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''Cholo'' () is a loosely defined
Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...
term that has had various meanings. Its origin is a somewhat derogatory term for people of mixed-blood heritage in the Spanish Empire in Latin America and its successor states as part of ''
casta () is a term which means "lineage" in Spanish and Portuguese and has historically been used as a racial and social identifier. In the context of the Spanish Empire in the Americas it also refers to a now-discredited 20th-century theoretical f ...
s'', the informal ranking of society by heritage. ''Cholo'' no longer necessarily refers only to ethnic heritage, and is not always meant negatively. ''Cholo'' can signify anything from its original sense as a person with one
Amerindian The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the European settlers in the 15th century, and the ethnic groups who now identify themselves with those peoples. Many Indigenous peoples of the Am ...
parent and one '' Mestizo'' parent, "gangster" in Mexico, an insult in some South American countries (similar to chulo in Spain), or a "person who dresses in the manner of a certain subculture" in the United States as part of the cholo subculture.


Historical usage

In his work ''Vocabulario en Lengua Castellana y Mexicana'' (1571), Fray Alonso de Molina reports that the word "cholo" or "xolo" derives from Nahuatl and means "paje, moço, criado o esclavo" ("page, waiter, servant o slave"). The term's use to describe a caste is first recorded in a Peruvian book published in 1609 and 1616, the ''
Comentarios Reales de los Incas The ''Comentarios Reales de los Incas'' is a book written by Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, the first published mestizo writer of colonial Andean South America. The ''Comentarios Reales de los Incas'' is considered by most to be the unquestioned ma ...
'' by
Inca Garcilaso de la Vega Inca Garcilaso de la Vega (12 April 1539 – 23 April 1616), born Gómez Suárez de Figueroa and known as El Inca, was a chronicler and writer born in the Viceroyalty of Peru. Sailing to Spain at 21, he was educated informally there, where he l ...
. He writes (in Spanish) "The child of a Black male and an Indian female, or of an Indian male and Black female, they call ''mulato'' and ''mulata''. The children of these they call ''cholos.'' Cholo is a word from the
Windward Islands french: Îles du Vent , image_name = , image_caption = ''Political'' Windward Islands. Clockwise: Dominica, Martinique, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Grenada. , image_alt = , locator_map = , location = Caribbean Sea North ...
; it means ''dog,'' not of the purebred variety, but of very disreputable origin; and the Spaniards use it for insult and vituperation". Interestingly, the Mexican hairless dog is known as "
xoloitzcuintli The Xoloitzcuintle (or Xoloitzquintle, Xoloitzcuintli, or Xolo) is one of several breeds of hairless dog. It is found in standard, intermediate, and miniature sizes. The Xolo also comes in a coated variety, totally covered in fur. Coated and hair ...
" or "xolo" in Nahuatl. In Ecuador, mestizas wearing indigenous attire in Ecuador were termed ''cholas''. "Chola appears to have been a designation largely reserved for women and which, according to Jacques Poloni-Simard, was used to indicate mestiza women who had achieved an incipient degree of hispanization that was beyond the grasp of men, who were more firmly bound to their native communities by tribute obligations." In Imperial Mexico, the terms ''cholo'' and ''
coyote The coyote (''Canis latrans'') is a species of canine native to North America. It is smaller than its close relative, the wolf, and slightly smaller than the closely related eastern wolf and red wolf. It fills much of the same ecological n ...
'' co-existed, indicating mixed Mestizo and
Amerindian The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the European settlers in the 15th century, and the ethnic groups who now identify themselves with those peoples. Many Indigenous peoples of the Am ...
ancestry. Under the ''
casta () is a term which means "lineage" in Spanish and Portuguese and has historically been used as a racial and social identifier. In the context of the Spanish Empire in the Americas it also refers to a now-discredited 20th-century theoretical f ...
'' designations of colonial Mexico, the term rarely appears; however, an eighteenth-century casta painting by Ignacio María Barreda shows the grouping Español, India, with their offspring a Mestizo or ''Cholo'' ''Cholo'' as an English-language term dates at least to 1851 when it was used by
Herman Melville Herman Melville ( born Melvill; August 1, 1819 – September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, short story writer, and poet of the American Renaissance period. Among his best-known works are ''Moby-Dick'' (1851); ''Typee'' (1846), a r ...
in his novel '' Moby-Dick'', referring to a Spanish speaking sailor, possibly derived from the Windward Islands reference mentioned above. Isela Alexsandra Garcia of the University of California at Berkeley writes that the term can be traced to Mexico, where in the early part of the last century it referred to "culturally marginal" mestizos and Native American origin. During the War of the Pacific (1879–1883) Peruvians were contemptuously referred to as "cholos" by Chilean officers. An article in the ''Los Angeles Express'' of April 2, 1907, headlined "Cleaning Up the Filthy Cholo Courts Has Begun in Earnest", uses the terms ''cholos'' and ''Mexicans'' interchangeably. The term ''cholo courts'' was defined in ''The Journal of San Diego History'' as "sometimes little more than instant slums as shanties were strewn almost randomly around city lots in order to create cheap horizontal tenements."


