In Latam we are celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month, that is why we made the following article to establish the distinction between the terms Latino and Hispanic that is so applied on these dates.
Surely you have noticed that especially in the United States the term Hispanic and Latino is used interchangeably. However, these two terms have different meanings.
The word Latino or Latino refers to geography, that is, people who are originally from Latin America, this includes most people from Central America, South America and the Caribbean.
The term Latin America was used for the first time by the Chilean politician, Francisco Bilbao, and it was applied to describe countries in America whose predominant language comes from Latin, languages such as Spanish, Portuguese and French.
Knowing all this, in a more literal sense, Hispanic refers to the Spanish language and is applied to describe any person descended from a Spanish-speaking country. That includes Spain in Europe and some countries in the Caribbean and Latin America, and excludes those countries in these regions where Spanish is not the predominant language. According to the Cervantes Institute, more than 400 million people in the world are from Spanish-speaking countries and almost 10% of those people reside in the United States. That is probably why the US government introduced the term Hispanic in the 1970 Census under Richard Nixon.
In conclusion, you can be Hispanic if you are from Spain, but you are not Latin American if you are not from America. If you are from Brazil, you are Latino, but not Hispanic. However, you can be both Latino and Hispanic. For example, if you are from Mexico, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador or El Salvador, you are Latino and Hispanic.
We hope we have resolved your questions and that together we can continue to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month.
Reference:
BBC News World. (2019). Latino or Hispanic? How these terms are used in the United States: Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzjd_7qkYtU
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