flashcards in many places; I bought these at Walmart. They include basic Spanish vocabulary, colors, numbers, and popular phrases. Using these flashcards, my daughter and I like to randomly pick out a couple of cards and make up stories using the words/phrases on the cards. For example, using the cards in the photo above, we can say, “Ella se puso la camisa, los pantalones y los zapatos antes de ir a la escuela.” (She put on her shirt, pants, and shoes before going to school.) Since making up stories is something many children love to do anyway, this is a fun game that helps with practicing Spanish words.

Exploring Latinos in History

Many Latinos have contributed to society in many areas, such as the arts, science, sports, politics, and entertainment. Since baby girl is only five years old and just starting Kindergarten, I didn’t want to overwhelm her with information. I found some great printables on the Nick Jr. website with information on famous Latinos in the arts, science, and sports. They had a coloring page packet and “Hispanic Hero” cards highlighting notable Latinos such as Tito Puente, Dara Torres, Ellen Ochoa, Celia Cruz, Rita Moreno, and Roberto Clemente, among others.

We took these printables, read the information on each person, and discussed their roles a bit. Baby girl wanted to know what each person looked like in “real life” as opposed to the drawings on the coloring pages so she could color them accurately. So, we looked each one up as well. The next day, she told her daddy and abuela all about Ellen Ochoa being the first Latina in space and said, “She’s my favorite. I liked her astronaut suit.”

Learning About Latin American Countries

In order to learn a bit more about the different countries that make up Latin America (actually, we sneaked Spain in, but I thought it was only fitting), baby girl and I decided to print out some flag coloring pages for her to color, cut out, and use to make posters. We picked a few countries, since doing them all would have been too much for her. As we did with the Latino historical figures, we looked up images of the flags for her to reference as she did her coloring. She was quite proud of her finished product!

I hope these ideas get you thinking of how you can talk about Latino history with your children, this Hispanic Heritage Month, or at any point.

What other kid activities help you to bring Latino heritage and history alive in your home?

Disclosure: Though this Hispanic Heritage project was an original idea, as a member of the Walmart Moms program, I was compensated for this post.

All photos © ModernMami.com

As I’ve mentioned before, my father has dementia. He was diagnosed with it about three years ago, but began to show symptoms close to six years now. His dementia manifests itself in many forms and shows in various things my dad says and does. Forgetting things is not all it’s about, but it does play a part, of course.

Two things my father holds on to very dearly are memories of Puerto Rico and music. He spends much of his day listening to the radio, old CDs and cassette tapes. He’s particularly fond of music he grew up with, especially boleros and other love songs sung by Trios Puertorriqueños, a popular grouping of three musicians. These songs remind him of his childhood in Puerto Rico, and those formative years we all cherish. He sings along and recounts memories that amazingly his mind refuses to let go.

Photo: Molly Stevens

These memories sometimes get mixed up, but overall, he has a vivid picture in his mind of Puerto Rico back then. The Puerto Rico he mostly remembers is that of his life in Aguadilla, the city he was born in, and the city he lived in until his late teenage years. His memory of Puerto Rico dates back to the late 1940s through right around 1960, before his family moved to New York City. Of course, this is not the same Puerto Rico he saw when we last visited in 2009. Though we tried to show him the areas where he grew up and played, it was not recognizable to him, since his vision of Aguadilla is not what it currently looks like.

When I received a complimentary copy of the DVD, Una Mirada a Puerto Rico, from Vme, a former sponsor of ModernMami.com, I knew right away that it was a documentary my father would enjoy. Sure enough, when I first showed him the film, he immediately began to say things like, “Mira que bella…mi isla.” (Look at how beautiful my island is.) He sang along to the background music used in the film, recognized many sights, and quizzed me on my knowledge of various historical facts. He also continually expressed his wish of wanting to go back to Puerto Rico and visit the area where he grew up, forgetting he saw much of it just two years ago. In fact, every time he watches this documentary, he has the same reactions, since to him, each time is the first time he’s seen it.

Documentaries like these help people like my father keep memories alive. But, they also help create new memories when shared with a new generation. This film will allow my children to see imagery of and hear music from La Isla del Encanto (The Island of Enchantment), the island their mother was born in and that makes up half of their heritage. For that, I thank Vme.