Modern usage


United States

Cholos, cholas and cholitas are used as informal slang terms in parts of the US, to refer to people of Peruvian, Mexican, and many others of descent, who usually are low-income and "tough", and may wear stereotypical clothes. This is usually used to refer to people who are born in different places.


Bolivia

In
Bolivia , image_flag = Bandera de Bolivia (Estado).svg , flag_alt = Horizontal tricolor (red, yellow, and green from top to bottom) with the coat of arms of Bolivia in the center , flag_alt2 = 7 × 7 square p ...
, "cholo" refers to people with various degrees of Amerindian racial ancestry. In Bolivia, the term "cholita" has overcome former prejudice and discrimination, and cholitas are now seen as fashion icons. A "cholo" in Bolivia is a campesino who moved to the city, and though the term was originally derogatory, has become more of a symbol of indigenous power. The word "cholo/a" is considered a common and/or official enough term in Bolivia such that "cholo" has been included as its own ethnic group option in demographic surveys conducted in the country. In these same surveys, the term had on occasion been used interchangeably with the term "mestizo." Nevertheless, some locals still use cholo as a derogatory term.


Ecuador

Cholos pescadores ''Cholos pescadores'' ('Cholo fishermen', ''cholo pescador'') are a social group that live in Ecuador's Guayas and Manabí provinces. They are descended from Hispanicized indigenous coastal peoples, which were wiped out as political entities duri ...
are a group of traditional fishermen along the coasts of Ecuador.


Peru

In Peru, Mestizos with greater Amerindian contributions (Indo-mestizo), are 27.7%: Those that would be in the range of 75% to 60% of Amerindian contributions, characterized by presenting a tonality of tan, brown, and brunette skin with major features of Amerindian ethnic groups. They are mostly descendants of Quechua peoples at around 23.7%; of other ethnic groups originating from the coast in 2%; of the Aymaras by 1.5%; of native ethnic groups of the jungle at 0.5%. Of the total of this sub-group around half are in the mountains, an important part of this segment due to migration are on the coast, preferably in Lima, major urban centers and finally around a quarter (1/4 ) in the jungle, they could also be called Indo-mestizos or the so-called "Peruvian cholo".


