Important places in the Latino community
August 18, 2008
While many Americans enjoy Cinco de Mayo, few understand its historical significance of the day in Mexican History. Watch Arturo Rangel, Tere Tibbetts, and Alejandra Quirarte de Orozco talk about the holiday and its celebration at Heavenly Ski Resort.
Watch Pastor César Minera of the Word of Life Ministries speak about his congregation and time in Tahoe as an evangelical leader.
Latino Night at Tahoe Underground on Wednesdays provides young Latino adults with a time and place to gather, socialize, and dance. The video below includes live Mexican music, dancing, and Raymundo Rosas talking about the importance of Latino Night at Tahoe Underground.
The video below includes a short series of images from South Lake’s Navarro’s Bakery (Panaderia). Jamie’s parents, Francisco and Adele moved to South Lake in 1977. Jaime opened the Bakery so his father could bake bread as he did before immigrating to Tahoe.
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Related posts: [ Explore South Lake’s Latino community ] [ Our Community ] [ Our Workers ] [ The Immigration Experience ] [ BMP community conversation to begin soon ]
The Immigration Experience
August 18, 2008
Watch community members Jorge Orazco, Jorge Montoya, and Alejandra Quirarte de Orozco talk about the experience of immigrating to Tahoe, the process of becoming a citizen, and the idea of “being a Latino.”
This video describes a history of the Latino community in South Lake Tahoe:
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Related posts: [ Our Workers ] [ Important places in the Latino community ] [ Our Community ] [ Explore South Lake’s Latino community ] [ Telling their own stories ]
Our Workers
August 18, 2008
Approximately one-third of South Lake Tahoe’s year round residents are Latino. Many of these residents work as janitors and maids in Tahoe’s hospitality-based economy. Latino construction workers also play an important role in rebuilding the homes destroyed by last year’s Angora fire.
In this video, Latino foremen José Castillo and Jesus “Chuy” Caro talk about Latinos working construction in South Lake.
Watch Francisco Mariscal and the Salas Family talk about cleaning houses and cabins at Camp Richardson in South Lake Tahoe.
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Related posts: [ Explore South Lake’s Latino community ] [ Important places in the Latino community ] [ Our Community ] [ The Immigration Experience ] [ South Lake neighborhood lives on, even without houses ]
Our Community
August 18, 2008
Watch members of South Lake’s Latino Community speak about their hopes, what they would like non-community members to know, and the issues facing this fledgling community.
In this first video residents describe the opportunities they see in the South Lake Tahoe community:
Latinos in the second video describe what they want others in the South Lake Tahoe community to understand about them.
In this third video, Latinos describe the challenges their community faces in South Lake Tahoe.
The final segment of this section is a 360º “virtual reality” panorama of Bijou Elementary School. Bijou is an important place for the South Lake’s Latino Community. The school’s gymnasium serves as the monthly meeting place for the Latino Affairs Commission, which reports important Latino issues to the City Council. Bijou’s location also provides the grounds for the community’s Family Resource Center, which provides basic needs services to many Latinos living in South Lake. Finally, this last year, Bijou became one of California’s “Two-Way Immersion” schools in which K-6th grade children learn to read, write, and think in both Spanish and English.
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Related posts: [ Explore South Lake’s Latino community ] [ Our Workers ] [ Important places in the Latino community ] [ The Immigration Experience ] [ Fire fund extends deadlines for Angora victims ]
Explore South Lake’s Latino community
August 18, 2008
Over the past few months, I have conducted an experiment in journalism to see if using a process called civic mapping, combined with using multimedia tools (audio, photographs, edited video, and networking software) would enable me to cover South Lake Tahoe’s Latino community in a new way.
My goal was to find a rich and authentic way to report that invited the community’s participation in the storytelling. The 12 videos in this package include interviews with residents and highlights of significant places in the Latino community. Read more
Related posts: [ Our Community ] [ The Immigration Experience ] [ Important places in the Latino community ] [ Our Workers ] [ I Get Why I Don’t Get It ]
I Get Why I Don’t Get It
May 18, 2008
Covering the Washoe people poses an interesting difficulty for the community-based reporting encouraged by this master’s program.