How do you share your heritage and keep memories alive?

Custom Hispanic Heritage Banner by Justin Edwards
and © ModernMami.com

As you know, I try my best to raise my children in a bilingual environment. I speak Spanish to them as much as possible, as do my parents, we sing songs in Spanish, read Spanish or bilingual books, and sometimes, we also watch cartoons in Spanish. My husband is very supportive in this effort and will point out new Spanish shows to us when he finds out about them and tries his best to repeat the Spanish spoken. It was actually him, who first introduced our daughter to El Perro y El Gato.

If I remember correctly, we were staying at a hotel and as he was browsing the channels, he stumbled upon HBO Latino, which was showing cartoons that morning. As I walk out of the shower, my baby girl screams out to me, “Mami, look! Perro y Gato! In Spanish!” She loves to point out when music, shows, books, etc., use Spanish. We watched the rest of the show wishing that we were HBO subscribers at home, since we had just found a new, funny, cute, bilingual show. Check out this behind-the-scenes look to hear from the show’s creators, animators, and even the voices of El Perro y El Gato.

El Perro y El Gato premiered a new episode titled, “Sigue Soñando / Keep On Dreaming,” on Thursday, September 15, the first day of Hispanic Heritage Month. We were sent a sneak peek DVD of the new episode, which of course, was enjoyed by all. The main characters of El Perro y El Gato are an overexcited orange dog (El Perro) and his laid-back, always hungry friend, a purple cat (El Gato). To keep our celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month going, today we have a 4-DVD set of El Perro y El Gato to give away to you!

ModernMami™.com Reader Giveaway

We want you to enjoy El Perro y El Gato with your children, so we’re giving away a 4-DVD set of the show, as pictured above!

How to Enter

Required entry: If you’d like to enter this contest for a 4-DVD set of El Perro y El Gato, simply leave a comment below sharing why watching bilingual shows is important to you and your family.

Extra entries (optional):
Each of the following will count as 1 extra entry. You’ll need to leave a separate comment for each entry.

1. Follow @modernmami on Twitter.
2. Tweet the following: Encourage #bilingual learning at home. Enter to win El Perro y El Gato DVDs from @modernmami! http://bit.ly/mPSylQ #giveaway #contest
3. Receive post updates by subscribing to our RSS feed. You can do so either via email or through a RSS reader. Leave a comment saying you did so or are already a subscriber.
4. Subscribe on friendfeed and leave a comment with your friendfeed ID.
5. Write a blog post on your own blog sharing the details of this contest. Be sure to include a link back to this post. Leave a comment with your post link.

All entries must be in by Friday, October 14, 2011 at 11:59 pm EST. You must be 18 or older and a U.S. resident. No purchase necessary. Remember to leave a separate comment for each entry. The winner will be chosen using Random.org and will be notified via email. (Please be sure to provide a valid email address with your entry.) Winner will have 48 hours to respond and claim prize, otherwise a new winner will be chosen.

El Perro y El Gato Photos and Video Provided and Used with Permission

Custom Hispanic Heritage Banner by Justin Edwards
and © ModernMami.com

Photo: Jose Oquendo

Having been born in Puerto Rico and growing up in a Latino household with parents that maintained our culture alive, celebrating our culture wasn’t something that was on our minds. We sort of lived it and “celebrated” every day. Now that my culture has blended with that of my husband’s and we have children with three cultures to celebrate, I do point out their Latino heritage. Of course, they are also seeing many aspects of Latino culture on a daily basis – the food we eat, the music we listen to, the language I speak to them – so, they are not without their culture.

Still, with our lives being a blend of cultures, the exposure my children have to their Latino culture is still a minor aspect of their lives. So, it’s important to me to incorporate Puerto Rican customs into my parenting and teach them about their heritage. Any opportunity is a good one, of course, which is why I take advantage of Hispanic Heritage Month as another chance to talk about our Latino heritage.

