03 12 25 Adams State University Dr Mari Centeno discusses Latina Suffragists Event

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It is Colorado's Morning News, Marty Lenz, Gina Gandick. Good morning.
It's Women's History Month, and today in celebration, we are
talking Latina Suffragists of the Borderlands, an upcoming event at
History of Colorado's Fort Garland Museum and Culture Center, hosted
by our next guest.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
And joining us now on the KWA Common Spirit Health
Hotline to talk more about it is doctor Mari Centeno.
Centennio Senteno, thank you so much for your time this morning.

Speaker 3 (00:26):
Good morning.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
Before we dive a little bit into what the talk
will be coming up, can you tell us a little
bit about what and who do listeners commonly know and
think about when we discuss the women's suffrage movement.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
Sure, I think that when we you know, in school,
we probably learned Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Katie Stanton. That's
probably who we learned about.

Speaker 4 (00:52):
Maybe in college, if you took a women's in Gender
Studies class, maybe you learned about Alice Paul Lucretia Mott,
the White Suffragists. Right.

Speaker 3 (01:05):
Maybe if you were lucky, you learned about the Journal
Truth and I to be wealth and married Church Terrell.
Maybe if you took a Colorado history class, you learned
about Elizabeth Piper Ansley, But that's probably very unlikely. So

(01:28):
I know that I never learned, and I had a
Women's and Gender studies minor from in college. I never
learned about the Latina suffragists.

Speaker 1 (01:37):
Why do you think that is?

Speaker 3 (01:40):
Well, I will be I'll give I'll be fair about
it and say that there were relatively few that we
know about that. But of course that indicates that they
were written about very little, and they were limited. It

(02:06):
appears that they were limited to the borderlands area. But
of course we could also attribute that to racism. They
weren't viewed as important enough to pay attention to, and indeed,
in a lot of my research, their work was you know,

(02:30):
attributed to just being translators, doctor, they translated the literature
into Spanish, when I think that does a real disservice
to their work. They were major community organizers. They went
into their communities and not only did they talk about

(02:52):
women's suffrage, but also took politics to the entire Ispano community,
especially as states like New Mexico were brand new states,
and so they were talking about national politics, you know,

(03:12):
taking that into the entire Ispano community. So yet talking
about them as near translators. I think was incredibly unfair
and incredibly racist.

Speaker 2 (03:23):
Well, doctor Santano, who are they? Who are some of
those names that may not commonly be mentioned when we
talk about just the overall breaking boundaries for women's rights.

Speaker 3 (03:34):
Sure, well, we have Maria de Lopez from California and
she was in fact the first woman, first Latina instructor
at UCLA. And we have Nina Otello Warren who was
from New Mexico and she was the first Latina to

(03:55):
run for Congress ever in the United States. We have
Hoisaida from Texas and she stood up against the Texas
rangers barred them from entering her family's newspaper. And we
have closer to home in Colorado with Funo County. I
got people wee Heel who's a man, but he was
part of the Constitutional Convention and tried to tried to

(04:21):
get a constitutional amendment into for women's suffrage and had
that written in Spanish. Yeah, to have women's suffrage from
the very beginning.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
You're hosting this talk, which I love, but I would
think because of the Spanish roots of the state of Colorado,
this would be made a priority. Are some of the
primary secondary schools. Obviously the colleges because they offer a
little bevy of offerings. And you mentioned some classes. I mean,
even thirty years ago at Colorado State, I had classes
that were more history specific, whether it was people of color, men, women,
and the like. Are we doing a better job of

(04:58):
offering and sharing these stories again, especially with our Spanish
and Hispanic roots in the state.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
Well no, I actually, let me be fair, I did
a sort of mini version of this talk in twenty
twenty and I had a very very difficult time finding,
difficult time researching. It's very difficult time. And since then

(05:27):
there has been a lot more published, and indeed, following
up on the research, I have found a lot more,
and indeed from Colorado, so that's been fabulous. So there
has been a lot more, and I think that's yeah,
it's been amazing.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
With a minute we have left, Oh I'm sorry, real quick,
doctor Sentinel. With the minute we have left, what do
you hope listeners take away from our conversation that we
have today and what do you hope attendees learn from
the event taking place at Fort Garland tomorrow.

Speaker 3 (05:59):
Oh? Yes, I'm a professor, so I'm wordy. Yes, I
hope that folks will realize that there's more than just
what we have learned in the history, that history is
always more than you know, what we have learned in
the past, that we're always learning more, that that it

(06:21):
can speak to us, that it can speak to your
own identity, that our stories are valuable as well. That
it's not just the limited amount that you may have learned.
It's not just the white, it's not that it's not
just black, it's not just an Asian, it's not just Hispanic.
That it can speak to your own identity, and so
please find out where your stories are in history.

Speaker 1 (06:44):
The name of the talk will be lots of such
a suffragiste, does I probably butcher that loss of suffragists
at the border Lands. It's going to be at the
Fort Carlan Museum and Cultural Center on March thirteenth, six
to seven thirty. Doctor Mari Sentenos, thank you for joining
us and look forward to having a good success with
the talk.

Speaker 4 (07:02):
Thank you, thank you so much.