Latest / Locatora Radio [A Radiophonic Novela] / Capítulo 096: Selenidad: In Conversation with Deborah Paredez

Transcript

Capítulo 096: Selenidad: In Conversation with Deborah Paredez · Locatora Radio [A Radiophonic Novela]

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Don't feel like sitting in a waiting room right now.
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Planned parenthoods got you covered as a leader in using
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: new technologies to provide high quality healthcare in ways that
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: fit your life. Through Planned parenthoods Virtual appointments, you can
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: get high quality, affordable care your way by phone or video.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Trusted providers will listen, give information, and support you in
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: all of your healthcare decisions. Planned parenthoods telehealth appointments are
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: high quality, affordable, and private, just like in person visits,
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: whether you need help with birth control, a prescription refill,
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: or other sexual or reproductive care services, skip the waiting
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: room and get the care you need when you need it.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Planet Parenthood takes the stress out of healthcare and as
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: ready when you are. Check out planned parenthood dot com
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: slash Local Dora to learn more and book a virtual
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: appointment that's Planned parenthood dot org slash look at Dora.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Radio Radio Radio Commies a myth and Bullshit. A radiophonic
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: novella Look a Radio hosted by malamno Alla La Locam
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: is welcome to Season four of Local Radio rosas Wanted
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: for Crimes against the Patriarchy. Look at a Radio as
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: a radiophonic novella, which is just a very extra way
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: of saying a podcast. We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: to bring you Quarantine Confidential, a special pandemic broadcast about
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: our experiences with quarantine and COVID nineteen. I'm Fosa and
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: I'm Mala. Last Time I Look at a Radio, we
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: spoke about unpacking the Latino Tote. Tune into that episode
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: on Apple, podcast, Spotify, SoundCloud, and audio Boom to hear
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: us talk about Latino voters and presidential election. Alright, and
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: just a quick update and reminder, we are hosting free
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: webinars with the l A Public Library, and we have
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: our upcoming final webinar with the l A Public Library
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: on December fifteen at four pm and we will be
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: discussing podcasting as social justice. If you haven't been able
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: to catch any of the previous webinars, they will be
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: on the library's YouTube page and Facebook page for a
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: couple of weeks, so check those out in case you
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: did miss them. And today, the bulk of the garnet
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: of this episode is going to be all about Selena
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: Kingthania and our specific reactions to the new Netflix show
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: The new Netflix series, Selena the Series, and we're just
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: going to jump right into it because there's so much
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: to say. There's a lot to talk about, and I
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: don't even know where to begin at this point because
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: they're already been talking about it. Now, there's a lot
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: to talk about. We've been discussing it. The articles have
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: been published, the reviews are out, um, the online conversations
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: have been happening even prior to the series of being released,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: and so it's been interesting to see all of the
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: individual conversations form either on you know, Latin Next media
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: publications and their comment section on your page Mala on Twitter.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: So let's let's start. Let's get to the let's start
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: at the beginning, right, and let's talk about Selena the
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: Netflix series. Our initial thoughts are initial feelings, and then
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: we'll get into the rest. So the show went live
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: on Netflix, started streaming Friday now of last week, Thursday
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: night at midnight, yeah, December four, officially, Yeah, so December four,
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: midnight midnight premiere and I stayed up to watch the
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: as few episodes, and I know a few other people did.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: And people's viewing patterns have been interesting because some folks
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: have taken their time. They've done an episode a day. Um.
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: I watched as many as I could, and the reviews
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: were already coming in before the premiere. The l A.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: Times put out a very harsh review, like in the
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: days leading up to the premiere, Time Magazine put out
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: a review, I want to say, like before the official premiere,
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: so we already feedback was being provided to the public. Yeah.
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: And so you know what after watching the series, after
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: you know, binging in in one night or binging it
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: in two days, what were your initial thoughts in my
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: last to this, you know, what did you think of
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: the series? Yeah? So I mean for context too. I
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: posted a while back in October um some tweets and
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: then an i g TV video reacting to the promo
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: videos first cely into the series, and I was giving
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: my predictions, and my predictions at the time for the
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: promo was that it was going to be very amateur
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: hour and that the whigs were bad and the dancing
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: was bad and the casting of the lead was wrong,
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: which was my basic like prediction, right, So when I
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: started watching it, I would say that the show itself
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: confirmed all of my fears and in fact heightened my
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: fears because it was so self centered around Abraham and
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: a B that I didn't even think that that was possible.
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: It didn't enter my mind that they would do what
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: they did with this series. So I was very shocked,
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: to be honest with you, how about you, what were
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: your initial first reactions to this? So I watched the
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: first episode on a Saturday. And you know, if you've
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: listened to the pot or you've heard me talk about shows,
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: you know that I am a committed binge watcher. I
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: will not stop until I start. But I approached this
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: season very differently. Are the series very differently? Um? I
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: would say that I had some hesitation and I had
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: some low expectations based on everyone's reviews, right, not only yours,
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: but like the publications that you mentioned. And so I
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: immediately thought that in the first episode, Abraham is you
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: can already see his character is somewhat of a bully, right,
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: the way he treats a b the way he has
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: him dumpster dive um to look for lights, you know,
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: the way he or to look for can't pete can
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: cans to make lights, you know, which is a scene
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: that we see in the series. And so my initial
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: thought was that's that's pretty mean light to make your
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: kids do that and now do it with them. Right,
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: situations call for that kind of those kinds of actions,
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: and you know, not to shame that. That's not my issue.
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: My issue was they make it like, all right, you're
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: gonna go do that, and I'm going to wait in
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: the car while you're in the dumpster. So I thought immediately,
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: you know, he's portrayed as a bully. And throughout the
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: series there, at least the part one right before anyone
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: comes from me, at least in Part one, there were
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: no redeeming There was no redemption for Abraham. You know,
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: we see the strict father, we see the patriarchal figure,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: the patriarch right. We see this man making all the decisions,
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: taking all the meetings, leading the band. But I don't
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: see any redeeming qualities of Abraham in the series. No.
