Celebrating Hispanic/Latino Heritage Month: Latina Stories to Inspire
Stories can unite us. They can educate and they can inspire. They can change us. In celebration of National Hispanic/Latino Heritage Month, we want to share with you a segment of our new cultural art exhibit, Migration is Beautiful // La Migracion es Bella. Through portraits and interviews, we dove into the lives of eight incredible women.
The following is a part of a portrait series created by local photographer, Melissa Toledo.
“I noticed injustices my whole life as an immigrant migrant farm worker. I started realizing that our immigrant kids, particularly Latino kids, were not graduating at the same rate; they were dropping out at higher rates; they were being punished at higher rates than other students. I started realizing all of these things that we needed to fix.”
Representative Teresa Alonso León
Oregon State Representative,
District 22, Woodburn
Immigrant from Mexico
“As a queer immigrant Latina it’s been a struggle to find a sense of belonging and relate with the dominant queer community because there is seldom other queers that look like me and can understand the struggles of belonging to different marginalized communities.
My ideal future would be for parents, especially Latino parents and grandparents, to understand that you don’t have to be afraid for your child. Just love them and embrace them and accept them, and they’re going to be okay. That’s the most important thing.”
Ingrid Solares
Licensed Clinical Social Worker
Immigrant from Guatemala
“It was not an easy journey for me. I had many doubts, being a Latina, being the daughter of an immigrant. I didn’t have role models. It’s not common to see women, especially Latinas and especially when they’re first-generation immigrants, go to college, and even less common for a woman of my background to enter a STEM field. And so I had many doubts about my ability to succeed. But what always kept me going was that desire to go back and care for my community. At the end that desire overpowered all of the doubts that I had.”
Eva Gálvez
Family Physician
First-generation immigrant from Mexico
The full series of portraits and stories can be viewed at the Migration is Beautiful exhibit in the Adelante Mujeres building (2030 Main Street, Forest Grove, Oregon).
About the exhibit: Thanks to funding from Metro and the Oregon Cultural Trust, and created and hosted by Adelante Mujeres, Migration is Beautiful // La Migracion es Bella features history, Latina stories, and Latina-created art, which celebrates the achievements and diversity of Latina immigrant women in our community.