Latino
Categories: Ethnic groups of the United States
Latino refers to anything connected with Romance languages and the associated cultures and ethnicities, especially Hispanic (Spanish and Portuguese).
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Etymology
Latino, feminine Latina derives from Latin (the adjectives latinus, latina), originally referring to Latium, the area of Rome, by aitiology derived from a king of the name Latinus.
The term should not be confused with Ladino (the Spanish-based language traditionally spoken by Sephardic Jews) or Ladin (a Rhaeto-Romance language spoken in the Italian Alps), even though the origin for all three names is the same.
US Ethnic usage
In the United States, Latino refers to non-Anglo-Americans who are living in the United States of America and are of Hispanic background, typically Spanish speaking people. The feminine form of the word is Latina.
Most frequently the term Latino is restricted to immigrants from Spanish speaking countries in Latin America and their descendants. American inhabitants of Brazilian origin are sometimes considered Latinos, even though their language is Portuguese. Some define Latino as also including Spanish and Portuguese people in America. Inhabitants of the French-speaking areas of Haiti, French Guiana, and the French West Indies are generally not considered to be Latinos; they are typically thought to have more in common culturally with English-speaking West Indians than they do with residents of Mexico and Central and South America.
The U.S. Census Bureau defines "Hispanic or Latino" as having a background in a Spanish-speaking Latin American country or being of actual Spanish ancestry. Thus immigrants from Spain are considered "Hispanic or Latino", but those from Brazil are not. The label also thus includes ethnically Spanish people with roots in the United States, such as the New Mexico Spanish and Louisiana Cajuns of Spanish origin.
Critique of Latino usage in US
The word Latino is debated as an appropriate label for the people living in the Americas outside of the US and Canada. Controversy surrounds on the usage since it implies a mirroring of Europe Latin area (see Latin Europe) in the Americas. But in doing so have excluded the indigenous descendants that are very much grounded in what is called the Americas. Thus the critique of the word falls on the exclusion of others and/or perpetuating a homogenuity of one race in the Americas. The exclusion falls on the indigenous societies and the seized populations of Africa.