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CNN World Report

Latinos Strive to Preserve Their Culture in the United States

Aired May 20, 2001 - 14:40   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SHIHAB RATTANSI, CNN ANCHOR: One half of the U.S. Latin-American population is Mexican, followed by Puerto Ricans and Cubans.

ASIEH NAMDAR, CNN ANCHOR: And with rising number of Latinos in the U.S., American popular culture is absorbing much from Hispanic traditions. Cubavision reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AMARILIS ORTA, CUBAVISION CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Natacha Stevanes (ph) is a Puerto-Rican who has lived in the United States for more than 18 years. Most of the time, she has worked in films and television. She is a producer and independent writer, and part of a generation that struggled for the unity and difference of Spanish- speaking filmmakers within the U.S. movie industry.

NATACHA STEVANES, FILMMAKER (through translator): When you start putting things together, sometimes you feel you neither belong here nor there. It's an imaginary space. It's like I said before, it's an island. Latinos live in an isolated island between two larger or smaller islands. It's a virtual space that deserves more discussion on who we are, where we are, what it means to be a Latino in the United States.

ORTA: Like many others, Natacha (ph) has decided to look at the reality of Latin immigrants that walk down the streets of United States face-to-face. So, in her work, there are disappointments, dreams and prospects in trying to raise Hollywood's myth of a perfect society.

More than 30 million Latinos live in the United States today. For many reasons, some of them have been forced to immigrate to a foreign country with a foreign language. However, that community that preserved its culture and identity despite the distance, continues to live and dream.

Experts say that in 20 years, one out of six U.S. citizens will be of Hispanic dissent. Spanish is spoken in all U.S. cities, and could be considered a second national language. It's taught in schools and universities, and many TV network broadcast programs in that language.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Sometimes you find the broadest sample of Latin American spirit in a U.S. city than perhaps you can in Latin America. And this contradiction to me is very interesting.

STEVANES (through translator): I think that the survival of Latinos in the United States is partly based on preservation of their identity, culture and language.

ORTA: We could then speak of a U.S.-Latin spirit with a persistently dual nature, given by the active participation of Latinos in the country's culture and language. Perhaps new words will be created to define the impact provoked in U.S. society by the most dynamic Latin features in the movies, salsa, corporal expression, their way of dressing and inter-mixture of races.

This report was made by Amarilis Orta from Cubavision International for CNN WORLD REPORT.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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