Hispanic or Latino: the use of politicized terms for the Hispanic minority in US official documents and quality news outlets

Abstract

In the 1970s, the American Census Bureau first used the term Hispanic to refer to individuals residing in the USA although born in or descending from Spanish-speaking countries. This paper explores the use of Hispanic and Latino (and to a lesser extent Latin American) in US official documents and quality news outlets within the framework of narrative theory. The Census Office documents and seven national newspapers, namely, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The Miami Herald, The Arizona Republic, San Francisco Chronicle and Los Angeles Times will be analysed. They represent the areas with large immigrant populations, on the one hand, and with descendants of Spanish-speaking peoples on the other. The paper will explore (1) the evolution of these terms in official use, that is, the US Census Office reports, (2) whether quality news media use of the terms has evolved in a similar way to official use or whether there is some degree of divergence between the two, (3) whether we can talk about regional variation and, finally, (4) whether the representation of the Hispanic minority in quality news media is largely negative, as it has been claimed for the media in general. The findings suggest that while official use is relatively stable, quality media use of the terms is largely unpredictable, although they do not seem to project a negative image of the minority.