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: And in an odd way, even though they centered Abraham,
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: they dehumanized Abraham. They made even Abraham flat while making
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: him the lead and the star of the show, which
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: I feel like is quite a masterful thing to pull
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: up to hi check the storyline, make it about him,
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: but also flattened himself because I think I agree with
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: you completely. The example that you gave of the dumpster
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: diving also reminded me of the scene with the food
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: stamps in the grocery store where he like makes his
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: kids pay with the food stamps and he leaves because
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: he's too embarrassed. And I feel like they wrote these
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: scenes in to make it seem like Abraham was kind
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: of a hard ass, but he comes off as kind
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: of a bully and all honestly, I'm sorry, and Abraham
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: co signed this representation of himself, like this is just
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: what we observed, right. He comes off as a bully
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: but also as a coward. It doesn't make him look good,
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: you know. And it's odd to me that he would
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: be okay with such repeated examples of him being horrible.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: I don't understand that part. And then with the wheeling
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: and the dealing and the trying to cut you know,
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: like record deals and talking to executives and men in
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: suits and they're going to events, I'm like, you guys
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: want us to think of you as like these mad men,
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: like businessmen. But what was interesting to me is I'm
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: sure a level of that happened, but when they're in
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: those meetings on the show, and they're having those conversations,
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: Selena's name really doesn't even come up. Didn't even bring
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: her up as the star and the act and the
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: talent that's going to get signed and that's kind of
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: gonna record the record. It's all vague. It's just give
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: me the record, give me the contract, give me the record,
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: give me the contract. She's not even centered and the
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: alleged making of her career. So it's just all very
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: odd to me. I agree, And I think you know,
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: there are people, there are men in particular that probably
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: see Abraham as the leader, right as like the man,
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: the head of household, the father, the husband that's going
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: to lead them through these different, you know, situations, whether
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: that be you know, gigging in someone's backyard or buying
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: groceries with food stamps and then negotiating these deals. So
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: I feel like they try to, in my my understanding
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: of it, they try to build him up, like look
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: at look at what he's done, right, look at how
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: he's like really brought them full circle. Um, But I
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: I agree with you, it's weird. Whether Selena was involved
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: in these meetings or not, we will never know, right,
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: But I do think that it's weird that she wouldn't
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: be involved in any of the conversations, even behind the scenes.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: Maybe not sitting in the meetings because he was the manager,
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: so I can understand that, but not even consulted, you know,
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: pre meeting, post meeting, you know, just a line. Let
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: me consult with Selena and the band, let me consult
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: with my family, and I'll get back to you. You know,
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: just something. And let me say this. In the days
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: since the show has premiered, and in the days since,
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: publications from Right to the l A Times, to Time
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: Magazine to the Texas Monthly giving their own independent, scathing reviews.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: It's really not just us, and my critique of the
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: series has been viewed almost a hundred thousand times at
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: this point, which I didn't think. I didn't. I had
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: no idea, right, but but a lot of people agree
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: on their own that there's something really wrong with this series,
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: that it's off. It's not like us being dramatic, although
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: this is a dramatic situation, you know, um bad. Dominicana
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: even last year put out her own analysis of the
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: promo materials and the whitewashing of the lead and the
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: lack of dancing. I've seen non Latinas, non latin X people,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: Asian people, black folks who are fans, White folks who
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: are fans, right, um, say that, yeah, this is not right. Like,
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: I just want to put that out there. How widespread
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: this conversation has become. A because she is an icon
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: and a legend and touched, you know, all of these
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: different demographics. But B because the issues are glaring, and
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: I just want to shout out the the Hannahs and
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: the Latinas, some of whom knew Selena back in the
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: day and worked in the Thehano music scene and what
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: have you who and a number of them who have
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: deemed me and who have reached out to say, like,
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: the anchor is justified, the issues are real. The centering
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: of Abraham is wrong, and that to remind us all right,
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: like that Selena was a genius musician in her own right,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: who was heavily involved in the making of the music,
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: and who wasn't just following orders and being told what
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: to do. She created herself in many ways with the
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: love and support of her family. But I want to
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: point out that like in the series, Abraham doesn't come
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: off as loving and supportive in addition to being a
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: hard ass. He just looks like a hard ass. I
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: actually wish that they gave him more humanity. Like it's
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: not even about comparing it to the movie. It's about like, no,
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: there's there's no way that somebody like Selena and the
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: music that came out of her family could have come
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: from a completely oppressive, abusive environment. Like that's not possible.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: So why did they put that on display here? Right?
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: I mean, and that we won't know we won't know,
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: I mean obviously it goes to that saying there's like
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: a room of writers, right, it's collaborative, it's multiple people. Um.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: But just in case anyone wants to push back and
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: say that to us, we know, we know, we know,
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: we know. No needs to state the obvious. Like we
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: are super fans. We've been reading the articles, We've been
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: keeping an eye on the conversations. We know folks like
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: peripherally or directly involved in different ways and different aspects
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: of these projects. And like the things that we're talking
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: about are not just like coming out of thin air. Right,
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: Like we're in l A and we're in the Selena
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: like fandom, and we're in the LATINOX media space more importantly,
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: and like conversations are being had, you know what I mean,
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: Like stories are being shared, and what I just wanted
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: to be known that people close to Selena when she
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: was alive, women close to Selena when she was alive,
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: I feel very much that the show did not do
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: her justice and that it's a crying shape. And I agree, yeah,
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: And you know, I think this is a good example
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: of you know, representation politics really falling flat, um, because
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: there has been a lot of examples. You know, are
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: people calling upon you know, unwavering support. Support the series
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: or they're never gonna make another show about us. Support
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: the series, or it's gonna get canceled, you know, support
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: the series because it's all in all Latin X cast
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: and crew. Right, those things are real, you know, those
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: things do happen, right, But there's a there's a big but, um,
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: you know, that's not enough, like to say, I see
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: myself on screen, so that's enough. We we want more
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: than that, right, um. And I think it's really important
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: that we recognize that a woman that was murdered literally
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: does not have a voice. She does not have a
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: voice because she was taken. She was murdered, and so
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: to create a series where her voice is so secondary,
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: it is horrible. It's a travesty, it's disappointing, it's a betrayal.
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: And I also want to give exam bowls because this
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: isn't the first series that's been made about an icon.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: We have the that was from Celia's perspective, we have
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: um the Huangabil series, we have the Luise Mighel series. Right,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: these are Latin X icons, and all three of those
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: examples are in first person there in the icon's perspective.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: And so I think this was a missed opportunity. And
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: we will be talking about the Ka Machine in the
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: second half of this episode with our guests, and so
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: I just want to plant that seed right now. Oh yeah,
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: And because there's layers on layers and on layers to
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: this conversation, and we will probably not get to everything
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: because there's so much. And I want to remind folks
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: that we are not the only people talking about this.
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: We are not the only voices. We don't consider ourselves
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: Selena scholars, We just are Selena fans. We have interviewed
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: plenty of other Latin X creatives and filmmakers, and actors
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: and actresses of all walks of life who have engaged
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: in all sorts of projects. This is honestly like the
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: one time Look is coming out and giving like a
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: negative review of a Latino X media projects. I just
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: want to put that out there, so let's be like,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: come on, if we don't like something, we cannot like something.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: We we also have the right to free speech. I
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: can't even believe that we have to like have this conversation,
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: but we do, and mainly because of the feedback that
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: we've been getting in that I've been I've been getting
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: from like men from latinos literally telling me to stop
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: talking about such and such a thing, or to not
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: center myself or I must just be jealous that I
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: wasn't cast And I'm like, bra like a woman can
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: have an opinion about a performance and about a casting
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: choice without it coming from a place of jealousy. I
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: was gonna say, what does that say about their idea
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: of women being jealous? Right, that there's an inherent jealousy
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: because it's not you, not because you're a person with
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: your own thoughts and opinions and values, but because you're
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: a woman. So you're inherently jealous exactly, and like one
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: of the reasons to why the whitewashing in the casting
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: choice and in the dancing, in the movement, in the storyline,
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: in the family dynamics, and the there's a very thorough
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: sort of whitewashing that I see in slein of the series.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: And I feel because we are so to say, as
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: a lot of people have pointed out, which is true
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: and factual, because we talk about it all the time,
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: you and I are very light skinned Latina's right, like
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: light skin Miss Pisas And if not like for that privilege,
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: shouldn't I shouldn't we be pointing out that the whitewashing
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: is unacceptable and actually we don't want that and we
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: don't like that, Like isn't it our responsibility for like
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: light skin Latinas with the platforms to say that whitewashing
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: is bad and colorism is bad? And no, I don't
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: want someone as light as me or lighter playing Selena Quintania,
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: like I don't. I don't think that that's a good thing.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: I don't want that representation in in the image of
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: somebody that just doesn't accurately reflect her, Like I think
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: that it's important for us to say whitewashing is bad
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: and colorism is bad, and we're gonna say no to
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: it here. Yeah. And you know, for me, I've been
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: thinking about this and I'm like, I've been thinking about
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: how to frame this without its sounding bad, um, And
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: so I haven't wanted to like post about it. I'm like,
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: I need to be able to say this right. And
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: for me as someone as I'm a petite woman, I'm
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: a small woman, um, and so when I see Christian Serratos,
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: there are parts of me that see myself and I
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: say that in a bad way, Like I should not
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: be able to see my body type on screen on
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: represent as a representation of Selena, you know. And so
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: I think that's another example. It's like, as someone with
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: you know, within privilege, I should be able to say
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: that's wrong because Selena represented so much for people with
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: different body types, especially in the nineties. And I cannot
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: emphasize that enough. That in the nineties the beauty standard
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: was who Cindy Crawford, Twiggy like so many different models,
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: Great Treggy, so many different models, um, celebrities. You know
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: that we're considered the ideal beauty type. You know, and
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: that's just in US media. Think about Latin media and
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: the white Latinas that are represented on screen, on film, um,
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: in the news, and so it's really important that Selena,
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: any representation of Selena is reflective of who she was physically,
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: phenotypically agreed, completely, agreed, completely, you know. And it's only
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: with like women of color that the continued like dissection
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: of skin tone, own facial features. I mean, the number
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: of photos swapping that I've seen going on online to
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: prove who she was when we know who she was,
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: and it's really not up for debate, Like she was
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: a brown Mexican American second third, maybe even fourth gen
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: focha from South Texas with native ancestry, with indigenous ancestry,
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: and her origin story and her family's entire origin story
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: is about being discriminated against racially as Mexican people who
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: are especially at that time and still not white in
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: South Texas. And you know, it's just like that erasure,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: which is something that I've been talking about UM with
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: regards to Selena the series is part of what's so
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: deeply upsetting and it's almost like, well, there you go, Well,
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: the white washing has been very successful in throw that
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: because now people are literally saying that Selena was white.