Hispanic Heritage Month runs from September 15 to October 15 and has been celebrated nationally each year since 1988. It starts mid-month because September 15 is a significant day to many Latin American countries who celebrate their independence on that date. This week, we’ll be celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month at ModernMami.com, in addition to regular content, and a couple of giveaways. Look for posts on celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month with your kids, a bilingual DVD giveaway, keeping memories alive and creating new ones, plus a round-up of Hispanic Heritage Month posts from other bloggers.

Have you ever celebrated Hispanic Heritage Month?

Custom Hispanic Heritage banner by Justin Edwards

“Es poca mujer.” These were words I heard at various points growing up and that have stuck with me. Literally it means “she’s not much of a woman,” but the phrase is used to mean a woman is not strong enough or cannot handle a situation. For example, if a woman is unable to handle her responsibilities as a mother, wife, and home manager, then some might say, “es poca mujer.”

The phrase has never been said about me, at least not to my face. I’ve heard it said by my mom, mostly, but also other family members in reference to other women we know. In all honesty, it seems like such a judgmental and harsh phrase to me. Of course, it goes back to something I’ve written about before – how in our Latino culture, women and moms especially, are somewhat expected to be super women. The result of not being able to balance it all is to be called out as “not good enough.”

Do you know how often I could be called “poca mujer” based on that definition? I try hard to get many things done and meet a lot of self-imposed expectations, but I would cringe if someone ever told me it wasn’t good enough. I can only do the best I can and really, who besides me can truly know what a successful day entails? Success for our family is probably different than it is for yours. So, for someone else to call me “poca mujer,” or to call anyone that, seems a bit cruel.

To me, saying “es poca mujer” about a woman is equivalent to calling her weak. And to call a woman weak because she is not able to keep up with so many aspects of her life – mainly those involving caring for others – well, it’s just wrong, isn’t it?

Are you familiar with the phrase? What are your thoughts on how it’s used?

Lately, I have been reflecting on some of the ways that I could expose my sons more to Latino culture. There are many ways that my husband and I model cultural practices at home such as the kinds of foods we cook and spices we use, the kinds of music we listen to, and the fact that we often speak to them in Spanish. However, I often wonder if all of this is enough. Sure, the boys know that they are Latino and that their parents and family are Latinos, but what exactly does that really mean to them?

My husband and I had totally different experiences than our sons growing up that better equipped us to truly understand and appreciate what being Latino means. I was raised in Spain by my grandparents until the age of 8 and spoke Spanish as my first language. My husband, who is of Puerto Rican and Cuban descent, was raised speaking Spanish at home here in the United States. He also lived and attended school in Puerto Rico for a number of years. There is really nothing that compares to being immersed in Latin culture and language by living in a native Spanish country. We learned exactly what it meant to be a Latino and the pride and culture of our people.

Our children are being raised here in the United States and are really Americanized at this point. They speak English fluently and prefer speaking English to their friends and in school. It seems like anything they value and understand is so removed from my fond memories of my childhood when it was a simpler time and we were bound together by our language and our cultural practices.  These days, young people think that eating rice and beans and listening to Reggaeton makes you a Latino, but there is so much more to us as a people.  It is the fabric of our culture that I am trying to impart to my children.  It is that pride that has propelled us through centuries of obstacles and strife.

I often wonder if I am doing a good job of passing on these cultural lessons and these feelings of pride to my boys.  Although we work very hard at home to instill these values in them, there are many things about our lifestyle that might be contradictory in the eyes of my children.  We live in an affluent neighborhood that is not very culturally diverse in terms of the ratio of Latino and African-American families to the Caucasian families that live here.  Actually, we are one of the few Latino families that live here and own our own home.  My children also attend a Parochial school close by that is not very culturally diverse.  As a matter of fact, there are only a handful of Latino children in both of my sons’ classes.

It’s almost as if the further we move away from our roots, the further we move away from the very things that we hold dear as Latinos, such as community and cultural unity.  As every new generation progresses, here in the United States, we are catapulted from those rich cultural practices of our past into the American way of life.  Most of us came here looking for opportunities and a better way of life and we definitely got those things.  Unfortunately, however, I believe that we somehow lost something along the way and it is this very thing, this essence of being Latin that is lacking in the younger generations.

