Synopsis:
The west side of Phoenix, Arizona is comprised of a very large Mexican American and immigrant population of various generations full of culture and different linguistic styles both in English and Spanish. Sergio Loza grew up in this community and developed an interesting relationship with language starting in Spanish, and eventually forced into English through racist laws in Arizona that soon forced him to no longer feel as comfortable speaking Spanish. This relationship and conflict stuck with him up to college at ASU where he took a Spanish heritage language course that changed the way he understood his use of Spanish and shaped his future. He is now the director of the Spanish Heritage Language program at the University of Oregon.
Producer’s Bio:
Martin Abraham Zepeda is an undergraduate student at the University of Oregon. He is currently pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism at the School of Journalism and Communications with a minor in Latinx Studies and Political Science. Martin’s focus is on written journalism but decided to make his first documentary film as he was extremely passionate about recognizing and displaying the excellence of Latinx individuals in institutions of higher education. His goal was to find an interesting story that other Latinx people could see to recognize that their experiences with Spanish can be common and cherished.