Mexico

The cholo gangs started from the U.S. in the mid to late 1920s. Cholo groups in Mexico were well established at least by the mid 1970s along the US-Mexico border, and in Central Mexico. These were called by various names, such as "barrios", "clickas" and "gangas". They were typically seen as American Hispanics and not as Mexicans because of their dress and appearance, which has never been traditional to Mexico. Many of these groups were formed by youths who had spent time in the United States and who returned with a different identity picked up in U.S. street life. These groups mimic the organization of
gangs in the United States Gangs in the United States include several types of groups, including national street gangs, local street gangs, prison gangs, motorcycle clubs, and ethnic and organized crime gangs.. Approximately 1.4 million people were part of gangs as of 2 ...
, especially California, Texas and Chicago. Cholos have their own style of dress and speech. They are known for hand signals, tattoos and graffiti. Groups of cholos control various territories in the city. Most of the violence among these groups is over territory. Well established Latino gangs from the United States (such as
Norteños Norteños (Spanish: meaning ''Northerners''; ''Norteñas'' for females) are the various, affiliated gangs that pay tribute to Nuestra Familia while in California state and federal correctional facilities. Norteños may refer to Northern Cali ...
,
Sureños Sureños (; Spanish: ''Southerners'')‍, Southern United Raza, Sur 13 or Sureños X3 are groups of loosely affiliated gangs that pay tribute to the Mexican Mafia while in U.S. state and federal correctional facilities. Many Sureño gangs have r ...
, Latin Kings,
18th Street Gang 18th Street, also known as , , , or simply in Central America, is a multi-ethnic (largely Central American and Mexican) transnational criminal organization that started as a street gang in Los Angeles. It is one of the largest transnational ...
and
MS-13 Mara Salvatrucha, commonly known as MS-13, is an international criminal gang that originated in Los Angeles, California, in the 1970s and 1980s. Originally, the gang was set up to protect Salvadoran immigrants from other gangs in the Los Ange ...
) have made a strong presence in Mexico through making alliances with local drug cartels based on particular regions or cities.


See also

*
Aymara ethnic group Aymara may refer to: Languages and people * Aymaran languages, the second most widespread Andean language ** Aymara language, the main language within that family ** Central Aymara, the other surviving branch of the Aymara(n) family, which today ...
*
Caboclo A caboclo () is a person of mixed Indigenous Brazilian and European ancestry, or, less commonly, a culturally assimilated or detribalized person of full Amerindian descent. In Brazil, a ''caboclo'' generally refers to this specific type of ' ...
*
Chicano Chicano or Chicana is a chosen identity for many Mexican Americans in the United States. The label ''Chicano'' is sometimes used interchangeably with ''Mexican American'', although the terms have different meanings. While Mexican-American ident ...
* Chulo (disambiguation) *
Coyote (racial category) ''Coyote'' (fem. ''Coyota'') (from the Nahuatl word ''coyotl'', coyote) is a colonial Spanish American racial term for a mixed-race person casta that usually refers to a person born of parents, one of whom a Mestizo (mixed Spanish + Indigenou ...
*
Mixed Race Day In Brazil, "Mixed Race Day" (''Dia do Mestiço'') is observed annually on June 27, three days after the Day of the Caboclo, in celebration of all mixed-race Brazilians, including the caboclos. The date is an official public holiday in three Bra ...
* Naco (slang) *
Pachuco Pachucos are male members of a counterculture associated with zoot suit fashion, jazz and swing music, a distinct dialect known as '' caló'', and self-empowerment in rejecting assimilation into Anglo-American society that emerged in El Pas ...
*
Zambo Zambo ( or ) or Sambu is a racial term historically used in the Spanish Empire to refer to people of mixed Indigenous and African ancestry. Occasionally in the 21st century, the term is used in the Americas to refer to persons who are of mixe ...


References


External links


The Folk Feminist Struggle Behind the Chola Fashion Trend
' an article describing Chola history from
Vice Magazine ''Vice'' (stylized in all caps) is a Canadian-American magazine focused on lifestyle, arts, culture, and news/politics. Founded in 1994 in Montreal as an alternative punk magazine, the founders later launched the youth media company Vice Media ...
{{Hispanic and Latino Americans navbox Ethnic and religious slurs Mexican slang Spanish words and phrases Latin American caste system Multiracial affairs in the Americas Social class subcultures Hispanic and Latino American culture Hispanic and Latino American portrayals in media Anti-indigenous racism in the Americas Motorcycling subculture in the United States Mestizo