That is why I am working very hard to raise my sons to be proud of whom they are and to be proud of being Latino.  I believe that you cannot know where you are going if you don’t know where it is that you came from.  It is not enough to remind my boys that they are Latin and to remind them that some of the things that we do are because we are Latin, we have to show them what it means to be a Latino.  Being a Latino includes a rich cultural heritage that is made up of an array of cultural practices that span across a vast network of native Spanish-speaking countries.  Although all Latinos do not originate from the same country, we have an unspoken brotherhood that binds us by way of a common language and a common history.  It is this pride and this brotherhood that I hope to teach my boys.  My hope is that my husband and I will be able to lay a foundation that will be strong enough to influence future generations of our family.  This is one of the legacies that we want to leave our children.

How do you maintain pride for your Latino heritage? If you have children, how do you help them feel proud of their Latino culture?

There’s really no better way to expose our children to our Latino culture than to travel with them to the place where we — or our family members — were born. We try to travel to both Peru, where I was born, and Puerto Rico, where my husband was born, at least once a year. We’ve only had the fortune to go to La Isla del Encanto once during the holidays. And, while that was almost two years ago, the experience was so full of culture that I decided to write the following post.

It’s 2:30 in the madrugada and the rooster won’t stop crowing. I thought this only happened at the break of dawn! What is going on? It was okay the first few days, but after all the late nights celebrating Año Nuevo and the first days of 2009 and just life in general – as they do on this beautiful island on a regular basis – I want to kill the stupid rooster. But then, I remember how Vanessa’s face lit up when she first heard it the morning after our first night in her father’s homeland, Puerto Rico.

“Mami, cucha! Ki-ki-ki!” — she instructed me to listen unable to contain her excitement.

For the first time in her short life, she was hearing the sound of a real rooster just outside her bedroom window. Later on, after she got dressed, we went outside to take a look at the culprit, and we were all surprised to see not only one, but two roosters, a bunch of hens, and about ten tiny chickies.

My husband’s family lives in the northwest part of the island and even though we’re staying in a recently constructed community, it’s still el campo. So — to my daughter’s delight —our next-door neighbor is somehow allowed to raise these farm birds. And even though I’m annoyed (to put it lightly) with their crowing at ungodly hours, I have to admit nothing makes my heart sing more than not having to explain to my daughter what it means to grow up en el campo.

A celebration like no other

The night before Reyes Magos — one of the biggest celebrations of Epiphany in any Spanish-speaking country I’ve ever had the fortune to experience — we were awoken in the middle of the night by a parranda at a neighbor’s house. This is basically when a group of friends armed with maracas, guitarras, güiros, palitos — among other instruments — gathers quietly in front of a friend or family member’s house late at night and when everyone’s setup they start singing and playing typical música navideña de Puerto Rico, waking up the household members to the sound of music, loud music. This goes on for a while and then the group and the members of the house move on to another house and so on, until the group is small no more and they reach the last house around 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning.

The night in question, we were all startled by the festive music. Vanessa woke up and asked: “Qué eso?” To which her father responded: “Una parranda!” And she immediately started dancing! What can I say; she has it in her blood… Anyhow, a few minutes later, and because I had never heard or seen a live parranda — and since you only live this particular life once and we were already awake — we decided to check it out. So, in the middle of the night and in our pajamas, we got in the car and took Vanessa to experience her first parranda. When we got there, my husband explained that it was probably the last house because of the amount of people and the smell of asopao — a kind of typical chicken soup that has to be served by the last house to receive the parranda.

We weren’t there long — and I don’t know how much of it Vanessa will actually remember — but I’m glad we did it. It is so much better to teach our kids about our culture through actual experiences…

What are some of your favorite cultural traditions? What do you do to teach your kids about them? Why do you think it’s important to keep traditions alive?

An Emmy-award winning bilingual freelance journalist, Roxana A. Soto was born in Lima, Peru, but has lived in the U.S. most of her life. She worked in print and TV for years, but went digital after having her first child and realizing there was little information online about bilingualism. In 2009, she co-founded SpanglishBaby — the go-to site for parents raising bilingual and bi-cultural kids. Roxana is married and has two bilingual and bi-cultural children.