DR. TARA YOSSO: First Chicano Studies Professor to Sign UC Divestment from Israel Petition

by
Miroslava Flores
La Voz de Aztlan

Los Angeles Alta California - 7/1/2002 - (ACN) Dr. Tara J. Yosso, Assistant Professor of Chicano Studies at the University of California at Santa Barbara has become the very first professor of that discipline to sign the "University of California Faculty Petition for Divestment from Israel". As of today, the petition has 169 faculty signatures. Professor Tara Yosso is the 168th. In addition the petition now has 63 staff, 231 student , 102 alumni and 82 community signatures.

Dr. Tara Yosso may be a new breed of academician within the much troubled field of Chicano Studies. This field of study has a very interesting history. The seeds of the discipline were first planted back in March of 1969 when a group of students, teachers, and community activists met at the University of California at Santa Barbara and drafted El Plan de Santa Barbara, a Chicano Plan for Higher Education. The "plan" set out a vision for the establishment of Mexican-American Studies Departments in colleges and universities throughout Aztlan that would teach our sociology, culture and history and prepare our young people to address the pressing economic and political problems of our community. The programs were vigorous and healthy at the beginning, but their effectiveness attracted the attention of the enemy and they began to infiltrate and sabotage the discipline to the point that many of these programs are now no more than a way for the system to deliver "academic welfare checks" to a network of decadent Chicano homosexual and lesbian academicians.

The academic corruption within Chicano Studies reached its peak in 1998 when the National Association of Chicano and Chicana Studies (NACCS) held its 25th annual conference in my hometown of Mexico City (Tenochtitlan). This took place just three years after NACCS voted to amend its constitution and establish what they called the Joto and Lesbian Caucuses (Joto means Faggot in Spanish). The vote took place in 1995 at their National Conference in Spokane, Washington. The infiltrators of NACCS and of Chicano Studies won an ultimate victory in Spokane and completely betrayed the vision of the Plan de Santa Barbara and the fathers, mothers, teachers and students that in 1969 had helped draft the plan.

The NACCS National Conference in Mexico City turned out to be an embarrassing debacle for Chicano Studies and its reputation. The Joto and Lesbian Caucuses turned the whole affair into what has been described as nothing less than "academic debauchery". Those in charge presented a series of extremely decadent academic papers they tried to pass off as legitimate academic research. Abominable papers were presented with titles that made references to "the erotics of little boys" and "slippery when wet".

The whole conference ended with one of the most embarrassing incidents in the history of Chicano Studies that made the news not only in the Mexican national media but also in a few newspapers in Aztlan. The members of the Lesbian and Joto Caucuses had planned a final bash before packing back to the United States. They planned an event at the Mexico City downtown Marlowe Hotel they called "Noche de Joteria" (Night of Faggotry). They had prepared a flyer that had come to the attention of the management of the family oriented hotel. Needless to say, the whole lot of sodomites and what in Spanish are called "marimachas" were asked to leave the hotel immediately.

Today, there is a glimmer of hope that Mexican-American Studies may be returning to their original purpose and intent. There is talk of either reforming NACCS or creating an alternative association. More and more good professors are rebelling against the homosexual and lesbian leaders that dominate NACCS and are refusing to focus on the "bedroom issues" pushed by the "jotos and marimachas" and instead are focusing on more substantiative academic issues. Professor Tara J. Yosso of UC Santa Barbara, hopefully represents a reversal of the many years of decadence in Chicano Studies. It is coincidental that she is teaching at the same university where the Plan de Santa Barbara was first drafted. She has shown courage by signing the petition. I ask, where are the others, and especially male Chicano Studies professors?

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The following is the first paragraph of the "Plan":

EL PLAN DE SANTA BARBARA

"Por mi Raza Habla el Espirito"

For all people, as with individuals, the time comes when they must reckon with their history. For the Chicano the present is a time of renaissance, of renacimiento. Our people and our community, el barrio and la colonia, are expressing a new consciousness and a new resolve. Recognizing the historical tasks confronting our people and fully aware of the cost of human progress, we pledge our will to move. We will move forward toward our destiny as a people. We will move against those forces which have denied us freedom of expression and human dignity. Throughout history the quest for cultural expression and freedom has taken the form of a struggle. Our struggle, tempered by the lessons of the American past, is an historical reality.