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: So you so yes, so that the white washing complete?
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: Got it? Thank you understood? Um? And again like they
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: have made specific choices. They did go lighter, and they
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: did go thinner, and they went with more eurocentric features
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: and without the dancing and without the rhythm and without
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: the physical embodiment of who she was in her culture
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: and the things that made her another. Um. And my
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: question is, if they're willing to compromise on things like
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: the dancing and the body type, you know, and the
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: singing and what have you, why go in that direction,
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: Why go lighter and thinner? Why not go browner? Why
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: not hire a browner skinned actress who's up and coming,
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: a browner skin dancer who's up and coming, who has
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: the body type, who has the dancing chops, because we
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: all know that those girls exist. We know that those
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: girls exist. And this is also about pointing out an
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: uplifting There are brown skinned women in our community who
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: are artists, who are dancers, who are actresses, who are capable,
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: and why are we ignoring them and not giving them opportunities? Yeah? Absolutely,
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: And I think also again this is part one so
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: maybe this will see this in part two. But in
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: part one I did not see Selena um reference any
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: women artists that she was inspired from. We heard a
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: little bit of like you know, Janet Jackson and Paula Abdul.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: Absolutely we did see that, but in terms of like movement,
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: in terms of dancing, we know that she like with
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: her hand movements, she you know, studied dancers like Flamenco dancers.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: There was an influence of Rossio urgal Um in Selena
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: in her vocals and her movements, and so I think
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: it's really important that we see that as well, because
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: while Selena was the first in many ways, there were
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: also women before her that I'm sure she was inspired by,
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: especially when we're talking about Spanish music or Spanish language music.
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: There was a lot of seeing with like a B
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: and Pete and such like brainstorming and writing music. And
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: did Selena say the word rehearse or rehearsal one time?
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: In part one? Was there one rehearsal scene with her
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: really like or her kind of vibing with a B
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: and with the band like to really figure out songs.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: I mean the argument that this is showing the process
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: and the making of would lead us to believe that
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: she wasn't involved in the making of that she was passive.
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: I didn't hear the words rehearsal right. I didn't hear
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: the words like collaborate right like. I didn't see her
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: working in the ways that we know that she did
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: work behind the scenes to bring the music to life.
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: There's that piece of it too. But we did hear
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: them talk a lot about standing there and looking pretty
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: or just singing, look pretty, well, better go get an outfit.
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: I need to go shopping. I need to go get
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: an outfit. They really reduced her to Her contributions to
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: her greatness were dyeing her hair a lot, and her
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: daddy hated that, getting different outfits and her daddy hated
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: that too. Um, and that was about it, and that's
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: what she did. Yeah, I would say that the limited
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: time that we did see Selena in the series was
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: her trying to design an outfit, and so I will
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: give partial credit in that way that it did give
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: us a small window into her process in creating her
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: outfits and the band's outfits. I wish we saw more
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: of that, you know, I wish we maybe we will
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: see it in part two. Right, maybe we will see
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: the Selena boutique become what it was. Um. And so
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: maybe they were planting the window, you know, that little seed. Um.
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: But I wanted more of it, you know, I wanted
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: to see more of it, and I wanted to see
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: her more involved in the music. Yes, and and that's that.
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: And you know, as much as I don't want to
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: compare it to the movie, and I think it's hard
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: not to because it was such a good movie, right,
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: I think what the movie did right was that it
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: involves Selena and all of it, in the rehearsals, in
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: the songwriting, in the making of the clothes, and so
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: we really saw it from her point of view. Um.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: And so again it's hard not to compare the twobe.
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: But when we've already seen one Selena from one angle,
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: it's hard to not see it again and more in
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: depth because it's a mini series. Absolutely, And here's my question.
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: There are so many people who are like, don't compare
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: it to the movie, don't compare it to the movie.
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: Question why not? The King Funny has produced that movie.
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: Abraham King Funny as name is in the opening credits
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: as one of the producers, as an executive producer. The
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: family signed off on the movie too. That's the first
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: introduction they really gave to like a national and international
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: audience to their family. And they were heavily involved there too.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: And don't we always talk about how j Lo was
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: in their house and and j Lo was just up
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: close and personal with the family to really get a
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: feel for who Selena was and how to embody her.
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: I completely reject the idea that we can't compare the
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: series to the movie. These are both que productions. These
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: are both Keene Fenia approved projects about the same exact
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: person about Selena. I mean, and we do, you know
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: Selena Selena or not? We do judge remakes, you know,
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: we do put them against each other. Think of how
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: many times you know, a Star is Born has been made,
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: countless movies, countless cinematic you know, things of cinematic films
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: that have been made and are compared to each other.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: And so yeah, you're right, we can, we can and
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: we should because clearly, um, they were both signed off
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: by the Keenthenias. We know that if you do anything
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: with Selena's likeness, you need some type of approval because
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: friends of ours have received the seas and assist letter.
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: I'm curious to see if Mala gets one. I hope
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: you don't write. We'll frame it, we'll send it to
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: our lawyer. It'll be fine. We'll send it to our lawyer.
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: We'll just we'll file it, you know, for the archives.
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: I'm sure it won't be the person, it won't be
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: the last, but that's fine. So shifting gears a little bit,
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: unless you know, we want to go back to what
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: you were going to say, Um, shifting gears. I wanted you.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: I wanted to give you the opportunity to talk about
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: the reception of your video. You touched on it a
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: little bit, but you've gotten lots of comments. For one,
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: people telling you you should spend more time talking about
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: x Y and z UM, which I thought was really interesting. Um,
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: and you've gotten lots of feedback from both men and women,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: from Bason straight men. Let's talk about that. So I
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: want to say that overwhelmingly, the viral like traction and
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: the support of my MALAA bras I Abraham Selena, the
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: series review has been supportive. Everybody agrees. Basically everybody agrees,
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: and you know, for those of you who maybe haven't
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: tuned in to my Mala's Ballaba segment. It's a little
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: bit different than Look at Thought. We're a little bit
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: more like, you know, um empathetic and even handed and
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: and and researched and a little more like journalistic on
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: the podcast, right, but uh, you know, using bad words
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: to discuss people, places and things, and so it's a
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: little bit more like intense, and it's a little bit
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: more aggressive, and it's a little bit um edgier. And
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: I do use foul language, and I do kind of like,
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: you know, make jokes and things. So what I have
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: My thing is there are so many men who have
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: made millions of dollars being such abuse of pieces of
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: ship for absolutely no reason. I can tell a couple
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: of fucking jokes. Okay, it's fine, So I do my
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: reviews lead to the series. People have overwhelmingly like agreed
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: that the series objectively is bad, that the series objectively
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: centers Abraham and a B, that the He's made her frumpy,
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: that the casting choice was wrong, and that there are
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: a lot of reasons to be upset with the series.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: So for the most part, folks are seeing the same thing.
