Latinx

The term Latinx emerged from American Spanish in the early 21st century,[9] and was reportedly first used online in 2004.[10] The term has gained popularity in social media, and is mostly used by community activists and in higher education settings by students, faculty, staff, and some administrators who seek to advocate for individuals living on the borderlines of gender identity.[11]

The term emerged in response "to circumstances in which existent language structures fail to articulate value in appropriate ways."[12][13]

Salinas and Lozano (2017) stated that the term is influenced by Mexican indigenous communities that have a third gender role, such as Juchitán de Zaragoza, Oaxaca (see also: Gender system § Juchitán, Oaxaca, Mexico).[11]

The term often refers specifically to LGBT people or to young people. Brian Latimer, a producer at MSNBC who identifies as nonbinary, says that the application of the term "shows a generational divide in the Hispanic community".[14]^:60 One college article said that the term "has been sweeping across college campuses."[15]

The term Latinx grew in usage since its origins, and came into popular use in late 2014.[16]

Many people became more aware of the term in the month following the Orlando nightclub shooting of June 2016; Google Trends shows that searches for this term rose greatly in this period.[14]^:60

A 2016 NBC News report noted that it was "difficult to pinpoint" the origins of the term, but found that usage was "without question on the rise at U.S. colleges".[17] A similar use of 'x' in the term Mx. may have been an influence or model for the development of Latinx.[18]

At Princeton University, a student group called the Princeton University Latinx Perspective Organization was founded in 2016 to "unify Princeton's diverse Latinx community".[19] As of 2017, several student-run organizations at other institutions have utilized the word in their title.[20]

In 2016, the term appeared in the titles of academic books in the context of LGBT studies,[21] rhetoric and composition studies,[22] and comics studies.[23]

On June 26, 2019, during the first 2020 Democratic Party presidential debate, the word was used by the presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren,[24] which USA Today called "one of the highest profile uses of the term since its conception".[25]

A 2019 poll found that only 2% of US residents of Latin American descent preferred to use Latinx, including only 3% of 18-34-year-olds.[26][1]

Scharrón-del Río and Aja (2015) have traced the use of Latinx in authors Beatriz Llenín Figueroa, Jaime Géliga Quiñones, Yuderkys Espinosa Miñoso and Adriana Gallegos Dextre.[27] The term has also been discussed in publications by Pastrana, Battle & Harris (2016),[21] Valdes (2017),[28][29] and many others.[30]

The term Latinx has been criticized for being used almost exclusively in the United States and for being virtually non-existent in Spanish-speaking countries.[16] A 2016 HuffPost article stated, "Many opponents of the term have suggested that using an un-gendered noun like Latinx is disrespectful to the Spanish language and some have even called the term 'a blatant form of linguistic imperialism.'"[34][16] In a 2017 article for the Los Angeles Times, Daniel Hernandez wrote "The term is used mostly by an educated minority, largely in the U.S."[35]

Another argument against Latinx is that "it erases feminist movements in the 1970s" that fought for use of the word Latina to represent women.[25]

Hector Luis Alamo described the term as a "bulldozing of Spanish".[14] In a 2015 article for Latino Rebels, Alamo wrote: "If we dump Latino for Latinx because it offends some people, then we should go on dumping words forever since there will always be some people who find some words offensive.[36]

Nicole Trujillo-Pagán has argued that patriarchal bias is reproduced in ostensibly "gender neutral" language[37][38][39] and asserted, "Less clear in the debate (as it has developed since then) is how the replacement silences and erases long-standing struggles to recognize the significance of gender difference and sexual violence."[40]

The term Latinx allows those who do not identify within the gender binary to be seen and accepted by getting rid of the gendered ending of Latina/o, said Yara Simón in Remezcla.[41] In Spanish and in English, the suffix "x has grown into the linguistic vacuum created by a culture that values inclusivity over the ideologies embedded in a and o."[42] Some commentators, such as Ed Morales, a lecturer at Columbia University and author of the 2018 book Latinx: The New Force in American Politics and Culture, associate the term with the ideas of Gloria Anzaldúa, a Chicana feminist. Morales writes that "refusal to conform to male/female gender binaries" parallels "the refusal to conform to a racial binary".[14]^:61 Jeffrey Herlihy-Mera argues that "The gesture toward linguistic intersectionality stems from a suffix endowed with a literal intersection — x."[43]

Defending usage of the term against critics arguing linguistic imperialism, Brooklyn College professors María R. Scharrón-del Río and Alan A. Aja argued that the Spanish language itself is a form of linguistic imperialism for Latin Americans.[27][34]

The term Latinx was added to the Merriam-Webster English dictionary[33] in 2018, as it continued to grow in popularity.[25]