“The impulse to define and neatly categorize the Latino experience not only shapes the way that Latino literature is understood; it influences what is available to us, what is acceptable to publishers, and what is read in the classroom,” write editors Blas Falconer and Lorraine M. López in the introduction to this 2011 anthology of twenty essays exploring the many ways in which Latinx American literature is understood. The essays—written by authors such as Joy Castro, Daniel Chacón, Alex Espinoza, Carmen Giménez Smith, Gabe Gomez, and Judith Ortiz Cofer—range in topics, some focusing on experiences that challenge what many perceive to be a Latinx narrative, while others encourage new modes of expression and push to reinvent literature that steps outside of traditional narratives, themes, and tropes. The anthology aims to shine a light on the diversity within diversity and to challenge writers to explore their own individuality. As Falconer and López write: “Only when we honor the multiplicity of voices in our cultural group can we honor the artistic spirit that drives us to create, as our first complex and original creation must be the self.”