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: But there are a lot of Latino men in particular,
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: many of them being gay men, who just don't want
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: to hear it, and who have said to me in
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: five and six paragraph long essays and my comments section
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: and on Twitter that I need to stop complaining and
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: just watch it and just appreciate it and be grateful
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: that they put us on screen. Anyways, I was told
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: to put on my skates and take a lap and
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: um to all of those men, I say, Mini Abraham.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: Yet guy at the be quiet. Literally nobody wants to
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: hear from you, and literally nobody cares. Like it's just
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: this is not your conversation, and you are a part
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: of the problem, you know. Like the series centered men,
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: it's for men, it's by men. I'm sorry, honestly, of
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: course men are going to cape for it. Men are
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: gonna love it. Men are going to see the value
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: in it. Then are going to see themselves in it. Um,
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: it doesn't matter because it's not about you. But they
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: made it up. They continue to make it about themselves,
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean. There have been some women
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: who have told me that, like, I'm just I should
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: be talking about world hunger and b M l um
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: and the environment and directing my anger towards those causes
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: instead of tearing down another leftina. And my thing is
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: like film criticism and TV criticism and commenting on an
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: actress's performance is like very valid in part for the course,
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: like everybody does it like we can. We can criticize
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: and actresses work, you know, like it's fine. So that's
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: what we're doing here. And I think that an actress
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: like Christians Sorados, who has been in the industry for
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: some time on The Walking Dead, one of the most
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: popular TV shows ever, Okay, she was in Twilight, Like,
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: she's not an up and coming actress. She's not like
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: a young, bootstrapping, like you know, no name actress who's
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: trying to make it in Hollywood. That is not her narrative.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: It's just not. And I just feel like someone like
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: Christian Serato's probably should have a little bit more self
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: awareness about her strengths and that the people around her
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: should have said no. Somebody needed to say no to this.
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: Someone should have said no, that the role is not right,
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: the casting is off. But that didn't happen here. Nobody
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: said no. And I wonder did they screen test the
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: show in front of anybody. I really want to know
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: if they had audiences preview this. I'm curious because it
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: doesn't seem like it and they've already filmed a second season,
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: so I don't know if it's I don't know if
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: it's going to get better. How could it? Did they
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: give it a chance to get fee back before they
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: filmed it? That's a very very fair point. Um. Yeah.
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: I also want to remind people that you're with one person.
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: You're an individual with one person, independent podcast, and yes,
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: with influence, you absolutely have influence of course, um. But
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: there are you know, publications such as L Times and
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: Time Magazine that have also you know Vice, um, L
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: you know that have also released their reviews. Um. And
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: you know, I want us to interrogate why we're able
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: to tear down a beautiful, smart woman and why we're
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: able to reject you know, what she's saying and call
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: and call it um you know, hating or um tearing
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: Latinos down. You know, I want us to interrogate that
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: as a community, why we're okay doing that? Right? There's
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: that piece. There's that piece. Also, I thought we were
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: canceling Latini about anyways. I thought Latina that was canceled anyways,
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: so well, the people that the people that are critiquing
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: you are not of the counseling Latinidas discourse space right right.
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: I want to say they're probably Hispanic capital Ah they are, yep.
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: And you know what the production reads as a Capital
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: H Hispanic production. Interesting. I'm sorry they gave it. They
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: gave it the novella treatment, but not in a good way.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: Not in a good way, not in a good way. Yeah,
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: I mean, I also want to remind folks that you know,
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: the Celia series was a tele novella. It was on
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: Telemundo and it was really good. It was really good.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: It was really a lot of episodesisode. I watched them all,
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: like a lot of episodes, good episodes. Yeah, yes, I
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: mean we could the actress who played Celia um beautiful actress,
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: really engaging actress, and an actress who can dance and
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: who could move, and who made me who had body,
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: and who made me believe her perform, who made me
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: believe her embodiment. It's so sad that the defenders of
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: the show basically have to admit that the actress doesn't
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: move well enough to play Selena and doesn't really look
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: enough like Selena to play her, but we should still
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: just suspend, you know, our disbelief and just kind of
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: go with it. Anyways, Like that's kind of been the
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: argument that I'm seeing, Like, so what if she doesn't
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: dance as well as her? So what if she's doesn't
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: look like her? You know, if you want an exact
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: representation of Selena, go watch the movie. And it's like,
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: so you admit it, this is a really bad representation
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: of Selena and we should just watch the movie instead. Yeah,
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: you know, I I admit that maybe if the person
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: they cast it could at least dance and even like
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: physically looked like Selena, I would be able to get
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: past it. I think it's really hard, you know, with
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: anyone's face to like be able to replicate. I could
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: get past that. Um, but the dancing was a part
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: of her identity, and so it's you cannot separate it
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: from who she was. Um, neither can you separate her,
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: you know, her body and what she represented and the
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: space she took up both physically and um, you know,
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: emotionally for our community. Yeah, alright, y'all, So we are
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: super excited to have our next guest with us. In conversation,
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: she is a Selena Scholar. Dr Deborah Bades. She is
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: a poet and interdisciplinary performance scholar whose lectures and publications
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: examine Black and Latin X popular culture, poetry of war
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: and fitness, feminist elegy, cultural memory, and the role of
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: divas in American culture. She is the author of the
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: award winning critical study Selenida, Selena Latinos and the Performance
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: of Memory. She has been featured and her work has
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: appeared in The New York Times, l A Review of Books,
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: National Public Radio, Boston Review, Poetry, Feminist Studies, and elsewhere.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: Her research and writing have been supported by the Hedgebrook
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: Center for Women Writers, the American Association of University Women,
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: and the Alfredo de Morale Foundation. She received her PhD
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: in Interdisciplinary Theater and Performance at Northwestern University and her
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: b a in English at Trinity University. She is eight
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: the Hannah. Born and raised in San Antonio, she has
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: lived on both coast and diered a handful of Chicago winters,
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: and taught American poetry in Paris, while remaining rooted in
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: her the Hannah, love of Selena and the spurs. We
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: are super excited to have dr Bars and look at
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: the radio today, we really felt like we voted it
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: to ourselves, to Selena and to our listeners to bring
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: in somebody who has truly dedicated her life to the
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: study the understanding, um and love of Selena, her music,
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: and her legacy. So we wanted to bring in the
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: big guns basically to help us contextualize our feelings about Selena.
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: The series also a very intentional choice to choose that
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: the Hannah, might I add, because while the Selena fandom
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: and love is real, we also understand the importance of
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: Selena to Texans right and that cultural importance and significance.
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: So no, everything that we do is with intention. So
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: without further ado, we're going to head into a quick
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: song break and then we're going to welcome Dr Deborah.
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: But it is vodka of It and ship all right,
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: Look on, what is remember that? Look a Thought now
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: runs ads on our podcast. If ads are not your
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: thing and you would rather have an ad free look
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: at Thought our listening experience, sign up to become a
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: Look at Thought our radio patren on patreon dot com
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: for ad free listening. We are also gonna be implementing
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: regular pil recap events for our patrons, so that means
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: that after Look where we talk about significant happenings in
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: the world, things of interest to our listeners, we're gonna
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: host Patreon only zoom conversations where we get to hear
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: from our listeners. We get to hear from you all
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: about your thoughts, your feelings about the topics that we've bards.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: So we're actually going to be hosting our first look
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: at Patreon capttle recap this Saturday after our the Selena
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: episode drops. So if you want to be a part
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: of that cappy little recap, head to patreon dot com
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: and become a patron today. Also, we would like to
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: invite all of you to donate to our venmo. We
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: are still an independent podcast and everything that you see
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: that everything that we produce comes out of pocket, and
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: so if you'd like to give a little donation, show
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: us a little love, or if you are looking for
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: a finedom drain and aspire to me our human wallet,
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: escort yourself over to our venmo at local dash Radio. Alright, look,
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: aw Motives. We are super excited to be joined by
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: the phenomenal, phenomenal Debra. But it is thank you so much,
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: Debora for joining us today. Thank you so much for
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: having me. It's really a pleasure for me to be
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: here and in conversation with the both of you. We
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: have been looking forward to this interview, Um, even before
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: we booked it with you, we were thinking about how
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: we could invite you onto the show, and this seems
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: like the most fitting moment given UH Selena the series
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: on Netflix, and we want to touch upon Selena the series,
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: but we also just want to talk to you about
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: Selena Kithenia, about your work around Selena, your your book
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: Seleni that and give our listeners a chance to to
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: hear from really a Selena scholar, UH Selena expert to
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: help us put our thoughts and feelings about the show
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: into context. I very much look forward to that. Yeah,
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: And you know, UM, I just want to say that
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: I've been following your work for many years. When I
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: was an undergrad at UC Santa Barbara, I worked at
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: the Multicultural Center and I had found a flyer from
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: when the m c C had booked you to speak there,
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: and I was like, we need to bring her back
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: because I wasn't a student at the time, and so
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: I had been really following your work for many years
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: and was just super um enamored with your work around
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: performance studies and selenid that. So this is truly a
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: treat for me. So thank you again, UM, and so
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: let's just get into the conversation. UM. At this point,
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: you know, it's been almost a week since the Netflix
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: series has launched. Have you seen it yet? Do you
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: plan on seeing it? Thank you for that question, and
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: thank you for the long time support of the work.
