Susana L. Gallardo

Seven different words for 'cookie'

Latina/o identity in the United States

Fall Books

In her piece in this issue, Gabriella Gutiérrez y Muhs draws on the human senses to connect us to diverse figures that “confuse” and “mystify” us (see story). We are angry, upset, laughing, crying, drunk -- all of those messy emotions that define us as human beings. These are the things that tie us irretrievably to people immensely different from ourselves. Sometimes in the talk of difference and diversity, we forget that lines of difference are always grounded in lines of humanity. The unfamiliar specificity of a stranger’s pain is still pain, and their joy, still joy.