Some of my work for this program has been to investigate the different forms of spirituality at Tahoe using video and audio to create multimedia presentations. Since the Washoe are the original inhabitants of this area, I was hoping to use multimedia to capture the essence of their spiritual connection to the land.
After a bit of work, I set up a meeting with a group of Washoe willing to talk to me about their spirituality. However, I was under the mistaken impression that I’d be able to videotape our conversation.
As the meeting started, members of the group expressed their misgivings about being videotaped. Sensing that only a written piece would be possible, I decided that the story would be to understand why I Washoe wouldn’t want multimedia coverage of their particular spiritual connection to the land.
Here’s the thrust behind the Washoe’s objection. To be videotaped and put online as a bit of information to be consumed by a non-tribe members is alien to what is needed to understand the significance of the land for a Washoe. For the Washoe, their land is everything and its significance can’t be summed up in a sound bite.
According to Washoe Tribe member Steven James, their language, and their culture are intimately connected with the land. This connection carries with it a way of viewing the world only attained by having grown up practicing the customs that define the Washoe way of life.
Here’s an example. Washoe Tribe member Lynda Shoshone told me of a public meeting in which the Forest Service, rock climbers, and members of the Washoe tribe gathered to discuss the prohibition of climbing Cave Rock. One climber stated how for 15 years she’d been climbing Cave Rock and that this was her spiritual connection to Tahoe. Shoshone said she replied, “Try 15,000 years. That’s how long we’ve been here and connected to the land.”
Another obstacle in understanding the Washoe’s connection to the land is because non-natives do not understand themselves to be a part of the land. Non-natives think the land is something that we can own, control, and sell.
One the other hand, in a way that at best we can only dimly grasp, the Washoe have a reciprocal and respectful relation with the land. The land–including the lake, the animals and plants, and the streams–is the source of all that is needed to live. The land provides the Washoe with food and clothing. In this sense, the land makes life possible for the Washoe. The Washoe, in turn, believe that they should take care of the land.
A third obstacle in understanding the Washoe’s connection to the land is that place makes all the difference for being an authentic person. It is the long history that the Washoe have with land in Tahoe that defines who they are as a tribe and as individuals.
For example, I can move from Reno to another place and remain the individual I am. My job may change. My friends may change. My house may change. However, I’m still thinking of myself as the same person.
For the Washoe, this is impossible. One’s identity is entirely rooted in the land around Tahoe. To leave the area is to deny the experiences and traditions that define one’s selfhood.
One last obstacle that we might make is to think of the Washoe tribe as an item of the past. Shoshone pointed to an information-laden poster on her wall that read, “Who were the Washoe?” She then said, “That’s wrong. It should read, ‘Who are the Washoe?’”
We, the community-based reporters in this area, need to remember that the habits and traditions of past Washoe still hold significance for the Washoe people in the present. The continuation of these habits and traditions up until today also help make sense of the resolution behind Shoshone’s statement: “We aren’t going anywhere.”
However, practically speaking, neither will any of the other communities living around Tahoe.
So, if the Washoe aren’t going anywhere, and the Tahoe public isn’t going anywhere, how can we cover the Washoe community? How can we hope to make journalism a positive force in this community, just as we’ve been hoping to help others who live around Tahoe?
The important point for the kind of community-based reporting endorsed by this program is that we can’t hope to represent the Washoe in a single series, with a single piece. Moreover, the complexity, tradition, and sacred nature of Washoe spiritual practice can’t be captured and put online for immediate comprehension and understanding by the larger Tahoe public. It’s not information or news to be consumed. Rather, it’s a way of life only experienced if one has been brought up in it.
When leaving the meeting, Washoe Tribe member Beverley Caldera said, “Respect us and our ways. Don’t lead, but walk alongside us.”