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: It's been such a pleasure to work on a project
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: about Selena's fans, um and all of the important work
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: I think they're doing over the many years that I've
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: been watching. So I have not yet watched the Sealina series,
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: only because I have a kid who's at home in
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: zoom school, and so I haven't had that chunk of
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: time entirely too to watch it. But I will say
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: that I have a sense of dread, I guess, or
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: I'm sort of feel like I'm I'm um kind of
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: bracing myself for it. And I think that that's UM.
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: How many I think many of us who have been
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: Selena's Selena fans or who have been following Selena fans
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: for so long often approached kind of officially sanctioned or
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: family approved or industry approved kind of biographies or stories
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: about her, with a sense of you know, precaution, if
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: you know, and sometimes a sense of all after it. Um.
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: I think because fans have known all along, right, that
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: many of us like claim to Selena for all kinds
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: of ways, and that there's often been of real limitations
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: right to how the official stories kind of present her,
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: and so yeah, so, I think part of me is
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: also waiting for not just the physical time that I
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: have to watch it, but for for the for the
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: emotional space to be kind of ready for perhaps some
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: of the same kinds of stories we might have been
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: hearing before that that many fans I know kind of
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: um either are less interested in or in some ways
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: kind of push against. Yeah so, I'm really interested in
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: the sense of dread specifically because I think that many
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: of us felt the same way I know I did,
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: seeing even just the promotional materials and the short clips
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: of things like dancing and dret I think is accurate.
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: And I want to talk about even like the intensity
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: of like the reactions that we're having to these things,
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: and why so I'd love to hear from you about
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: like your experience with that. Sure, you know, I um,
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: I think that it's so interesting In some ways, I find,
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: you know, it to be important that a new generation
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: of you know, not just let the next communities, but
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: you know, more broadly speaking, all kinds of folks will
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: be exposed to Selena if they haven't been. But I
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: it doesn't. It reminds me of how many of us
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: felt when the movie came out, right, the Warner Brothers
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: Greggan now that directed um biopic came out, that there
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: was the sense that so many of us um fee
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: that Selena Um was so much more than just her
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: biography the details of her biography, or was so much
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: more valuable to us than someone who was a good
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: girl who listened to what her family said, right. And
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: I think that, um so that you know, the often
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: the official remembrances kind of focus only on those kinds
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: of things, and so and often I think to the
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: exclusion of the various ways that either young Latina's or
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: queer communities have often you know, sort of been drawn
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: to her. There's often a very explicit, um exclusion of
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: of those kinds of voices in the remembrances of her.
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: And and I think that very thing that very urged
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: to control her image beyond death. Um, is actually part
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: of the reason so many people are drawn to her
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: where it'side right, even even after death, there's still this
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: this drive to control the young, you know, Latina's image
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: or body or you know, or output or whatever, or
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: to exploit it. You know that maybe that perception sometimes.
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: So I think that that, having having been around folks
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: who for so long have been teaching me so much
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: about Selena vandom and my own relationship to it, has
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: has made me approached this the new series in the
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: same way. And you know, um, I again, I haven't
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: seen it yet, but when I do, I imagine that
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: will be some of what I carry with me to it.
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: I think so many of us are drawn to Selena
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: because of that what we perceive, or what I've perceived,
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: as a rebellious energy. Right. She may not have rebelled
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: against her family in in the literal sense of I'm
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: not going to do this, I'm not going to perform,
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: but in the way she actually performed her Latini, that
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: her femininity. UM, I think that is the rebellious energy
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: that we're really attracted to, drawn to twenty five years later, right,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: and so I mean, let's even talk about the timeline.
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: It's been twenty five years. Is there a part of
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: you that is surprised that her legacy has persevered so strongly?
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: We've had, you know, the Mac cosmetics line, now we
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: have a Netflix series. What are your thoughts on that?
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: You know, there is a part of me that was
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: I mean, there was a part of me that was
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: surprised that she became so phenomenally popular to begin with,
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: not because she wasn't tremendously talented and had this larger
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: than life persona, but just simply because, you know, she
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: and as much as she was a kind of Latina star,
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: she was also very explicitly to Hannah, and as we know,
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: within the kind of spectrum of Latina, Johanna's often aren't
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: the coolest, considered the coolest, right, we were often the
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: considered the ones with the best dance moves or whatever.
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: So to me, it was already kind of phenomenal, right,
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: that she possessed so much, right, so much charisma, so
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: much talent um, and and so much of a kind
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: of force of personality that she even you know, she
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: became popular globally across the range of Latin X communities,
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: and so then um even and now I think twenty
• 48:00
  Speaker 1: five years later, you know, I I say, I've been
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: doing more interviews about her in the last few years
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: than I did in all the years before that. And
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: I think there's a couple of reasons. I think one
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: it really speaks to the incredible dearth of representation of
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: Latina's in popular culture. Right. There hasn't been someone who's
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: replaced her, so to speak. And that's not because there
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: aren't phenomenally talented Latina's out there, you know, It's because
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: of the very limited range of representations that were often allowed.
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: Right It's either like the sexy girl or you know,
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: something like that, or the game banger, you know, like
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: girlfriend or whatever. Right that those persist, those kinds of
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: limited representations still persist, and so there isn't there hasn't
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: been space, um that's been kind of allowed for a
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: range of representations. And so I think people keep turning
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: understandably to this one amazing figure who has guided us.
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: I think another reason is that it continued she Her
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: death happened during you know, in the middle of the nineties,
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: when there was a tremendous amount of legislative and pol
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: see kind of forces at work that we're very, very
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: harmful to Latin X communities. And I mean we are
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: now in a moment which is is you know, shocking
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: to me that that is it's worse, you know, if
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: certainly not continued, but absolutely in some ways worse. And
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: so because Selena has always been a kind of source
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: of solace um that let you know, seek out during
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: these horrible times, I'm not surprised that there is a
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: kind of you know, that there remains in interest. And
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: then finally, I would say, you know, there's a new generation,
• 49:30
  Speaker 1: and I feel like, you know, there are certain things
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: that culturally we hand down to our generations right as
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: Latin the next communities, you know, whether you know, whether
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: that is learning a particular dance move right. And I
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: think for so many of us, Selena and either her
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: particular songs or her particular style becomes the things we
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: hand down either at THEA teaches us or a gate
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: a gay THEO teaches us, you know, or or our
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: mom teaches us. And I think those three reasons are
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: in large part why we continue to see her have
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: such a central space place in Latin X culture. And
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: broader American culture. Thank you so much for that. Um
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: really rich like background. I've seen some conversations going around
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: about the question of exploitation and Selena's name and likeness
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: and whether or not the family exploits her or the
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: fans exploit her, or if there's a complicity there with
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: things like the as I mentioned, like the Forever twenty
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: one line in the MAC line and now you know
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: the Netflix series. So I'm interested in that that question,
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: and I'm really interested in your your take on that. Sure,
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: you know, I think that question around exploitation and commodification
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: has been um at the heart of selena commemoration from
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: the very beginning, right when we saw People magazine, Um,
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: you know issued it's double it's sort of two different covers,
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: you know, when she died. Part of the country got
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: Selena on the cover, the southwestern states mostly, and then
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: the rest of the country got the cast of Friends, right,
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: which sort of tells us so much about this country, right.
