"Americanos Todos": Redefining U.S. Latino and Latina Identity during the Second World War

Abstract

This thesis analyzes interviews to demonstrate that Latino/a wartime experiences were pluralistic, gendered, and encompassed a range of multiracial encounters. I argue that the war influenced the emergence of new forms of identity by confounding what it meant to be “Latino" and “American”, and catalyzed movements for inclusion that formed a Latino civil rights consciousness.