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Hi friend,

A question I often get about my new book, which includes my own family history, is: “Did you always want to write this story?” The answer is complicated. As a Latina historian working in the field of ethnic studies, I was given the message, early and explicitly, that I would not be seen as a rigorous scholar if I wrote about anything too close to home. 

I went on to write two books. The first, Fit to be Citizens? Public Health and Race, demonstrated the power of medicalized racism in shaping policy, from urban planning to immigration (no, not even science is objective). In my second book, How Race is Made in America: Immigration, Citizenship, and the Historical Power of Racial Scripts, I introduced a theory of racial scripts, which highlights the ways in which the lives of racialized groups are linked across time and space and thereby affect one another.

While these books may seem more at “arms-length” from the personal material in A Place at the Nayarit, they were still an attempt to help me make sense of the world my family and I inhabited. As I child, I remember being startled when I looked around and didn’t see myself or people who looked like my family reflected anywhere in history books, novels, or popular culture, unless it was as a flattened stereotype. (Even today, Latinos make up only 4% of speaking roles in film and television.) I became a professor and writer in part to change that.

Scholars have always been inspired by their family histories. When I was being trained as a historian, the big books in Latinx history—George Sanchez’s Becoming Mexican American, Vicki Ruiz’s Cannery Women, Cannery Lives, David Gutierrez’s Walls and Mirrors—took on questions of the authors’ parents’ generation. But the authors didn’t necessarily write directly about their families. We can see that changing in more recent books, like Miroslava Chávez-García’s Migrant Longing: Letter Writing across the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands or José Orozco’s Receive Our Memories: The Letters of Luz Moreno, 1950-1952, which both mine their family archives, including a treasure trove of correspondence, to tell their story. I wish I could say that perhaps there is less of a felt need for authors to prove their bona fides. Chávez-García, Orozco, and I were already tenured when we ventured into more personal material. I know for me, it was less of a feeling of “I can write this book now that I am a full professor” and more, after teaching for several years, that certain stories don’t often get told. 

As someone who has written a book based on my family history, I'm fascinated by how others are inspired by theirs, including Eric Porter. I had the pleasure to review his book, A People's Guide to SFO, where his grandfather landed a job as a skycap in '42, moving his family from Louisiana to the Bay Area. 

My moment of joy:
We have library cards, and we're not afraid to use them.
My “panda sisters” (i.e. high school classmates) helped me spread the word about the Library Foundation's "Stay Home and Read a Book Ball."
Upcoming events:

I'm honored to serve as an honorary gala chair for The Library Foundation of Los Angeles's 35th Annual "Stay Home and Read a Book Ball" on Sunday, March 5th. The Foundation provides critical support to the Los Angeles Public Library resulting in free programs, resources, and services available to the millions of adults, children, and youth of Los Angeles.

If you’d like to join us, you can post photos of you reading solo or with guests for the Ball on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter using the hashtag #StayHomeandRead. Don’t forget to tag us
@LibraryFoundLA. You can rsvp and donate here.
In case you missed it:
 
It’s an honor to be a finalist for a PROSE Award from the Association of American Publishers – and extra special given that Professor Evelyn Alsultany is also a finalist! Ev and I wrote the last drafts of our books together in the “Zoom where it happens.” 

Making a Neighborhood – one of my favorite newsletters that shows why local history matters – gave A Place at the Nayarit a shout-out last month in “Three Reads to Help You See Los Angeles in a New Way” (subscribe to read the full essay).

I recently sat down with La Raza Chronicles to discuss the importance of restaurants in our communities. Listen to the full interview here.

Photo by Mel Castro
Thank you to all of those who purchased A Place at the Nayarit: How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community. All 2022 proceeds from the sale of my book went to No Us Without You, a 501c3 charity that provides food relief for hospitality workers who have been disenfranchised in the pandemic. We share a goal of showing how immigrant workers have sustained the country, and I'm proud to support them.  I will continue to contribute a portion of the book sales to No Us Without You in 2023.

I have learned much from the good people who have attended recent book talks. And I'd love to hear from those whom I haven't met yet or heard from in a while. Please share your thoughts on the book on TwitterInstagram, or leave a review on the platform of your choice.

Until next time,

Natalia

P.S. This newsletter is free so forward it to a friend if you wish. They can also see past issues and subscribe here.

 
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Natalia Molina
Department of American Studies and Ethnicity
3620 South Vermont Avenue, KAP 462
Los Angeles, CA 90089

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