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: And then what happened was the Sealina issue sold out overnight,
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: and then they issued another one, and then that sold
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: out overnight, and then People Magazine said, oh my goodness,
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: one there's Latinos out there and too they buy stuff. WHOA,
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: what can we do about that? And then they immediately
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: and this is all documented not only my book, but
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: in People Magazine's own pages. They they that became the
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: inspiration for launching UH People in Espanol. Right, So that
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: her her the space of her memorialization has always from
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: the beginning been a space of of marketing, right, and
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: of of commodification of industries, kind of stumbling upon Latinos
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: as a market base, right, constructing us that way, and
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: so you know, and there has been conversations from the
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: beginning as well about how much or to what extent
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: her family continue to capitalize on her, either before and
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: after her death, certainly, and I think that those are
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: all super important questions that we can continue to ask, right,
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: whether it's Matt Cosmetics, whether it's you know, um buying
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: a T sile you know, T shirt at Target or
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: whatever that that is, all those things are there, and
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: I think it's really important. And simultaneously, I also have
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: been much more interested in what fans are doing with
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: that mac lipstick, right, what is possible for them? Right?
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: Or what are fans doing with the boostier that they
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: kind of individually put the little you know, sparkly studs on. Right, that,
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: certainly we could. I think it's important to talk about
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: the commodification and the exploitation. But I also think that
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: the more interesting and um nuanced and complicated work and
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: transformative work is happening among those fans who, even as
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: they may be do you know what I'm not even doing,
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: even as they may be encouraged to buy the lipstick, right,
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: it doesn't mean they're kind of blindly non critical forces
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: out in the world, right, but that they are finding
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: that they can be something, or do something, or achieve
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: something that they might not otherwise by remembering or coming Selena. Yeah,
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm definitely in the demographic that has like
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: the Mac Cosmetic slipsticks. Right. Um it was it literally
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: launched on my birthday, so multiple people gifted it to me,
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: and um, to me, it felt like a time capsule,
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: like Selena is no longer here, but look at the movement, right,
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: look at how she's impacted generations. Right. I was three
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: when she passed away, Right, But I have known her
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: my whole life. I have family and the has I
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: have family in San Antonio, and so for me It's
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: like the phenomenon of Selena and her impact and legacy
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: has always been present in my life, and I think
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: for many Latina's. Um, I'm curious for you because we're
• 53:46
  Speaker 1: both you know, l A born and raised for La based. Um,
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: I'm curious for you as a the Hannah, your own.
• 53:53
  Speaker 1: I want to hear your own connection to Selena and
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: how I don't know if, if, if, how it free hides,
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: because I don't think that's as important, But I just
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: want to hear your connection to Selena as a Tahannah
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: and maybe how it's a little different from ours as
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: you know Latinas in l A. Sure, that's a great question,
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: because I think studying Selena and her fans teach us
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: a lot about like Latinidad more broadly, right, you know,
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: and how so many of us come together under the umbrella.
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: But it also teaches us so much about the regional
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: distinctions within that right or nationalist ones or whatever. And
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: I think that you know, I, you know, I Selena
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: and I were the same age. We were only maybe
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: six or eight months apart in age, and like her,
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: my family had been in Texas for many generations, so um,
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: she and I had a kind of very similar as
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: many Tahanas of our generation did very similar relationships towards
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: the learning of Spanish, right, you know, our Spanish wasn't
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: ever really quite good enough, and we were sort of
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: always negotiating those ideas around authenticity in regards to our
• 54:52
  Speaker 1: language acquisition. And so generationally, you know, like Selena, I
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: grew up listening to my dad playing Tohano music and
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: to you know, trying to learn Janet Jackson's moves, right, Like,
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: all of those things really resonated with me generationally, and
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: so I think, what so for me, you know, listening
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: to her sound, it was very um there was something
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: I so connected with because it was a combination of
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: all those forces, right, and in that way, very Tehano,
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: very American, right, very Latin, you know. And the thing
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: that was exciting for me was the way she was
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: bringing in influences into Tehano music, which had been the
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: music of our parents. Right. We were not trying to
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: kind of get into that, you know, because it seemed
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: really masculinist. It seemed like it had kind of strict
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: kind of musical kind of like um uh strictures, and
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: she was bringing in kind of you know, you know,
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: she and her brother, you know, bringing in kind of
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: Soca sounds or kind of Caribbean rhythms into and kind
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: of really making it something that I think um appealed
• 55:54
  Speaker 1: to so many folks like me. And then also, you know,
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: she was this young woman trying to like being large
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: of her own image, right, you know, in designing her
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: own costumes, she was really trying to kind of be entrepreneurial, right,
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: which means which of course I read and many young
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: Latinas at the time read, is like securing financial independence,
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: which was extremely important to those of us who felt
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: like our sexuality, or our economic independence, or even our
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: just mobility in other ways was constantly being policed, not
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: just by our families or patriarchal cultures, but but by
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: the community, by the you know, country more largely. And
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: so I think I I experienced her and then obviously
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: her death. I was living in Chicago when she died,
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: and it was devastating, you know, I was with it
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: was It was a moment where I was also really
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: coming to know and becoming very good friends with other Latinas,
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: right from you know, Puerto Ricans and uh and all
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: and all kinds and so it was also amazing to
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: me that just as much as I was grieving her
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: as someone who was, you know, almost like a shadow
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: self to me in terms of the kinds of generational
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: and regional context connections we had, that my you know,
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: my friends were feeling the same way. And I thought, Wow,
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: even though there's very much kind of a cultural and
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: regional specificity here, there's something else too that she connects
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: with four people beyond that. And so for me, that's
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: kind of how how I experienced it. And and also,
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: I will say, because she was working in a genre
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: that belonged like to our parents, right and but bringing
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: to it our own sensibilities, she became a kind of
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: common language right across generations that we didn't always have,
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: which was I think really important and a new thank
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: you so much that was so um yes, I agree, yes,
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: and which really makes me think about all of the
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: hullabaloo around casting Selina. Now the two times that it
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: has happened on like a large scale, so j Lo
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: as Selena, there was a lot of conversation around j
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: Los casting a Selena, and now with the casting of
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: Christians Serratos as Selena and Selena, the series there's a
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: ton of conversation about casting Selena. So my question for
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: you dr about it, this is what are the expectations
• 58:18
  Speaker 1: for casting Selena and what would it take to get
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: it right? That is such a great question, right, Casting
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: has always been so loaded because one I think it's
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: it's it becomes a very fraighted question, partly related to
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: what I said earlier about the fact that there's such
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: limited representation at all. So so every time there is
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: an opportunity for casting a brown woman, all of the
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: all of the expectations, and the longings and and the
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: demands get get heightened, right and intensified because there's still
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: a few opportunities, which speaks to a larger systemic industry problem. Right. Um.
• 58:52
  Speaker 1: And so then the second thing I would say is
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: that the you know, casting Selena, because Selena dignified a
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: certain in certain ways that affirmed often denigrated parts of
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: our culture. Right. Her style was often seemed to be
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: pretty working class, right, or some called it tacky, right,
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: But to us it was just like, oh, this is
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: the style, you know, this is our style. Uh. She
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: was not she was brown. She was underdively brown, right,
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: you know, she was not like a fair skinned Latina.
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: She wasn't after Latina, but she was unmistakably brown, right.
