Antonio Delgado

Wednesday October 3, 2012

     Today instead of having class we were supposed to go see Antonio Delgado in Perry Theater.  Delgado had a PhD in Urban Planning and Public Policy from the University of Illinois at Chicago.  He focuses his work on immigrants, mainly Hispanics, in the Chicago area.  Chicago has the second largest Mexican population in the U.S.  Delgado wants to inform the public, and other Hispanics about the traditions, culture, and struggles that many face.  When talking with Martha, I found out that many Hispanics are interested in history, but mainly only the history that relates to their lives or the lives of their relatives; they don't really focus on the history of Hispanics in general.  Martha had to go to this because it was so important to her Senior Seminar paper about the churches and immigrants in the Aurora area. 
     Unfortunately, I had to work from 6:15 until close today, so I was unable to go to the presentation.  When doing some research at home about Delgado I found this website that gives some more brief information.  Delgado was from Chicago and became interested in learning at a young age when he would always be reading.  When doing research of his own he found that several stories and things that he learned growing up were not represented in museums and libraries throughout the city.  He felt that his culture was being underrepresented.  He set out to not only learn more about his own culture, but to teach others about it and about how multi cultured many cities throughout the U.S. are, especially Chicago.  Delgado has lived in several different cities throughout the U.S., but he still says that he loves Chicago the best.  This article talks about Delgado and his work in the field.  The author, Cara Jepsen, talks about how Delgado makes an interesting point saying that there have been Hispanics in Chicago since the 1920s, but were not a recognized population.  Delgado has given several lectures throughout the state of Illinois on Early Mexican Chicago.