Latino and anglo political portraits: lessons from intercultural field research

• Published in: International journal of intercultural relations 2001-05, Vol.25 (3), p.235-259
• Main Authors: Weigl, Robert C., Reyes, Jesús M.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Advocacy; El Salvadorean people; Immigrants; Intercultural Communication; Intercultural field research; Latin American Cultural Groups; Latino–Anglo politics; Political action; Political Attitudes; Political Behavior; Political Participation; Social integration; Training; USA; Washington, D.C; Whites
• ISSN: 0147-1767; 1873-7552
• DOI: 10.1016/S0147-1767(01)00002-5

Authors report sharply contrasting portraits of Anglo and Latino political values and behaviors, urging careful consideration of these differences in plans to include Latinos in civic life in the US. Reported data were collected during two and one half years of ethnographic field research which accompanied a domestic diversity program. 1 1 This report summarizes a symposium presented at the meetings of the International Academy of Intercultural Research, March 17, 1998 in Fullerton, CA. The authors want to thank panelists Rosita Albert, Milton Bennett, Dan Landis, and Frank Montalvo for their thoughtful comments which have helped guide preparation of this report. We are deeply appreciative of the support of project fundors — Fairfax County, VA, the Mobil Corporation, and the Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Foundation — for endorsing an exploratory action research venture. Our most deeply felt thanks go to United Community Ministries, a non-profit human service agency in Alexandria, VA, that so generously supported, hosted, and guided this project. We also want to acknowlege the valuable editorial assistance of Fathali Moghaddam and Gail Weigl at Georgetown University. Developed in the Washington, DC metro area, the Hispanic Leadership Project set out to prepare leaders from a recently arrived Latino immigrant population — primarily from El Salvador — to advocate and form political alliances on behalf of their people. With joint local government and private foundation support, project designers sought alternatives to the marginalization and misrepresentation which are common experiences of Latino peoples recently settled in the US. Intentionally inclusive, but accidentally ethnocentric, the Hispanic Leadership Program could not realize most of its ambitious goals for social change, but proved to be a very heuristically powerful approach to set certain Anglo and Latino cultural patterns in bold relief, particularly those related to political self-expression and world view. Despite the specific features of its context and participants, the project offers broader lessons to guide future research and practice; noted are guidelines for quantitative follow-up study and for subsequent efforts to foster Latino participation in politics. The Hispanic Leadership Project and companion research are offered as a demonstration of learning to be extracted from putative program failures and from use of qualitative methods in intercultural research.