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: She hadn't lightened her hair right when she dyed her hair,
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: she just kept dyeing it black, right, So all of
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: the you know, and her body was not skinny, right,
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: She was not a kind of Latina. Right. She was curvacious,
• 59:38
  Speaker 1: and particularly curvacious, you know in her rear, as many
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: people have talked about. And so all of these things
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: because these particular phenotypic um and kind of stylistic signs
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: affirmed for us that which is often was often denigrated
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: when casting came about. And she was Tana, you know,
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: Mexican American, and often that doesn't t hananist doesn't off
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: and get represented, right, So suddenly all of those things
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: become the place that we want, like to be had
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: represented in the person who has cast. You know, I
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: personally think that the person who plays a character, you know,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: the whole point of acting is to kind of perform
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: someone that's other than you. I don't feel very invested
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: that that person has to be you know, Mexican or
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: Tehana or you know, X Y or Z like certain
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: kinds of things. But I do think that it becomes
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: important because of the limited representation and because of the
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: things that she represented, for those things to be highlighted
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: right or to be affirmed in the representation. So I
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: do think that as a result, all of these kinds
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: of things come up with the casting, and I think
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: going back to the film and then we can speak
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: to the series. You know, for me, what was so
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 1: amazing and as I write about in the book, you know,
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: there were they did these open casting call auditions supposedly, right,
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: and what was so interesting in talking to the young
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: women and girls who auditioned, was theyre so savvy? Right?
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: They were? Many of them said, we know this is
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: a duplicity stunt. We're here for other reasons. Yeah, some
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: of us want to be stars, absolutely, But performing Selena
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: or being Selena or dancing like Selena means like I
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: get to be my you know, my my most talented self.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: Or it means I get to do this like sneaky
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: trip with my mom that my dad doesn't know about,
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: so we can like bond right, Or it can mean
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: like I saved up my babysitting money and I came
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: out here with my friends and we like took the
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: train from like the way outer suburbs and you know, uh,
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: and and we're just here because we love Selena and
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: we want to bond around loving Selena. Right, So they
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: were very savvy about like, these people don't really want
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: to employ us, you know, or or celebrate us, and
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: yet they can't out a space for that. And I
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: think that's what I mean by so for Selena fans
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: for so long have approached those official commemoration spaces like
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: to kind of do with it what they will instead
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: of having it determine how they remember her. And I
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: think I've heard and again since I haven't seen the series,
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: but I have her, um that uh, you know that
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: certainly the body type often becomes a space, at least
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: in the new series of like perhaps this is an
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: actress that's perhaps been in Hollywood long enough to have
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: like a skinniness, right that Selena didn't have, or things
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: like that that I think, you know, are are important
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: to to address. Yeah, I agree. I think that there
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: are valid concerns about the casting of the current Netflix series, um,
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: and I think that they should be taken seriously. You know,
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: I think there's kind of because we you know, we've
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: been we're very much on social media or very much online.
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: Mala has you know, released her own scathing review of
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: the series, and I haven't really publicly stayed in my opinion.
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: But what I continue to see is people almost interpret
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: some any type of criticism as like us relishing or
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: being happy that the series isn't good, or that we're
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: tearing down another Latina. It's and I I part of
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: me feels bad for Christian Seratos that she is, you know,
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: facing all this criticism, but I'm also really are more
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: upset at the casting. You know, she shouldn't have been
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: given this this role. They really to me, you know,
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: as an indie podcaster, there was so much potential to
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: invest in new talent, to invest in a brown Latina
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: to play the role. And I think that that's where
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: we're at right now. Mala and I in that energy absolutely,
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: you know. And this is the thing that I think
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 1: has has also been true from the beginning, is you know,
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: becoming there's this understanding that becoming Selena can make you
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: can provide opportunities for you, Right, Jennifer Lopez became Selena
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: and then she became j Loo Boom, right, like that
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: was a path that she acknowledges that even you know
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: that I think that many folks would acknowledge. And so
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: here was, as you said, this opportunity for a kind
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: of new star making machine, right, because that is it
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: can be right to be calm, to be to literally
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: you know, perform that role can afford certain opportunities, especially
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: for someone again who possesses certain traits that we have
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: historically denigrated, right, And that's part of why we loved her,
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: right And certainly, you know, I think I've said this
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: many times before that Selena she was poised and sort
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: of in the historical timeline of the industry in a
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: moment that kind of was very much sort of uh,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: foreshadowing kind of what would happen with pop diva's right
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: in the years after her, Right, you know, she became
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 1: a kind of prototype in some ways for that, um,
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: but she died before actually a lot of that kind
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 1: of the formula for that kind of got really kind
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: of instituted right by the industry. So for example, you know,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: Beyonce talks about her influence in the kind of how
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: she shaped her own diva personality. But in the years
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: since the nineties, right, we sort of now have a
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: kind of formula for like a pop diva, right, she
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: has to have a fragrance line, and she has to
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: have this kind of fandom, and she has to have
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: like this kind of kind of shame, especially their divas
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: of color, kind of particular shade of you know, foundation,
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: you know, or a particular kind of highlight in the
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: hair that Selena, you know, she died young enough. And
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: also before particular kinds of regulatory regimes, right came a
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: became pretty regularly instituted in the industry. So there's also
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 1: this part of us that's drawn to like the concessions
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 1: she didn't have to make yet, you know, and that
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: that's really important. And so of course we long to
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: see that in the casting or in the representation that
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: is made of her. And so when it's not, it
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: does seem like a betrayal, right, or like a particular
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: kind of of not just a you know, an inaccuracy
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: that seems to hold much weight. Absolutely, And uh, I
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: do want to point out something really interesting I've noticed
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 1: with the online conversations, and of course the internet is
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: a wild place. All kinds of things happened on the internet.
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 1: People say all kinds of things on the internet. But
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: something that I have noticed in giving my critique um
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: of Selena the series, a lot of men, a lot
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: of Latino men, telling me on my post and on
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: my pages, stop criticizing it. Just watch it, just appreciate it.
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: Just be grateful that they put us on screen. And
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: if you criticize it, they're going to think that all
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: Mexicans do is tear each other down and they're never
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: gonna give us anything. Ever. Again, first of all, how
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 1: freaking dramatic number one, like come on, come on, But
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: a lot of men, and um, I find that very interesting,
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 1: and I wonder what that's about, given what a rebel
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: she was, that being the reason we love her, and
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: this dynamic within the community when it comes to critique. Yeah,
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: there's so many things. Um, I think your your observation
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: is so stutid, and there's so many I think approaches
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: to that. You know. The first thing I would say
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: is you know that what remember what the spaces of
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: Selena remembering right or or or critical engagement often often
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: like makes clear right are particular not just particular ways
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: we come together as let you know, the communities, but
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: also the fissures right that like to talk about her
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: or to kind of rigorously you know, critique representation of her,
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: you know, brings out kind of like gendered claims, right
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: or sexist you know, often um kind of policing of
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: you know of in this case, you know, your own
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: wants response to it, right or even you know, even
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: if it was a tirade, the point is that that
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 1: that's that's a valid claim to her right. And to
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: have then been you know, ransclained in that particular way
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: also shows right, this is the very thing that drew
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: us to Selena in the first place, was that particular
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: kind of And whether or not she was an actual rebel,
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: right doesn't really matter. What matters, I think is the
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: way that she her persona right embodied that kind of
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: like unrestrained you know, potential right, that potential to be
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: like I am going to wear this boostier and not apologize,
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: and I am gonna sort of you know, speaks English
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: and not apologize, right, And I am going to try
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: to like maintain gain a certain amount of economic independence
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: even as you know, the family or the industry tries
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: to control me. Right. And so I think that those
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: become those those kinds of things then are very important
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: for us, and what happens is if we are trying
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: to lay claim to them, often those same policing forces
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: come for us, right. I think that that's very much
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: something that gets revealed in this and I think it
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: also very much speaks to the ways that you know, precisely,
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: I think because Selina negotiated the good girl like not
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: so good girl kind of um uh spectrum right in
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: her own, in her own um persona. You know, I
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: think that there's always going to be folks who are
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: invested in wanting to have you know, this kind of
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: saintly or good daughter image, because that's often, you know,
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: what is expected right of Latin the daughters, you know,
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 1: because she'll always be seen as like the daughter who
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: was good, right and because of her youth, because of
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: the relationship with the father, because of the ways the
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: official narratives often portray the story as her fulfilling her
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: father's unfulfilled dreams, right, that the narrative very much reinforces
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: that kind of infantilizing So those kinds of things become
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: very clear, those kinds of claims, right, or those investments
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: become clear in our engagements with with those memorializations. Yes,
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 1: a loss. You know what Mola and I have been
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: you know, in their nos we've been discussing like a
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: young woman doesn't go a lope because she's not you know,
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: constrained at home because she's not you know, uh fulfilled,
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: or or like you know what I mean, like a
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 1: good daughter, you know, or a good girl doesn't go
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: a lope with someone you know, and Mary's about their family,
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: and I think that that's something that needs to be recognized.
