Our Migrant Souls
A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of “Latino”
by Héctor Tobar
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Pub Date May 09 2023 | Archive Date Jun 30 2023
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Description
WINNER OF THE KIRKUS PRIZE FOR NONFICTION
Named One of The New York Times’ 100 Notable Books of 2023
One of Time’s 100 Must-Read Books of 2023 | A Top Ten Book of 2023 at Chicago Public Library
A new book by the Pulitzer Prize–winning writer about the twenty-first-century Latino experience and identity.
In Our Migrant Souls, the Pulitzer Prize–winning writer Héctor Tobar delivers a definitive and personal exploration of what it means to be Latino in the United States right now.
“Latino” is the most open-ended and loosely defined of the major race categories in the United States, and also one of the most rapidly growing. Composed as a direct address to the young people who identify or have been classified as “Latino,” Our Migrant Souls is the first account of the historical and social forces that define Latino identity.
Taking on the impacts of colonialism, public policy, immigration, media, and pop culture, Our Migrant Souls decodes the meaning of “Latino” as a racial and ethnic identity in the modern United States, and gives voice to the anger and the hopes of young Latino people who have seen Latinidad transformed into hateful tropes and who have faced insult and division—a story as old as this country itself.
Tobar translates his experience as not only a journalist and novelist but also a mentor, a leader, and an educator. He interweaves his own story, and that of his parents’ migration to the United States from Guatemala, into his account of his journey across the country to uncover something expansive, inspiring, true, and alive about the meaning of “Latino” in the twenty-first century.
A new book by the Pulitzer Prize–winning writer about the twenty-first-century Latino experience and identity.
In Our Migrant Souls, the Pulitzer Prize–winning writer Héctor Tobar delivers a definitive and personal exploration of what it means to be Latino in the United States right now.
“Latino” is the most open-ended and loosely defined of the major race categories in the United States, and also one of the most rapidly growing. Composed as a direct address to the young people who identify or have been classified as “Latino,” Our Migrant Souls is the first account of the historical and social forces that define Latino identity.
Taking on the impacts of colonialism, public policy, immigration, media, and pop culture, Our Migrant Souls decodes the meaning of “Latino” as a racial and ethnic identity in the modern United States, and gives voice to the anger and the hopes of young Latino people who have seen Latinidad transformed into hateful tropes and who have faced insult and division—a story as old as this country itself.
Tobar translates his experience as not only a journalist and novelist but also a mentor, a leader, and an educator. He interweaves his own story, and that of his parents’ migration to the United States from Guatemala, into his account of his journey across the country to uncover something expansive, inspiring, true, and alive about the meaning of “Latino” in the twenty-first century.
Advance Praise
“The master writer puts on his maestro cap to give us memoir, media criticism, meditation, travelogue, history lesson, and so much more, in a style and pacing with all the brilliant nuances and hues that Latinos exemplify.”
—Gustavo Arellano, author of Ask a Mexican
“Our Migrant Souls is an important contribution to the growing body of work offering answers to a seemingly simple question: What is a ‘Latino’? In precise yet lyrical prose, Héctor Tobar leads readers on a tour of the United States of America, where to be Latine often means to go unseen.”
—Myriam Gurba, author of Mean
“Héctor Tobar bursts the bubble of colonizing inhumanity contained in the ‘Latino,’ ‘Latinx,’ and ‘Hispanic’ labels. The migrant son Tobar crisscrosses the country to find stories of the buried and reviled, inspired and inspiring humanidad of the one out of every four people in the United States who bears these labels. Our Migrant Souls points to the inevitable reckoning a country deep in denial must undertake.”
—Roberto Lovato , author of Unforgetting
“Unflinchingly clear-eyed, intelligent, and compassionate, Our Migrant Souls is essential reading for all Americans. Héctor Tobar peers into the fractured kaleidoscope of Latinidad and reveals that an identity is forged by history and by each of our unique stories. Generous in its expansive analysis of how empire and constructed ideas of race trickle through our veins, Our Migrant Souls is also heartfelt, poetic, and intimate. Tobar delivers a brilliant, honest, and necessary book about race when we need it most. It is a salve for the times.”
—Carribean Fragoza, author of Eat the Mouth That Feeds You
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9780374609900 |
| PRICE | $27.00 (USD) |
| PAGES | 256 |
Available on NetGalley
Featured Reviews
Giovanni G, Reviewer
Our Migrant Souls is a beautiful, book-length essay filled with indignation, melancholy, and, most importantly, love. Love for Latinos, love for a mixing of races and cultures, love for breaking free of outdated, restrictive stories.
Unlike his earlier Translation Nation: Defining a New American Identity in the Spanish-Speaking United States, which was essentially a compilation of mini-profiles as Tobar traveled across the United States meeting Latinos, this book masterfully weaves the stories of his students, the people that he meets, and his own family into a moving treatise about what connects Latinos of all sorts and about the future we can create if we fight the oppressive capitalist system that dehumanizes the poor and the brown and Black.
Read it. If, like me, you're Latino, it will fill you with pride. If you're not, it will help you see the people all around you that you're failing to see.
Ann M, Reviewer
One of the best non-fiction books I have read so far this year. This is my first exposure to the author, and this book drew me immediately. There is a photo of him and his mother and he writes using "you" as in talking about his mother's history but expands to talking to his students. He weaves personal narratives from his life, from his students and history. It is grounded in Los Angeles where he grew up and he weaves through Thomas Dixon whose book ended up becoming the film "Birth of A Nation" to living next door to James Earl Ray. He talks about racial constructs as pertains to Latinos/Hispanics and Latinx.. His chapters are simply titled - Empires, Walls, Beginnings, cities, Race, Intimacies, Secrets, Lies, Light, and Home - yet the way he weaves different generational perspectives, personal histories, cultural histories and feelings is incredibly beautiful and moving. One of the particularly moving passages to me was when his young son asked (upon seeing the border wall between Mexico and the U.S. extend into the water -- "can't people just swim around the wall?" - how do you tell a young child what the ramifications for anyone who tried that would be (he equates it to how black parents have to have the "talk" with their children about encounters with the police. And as a professor, having to explain to his young students who are writing about their parents but don't seem to know what they were fleeing when they came to America.
I highly recommend this book.
Thank you to Netgalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for an ARC and I left an honest review.
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