Chicanx Student Activism in the 1970s
The landscape of universities across the United States in the 1970s was infused with remnants of Civil Rights activism. Students across the country had spent hours marching, demonstrating, and using their voices to advocate for those whom acts of discrimination, segregation, and racial injustice aimed to silence. Among these excluded bodies were Chicanx students at the University of Texas at Austin. In response to race-based discrimination and segregation, various initiatives at UT Austin fanned the flame of activism that had burned fervently for many years in the Texas hill country. The Alba Club was founded in the late 1940s to create a space for Mexican American students to engage in discourse on subjects like segregation, prior to the infamous civil rights movements of the 50s and 60s. Then in the 70s, a group of Mexican American students and faculty members at UT Austin collaborated to start Onda Latina: The Mexican American Experience, in conjunction with the Longhorn Radio Network, to share the Mexican American experience over the air waves with members of the university community as well as the public more broadly.
Episode 22: Minority Admissions After the Bakke Case
In 1978, the Supreme Court of the United States heard the case of Regents of University of California vs. Bakke. The Court ruled while racial quotas used in university admissions are unconstitutional, affirmative action is constitutional in some contexts. This episode of Onda Latina considers the Chicanx perspective on minority admissions in light of affirmative action. Host, Armando Gutiérrez speaks with Dr. Isabel Pritchard, a visiting professor of government. Pritchard explains that as a result of the University of California’s affirmative action program having national renown, it was primed to receive political backlash despite the program’s intention to address severe underrepresentation in its minority student populations.
A Heritage of Activism
As it was intended, Onda Latina highlights the Mexican American experience across a wide collection of topics. Episode 22 provides an example of how Chicanx longhorns were engaging in conversations on difficult and important issues like affirmative action. In other words, they committed themselves to ensuring their perspectives were represented within the broader backdrop of university happenings. These conversations were not limited to issues facing UT Austin, exclusively, but Mexican Americans. In considering this radio show to be a joint initiative between faculty and students, the question remains: what inspired Chicanx students to engage in activism of this nature? Whether they knew about the members of the Alba Club or even the students who advocated for meaningful and necessary change during the 50s and 60s, these students committed themselves to a similar activism: upstanding for their community, using their voices, speaking their truth.
Filling the Gap
Throughout the 1900s and even still today, many UT Austin students have invested their energy and resources to advocate for causes important to them. Be it for marginalized populations, against university faculty and administration, or for some other cause, student activism on the Forty Acres has long called attention to the many gaps that exist within student experiences. While some are gaping and others less so, when all other resources have either come up short or been diverted away from bridging these gaps, there is a heritage of students showing up and helping other students. Onda Latina exemplifies this type of grass-roots activism. A small group of Chicanx students, in connection with faculty members of Mexican American heritage, pooled their ideas, passions, and voices in order to share their cultural perspective on issues directly affecting people of color, Mexican Americans in particular. Their desire to share their insights and voices prompts audiences to consider the question: Was there an absence of their insights and voices on the Forty Acres prior to the creation of this radio show? Through their prolonged commitment to ensuring their perspectives were shared and their voices were heard, they inspired some type of change in their lives. If activism is, therefore, one means by which change is realized in our world, perhaps one may deduce their activism likely prompted change outside their individual lives as well. Thus, these longhorns of the past remind longhorns of the present that what changes UT Austin is what changes the world.