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: As much as we do want to put you know,
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: the good girl well not us, but as much as
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: people want to put the good girl label on her, um,
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: those are factual things, you know. And even if and
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: like you said, her persona channel this energy, right and
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: I think there are factual events that happened in her
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: life that you cannot deny. There was some type of
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: you know, rebelia to her. And that's also why you know,
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: we continue to be so fascinated by her, because how
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: many of us get to rebel against our parents or
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: do the do the things that are our parents don't
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: want us to do. Absolutely right, it is about what
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: particular facts are highlighted or not, or how they're how
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: they're presented and I think also even just thinking about
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: the sound of her singing voice, right, how to kind
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: of depth, how to kind of power, how to kind
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 1: of force to it that was not you know, a
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: pretty little refled there was that you know, that tear
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: in her voice that people talk about. Right that also
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: even just in the sound of that, we could find
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 1: a sense of of rebellion or sorrow or or like
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: pushing through the sorrow. Right, So that in both the
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: details of the biography, but even in the ways that
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: we can't quite always you know, have the language for,
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: but we know we can hear it right in the
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: in the voice, or we can see it in in
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: the particular movement in the kumbia right that she does
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: right in And I think that that that's part of
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: what we continue to be drawn to. Right that often
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: again gets doesn't always get accounted for in some of
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 1: these official narratives, but that are undeniable right because of
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: my research, all those series of research bore that out
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: right that again and again, communities lat the next communities
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: across a number of spectrums really were drawn to those
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: ways that she allowed for non normative or historically marginalized
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: communities with even within Latina to find a space to
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: be at home or to find a space of connection
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: as I mean, diva's often do provide that kind of space, right.
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: But um, certainly it's it's undeniable that she was one
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 1: of those who did. Absolutely it's so um watching her
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: perform get yes like old videos or she pulls up
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: these different men and just absolutely abolishes them just with
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: her presence and her sexiness and her body. Like that
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: is not like an altar server, you know, Like you
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: cannot be an altar server and performed and just destroy
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: men and they love it in front of like stadiums,
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 1: Like that's not how that works, you know, absolutely that
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 1: is such a great example, right, And and the way
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 1: I think also that Selena was so you know, for
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: someone especially so young, so unabashedly like in her body
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: and comfortable in that whether or not maybe she was
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: or wasn't is less and less interesting me. But on
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: stage she fully inhabited right her body in a way
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: that was extraordinarily affirming, uh, in a number of ways.
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: And also, like just um was was full of a
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: kind of of sell possession right that so many of
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: us either you know want to either are searching to
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: have ourselves or who who many of us might have,
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: but then found in that a sense of affirmation. It's like, yeah,
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: you you go and you you do that too, you know.
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: And I think that's continues to be what so many,
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: um latin Is in the generations after mine right that
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: I'm seeing now continue to be drawn to, which again
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: speaks to how much I think we continue to be
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: either overlooked or over policed. Right Uh, in many ways
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 1: in the logic culture. It's so true, you know, right
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: right now, as you were speaking, It's true. She she
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: was like literally in using her voice, like in her
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: power and also in her body, which is what we're
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: We're not taught to do that as latinas, especially as
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 1: young girls, were not taught to use our voice, and
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: we're not taught to be comfortable in our bodies. Right
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: Our bodies are always public discourse literally in our families.
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: And so for you to say that, yes, it definitely
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 1: connected to that. Right now. Um, I'm curious. You know,
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: you mentioned you have a daughter, and so how are
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 1: you cultivating are you cultivating that fandom with her or
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: how is that you know, even allowed you to connect
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: to your daughter. That's such a great question. So she
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 1: you know, I don't. I don't think there's ever been
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: a day when she didn't know about Selena, right, And
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 1: there's posters and there's music, you know, all over the
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: house in some way in the department, and and yet
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: I think she also, um, you know, and she what
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: was so interesting to me was she has come home
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: from school several times, you know, and she goes to
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: a school in Manhattan where let's just say there's not
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: a lot of brown folks. And even from that, you know,
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: she had a science teacher once who said, oh, look
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 1: we mama, we we we looked at the Google doodle today.
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 1: Did you know you know Selena' is the Google Doodle.
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: And I was like, look at you learning that at school. Um.
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 1: And so I think that that for for her, I
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: feel like one she you know, she is absolutely I think,
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: you know, all in when it comes to Selena, you know,
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: even as she herself is much more I think she
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: would consider so much more of a tomboy in her
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 1: and her self presentation. But she understands like, oh, that's
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: a voice, like because my daughter is quite musical, unlike me,
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: and so she's like, wow, like this is a young
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: woman who's singing like that, you know, and uh and
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 1: clearly has all the dance moves to go with it,
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: you know. So I think that again, as I've said before,
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: and Selena becomes our inheritance in so many ways as latinos,
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: and so it's it was like an it was never
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 1: a question whether or not I would like pass on
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: that inheritance to her and and to do for her
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 1: to do with as she will, you know. And and
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: I think that's been really a wonderful thing for us
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: to experience together. Beautiful. I think that's a really beautiful
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: note to leave the interview off on. Actually Dr Deborah Bades,
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: author of Selenivad and they, I mean, just all around
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: stellar human being. Um, thank you so much for being
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: on the podcast with us today and we're talking about
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 1: such an important legendary figure as Selena Kintunia. I really
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: truly appreciate it. It is really my pleasure to talk
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 1: to such smart brown women about her. Finally, you know,
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 1: to have this kind of conversation, you know, at this level,
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: it's it's always you know, Selina truly has been such
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: a gift to me because it's always talking about her
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: provides me the opportunity to talk to other amazing Latina's
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: about all the things that are possible for us and
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: all the things that we grieve. Wow. Yes, on that note,
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 1: thank you so much once again for you know, taking
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: the time to have this interview with us. This has
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: been such a delight and such a powerful conversation. I
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: know that our listeners are gonna love it. Thank you,
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: Thank you alright, look, I'm what is? Thank you so
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 1: much for tuning into another copy glow of a Look
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: At Radio. We also want to remind you that you
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 1: can get fifteen percent off of your purchases from Latina
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: owned makeup brand Viva Cosmetics. You can visit Viva Cosmetics
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: dot com and use our affiliate code look at Radio
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: twenty off of your order. And I think it will
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: be a great present for the holidays for your Budma,
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 1: your mom, your sister. Check out Viva Cosmetics. Agreed. We're
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: also going to be dropping more Look at the Radio
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 1: merch or Look Good, Talk Mean masks and I Look
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: Good and I Talk mean Crop teas are poppy hats
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: and we also have some other merch in the work,
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: so keep an eye out for that and visit Look
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: at radio dot com to shop lokipa we will catch
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 1: you next time. Radio Radio Radio Commies, A Myth and Bullshit,
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: A radio phonic novella. Lok Radio hosted by Malamo