Juan Flores

What does it mean to be “Latino”? Why does history matter? Why are Puerto Ricans “exceptional”? How has Latino identity and culture been

transformed by the relatively recent arrival od millions of immigrants from Latin America

Latinos are united by similar or shared historical events European conquest and colonization Slavery Wars of independence United States imperialism Migration

Puerto Ricans have had a long relationship with the United States as a colonized people

Areas of cultural expression: Urban space and performance Popular musical stylers Nuyorican literature

According to Flores, all of these cultural forms are underscored by prejudice and exclusion

Flores studies the rich history of cultural and musical interactions between Puerto Ricans and African Americans

Both groups share similar experiences of racial discrimination and economic subordination in New York

Young Nuyoricans who had grown up listening to rocka nd roll and singing doo wop began mixing the Spanish Caribbean music of their parents with the rhythm and blues that had picked up from their African American neighbors

According to Flores, boogaloo constituted “a meeting place between Puerto Ricans and blacks, and by extension, between Latin music and the musical culture of the United States.”

Joe Cuba, “Bang Bang” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WByu

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Pete Rodriguez, “I Like It Like That” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIJfdV

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By 1970, boogaloo craze superceded by the popularity of salsa whose aesthetics were unambiguously Spanish Caribbean

Most music scholars skip from mamba (1950s) to salsa (1970s) but Flores works to reclaim the importance of boogaloo

Looks at Puerto Rican and African American cultural interactions from the seventies to the nineties

Details activie participation of Puerto Ricans in early development of hip hop culture and rap

Illuminates the difficulties young Nuyoricans had in defining themselves within a cultural world that did not easily accommidate their multi-racial, bi-cultural, and bilingual experience

According to Flores, what are some of the complexities and contradictions of pan-ethnic Latino identity?