X marks the spot

Abstract

This essay critically assesses the shift from Latina/o to Latinx to articulate new formations of language, history, and cultural politics. Taking cue from Suzanne Oboler’s foundational 1995 book Ethnic Labels, Latino Lives: Identity and the Politics of (Re)Presentation in the United States, it further asks what’s at stake in adopting new labels and discarding those preceding them, particularly for attending to the lives and histories of individuals incessantly impacted by matters related to gender and sexuality. While recognizing the important representational work the X does, the essay also troubles an easy embrace of it by asking what the X crosses out or eliminates from consideration within contemporary identity politics.

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