I take this to be a great metaphor that bears similarity with an idea important for this program: journalism is a conversation. In conversation, neither party speaking has priority of importance. Moreover, conversations take place over time and often involve miscommunication.
In short, would you say of someone whose motivations, about which you were unsure, could sum up your life and the significance of your home in a minute long multimedia presentation?
Using my own intuitive response to this question, I get why the Washoe objected to the approach behind my story. In other words, I get why I don’t get the Washoe way of life.
However, I do understand that this is also an offer to get to know the Washoe–an opportunity that I hope next year’s cohort will explore.
Tags: WashoeRelated posts: [ St. John’s in the Wilderness ] [ Tales from Tahoe ] [ Explore South Lake’s Latino community ] [ First meeting of BMPTalks highlights policy challenges ] [ What happened? ]
St. John’s in the Wilderness
May 16, 2008
St. John’s in the Wilderness Episcopal Church is located on the scenic shores of Glenbrook in South Lake Tahoe.
Click on the photo to hear church members Barbara Olsen, Dennis Cocking, Carolyn Goodenough, and Bonnie Woizeski speak about the spiritual significance of the church’s location.
Related posts: [ “Love thy neighbor” takes on a new meaning for local church ] [ Together in prayer, Junto en la oración ] [ I Get Why I Don’t Get It ] [ Our Community ] [ Important places in the Latino community ]
Cinco de Mayo Celebration in South Lake Tahoe
April 29, 2008
Here’s a link to my blog with information about this week’s Cinco de Mayo celebration at Heavenly. I hope to see you there.
Related posts: [ Important places in the Latino community ] [ Explore South Lake’s Latino community ] [ What would you do if you were TRPA? ] [ Is there missing information? ] [ Most connected groups ]
Has agency conflict made the fire threat worse?
March 25, 2008
A number of local papers ran a story by the Associated Press Monday that argues bureaucratic infighting among land management agencies has seriously damaged efforts to prevent catastrophic fire in the Lake Tahoe basin (See: Records show infighting hurt Tahoe fire prevention in the Tahoe Bonanza).
Based on your own experiences and observations, do you think this is the case? Do you see evidence that the infighting is still going on, or do you think recent steps by the TRPA and others are improving the situation? What suggestions do you have for reducing the threat of major fire in the basin? Read more
Related posts: [ Hello Friends. ] [ Together in prayer, Junto en la oración ] [ The life of a fire ] [ Community newspaper struggles to reach Hispanics ] [ Hispanics attend landscaping class ]
Keeping Tahoe Green
March 16, 2008
Ten years in prison and a fine of up to $750,000—would you pay that price for a better view of Lake Tahoe from your house? Perhaps not, but many seriously consider it, and some actually do pay such a price. Patricia Vincent, a 58-year-old resident of Incline Village, is facing these steep fines after recently cutting down three trees on federal property—trees that were obstructing her view of the lake from her house.
But why are the consequences so drastic? Why would anyone choose to accept them? The answers to these questions might be as numerous as the trees around Lake Tahoe. Read more
Related posts: [ South Lake neighborhood lives on, even without houses ] [ Defensible space advocate helps her community ] [ Incline Lake: Public may soon own “Duke of Nevada’s” summer retreat ] [ BMP compliance is low in Tahoe Basin ] [ Are slash mats worth the cost? ]
Latest Headlines
- Hearing planned in Incline tree-felling case - The federal trial for an Incline Village woman charged with hiring a tree-cutting company to chop three Ponderosa Pines from her Lake Tahoe property has been canceled and a change-of-plea hearing scheduled May 1.
- Truckee man takes torch to North Pole - A Truckee man who reached the North Pole this week carrying an unlit torch for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games plans to discuss his experience and environmental issues Saturday by audio and video transmissions with participants at a Lake Tahoe festival.
- Quake pattern watched closely - As earthquakes continue to shake Reno, two reports released this month give new insight into the likely characteristics of a temblor at Lake Tahoe.
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