La Raza Cósmica
Encyclopedia
Published in 1925, La Raza Cósmica (The Cosmic Race) is an essay written by late Mexican
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

 philosopher, secretary of education, and 1929 presidential candidate, José Vasconcelos
José Vasconcelos
José Vasconcelos Calderón was a Mexican writer, philosopher and politician. He is one of the most influential and controversial personalities in the development of modern Mexico. His philosophy of "indigenismo" affected all aspects of Mexican sociocultural, political, and economic...

 to express the ideology of a future "fifth race" in the Americas
Americas
The Americas, or America , are lands in the Western hemisphere, also known as the New World. In English, the plural form the Americas is often used to refer to the landmasses of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions, while the singular form America is primarily...

; an agglomeration of all the races in the world with no respect to color or number to erect a new civilization: Universópolis. As he explains in his literary work, armies of people would then go forth around the world professing their knowledge. Vasconcelos continues to say that the people of the Iberian
Iberian Peninsula
The Iberian Peninsula , sometimes called Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe and includes the modern-day sovereign states of Spain, Portugal and Andorra, as well as the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar...

 regions of the Americas (that is to say, the parts of the continent colonised by Portugal
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

 and Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

) have the territorial, racial, and spiritual factors necessary to initiate the "universal era of humanity". As a form of futuristic race, the people would have major influences from Mongoloids (native Amerindians), Caucasians
White people
White people is a term which usually refers to human beings characterized, at least in part, by the light pigmentation of their skin...

 (colonizing Europeans), and Negroids (black slaves).

Claiming that the Darwinist
Social Darwinism
Social Darwinism is a term commonly used for theories of society that emerged in England and the United States in the 1870s, seeking to apply the principles of Darwinian evolution to sociology and politics...

 ideologies are "scientific" theories only created to validate, explain, and justify ethnic superiority and to repress others, Vasconcelos attempts to refute these theories and goes on to recognize his words as being an ideological effort to improve the cultural morale of a "depressed race" by offering his optimistic theory of the future development of a cosmic race.

Usage of phrase

The phrase, "La raza cósmica", in English "the cosmic race", embodies the notion that traditional, exclusive concepts of race and nationality can be transcended in the name of humanity's common destiny
Destiny
Destiny or fate refers to a predetermined course of events. It may be conceived as a predetermined future, whether in general or of an individual...

. It originally referred to a movement by Mexican intellectuals during the 1920s who pointed out that Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages  – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...

ns have the blood of all the world's races (White Europeans
White people
White people is a term which usually refers to human beings characterized, at least in part, by the light pigmentation of their skin...

, Asian
Asian people
Asian people or Asiatic people is a term with multiple meanings that refers to people who descend from a portion of Asia's population.- Central Asia :...

-descended Native-Americans
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...

 and Black Africans
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...

), transcending the peoples of the "old world".

Vasconcelos also used the term when he coined the National Autonomous University of Mexico's motto: "Por mi raza hablará el espíritu".

It has come, often in its shortened version "La Raza
La Raza
In the Spanish language the term Raza translates to "race". Its meaning varies amongst various Spanish-speaking peoples. For instance, in Spain, "Raza" may denote specifically Spanish and often of a something or someone of a European Christian heritage. The Francoist film Raza, from 1944, which...

", to refer to the mixed race people
Multiracial
The terms multiracial and mixed-race describe people whose ancestries come from multiple races. Unlike the term biracial, which often is only used to refer to having parents or grandparents of two different races, the term multiracial may encompass biracial people but can also include people with...

 of Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages  – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...

, i.e., primarily mestizo
Mestizo
Mestizo is a term traditionally used in Latin America, Philippines and Spain for people of mixed European and Native American heritage or descent...

s, mulatto
Mulatto
Mulatto denotes a person with one white parent and one black parent, or more broadly, a person of mixed black and white ancestry. Contemporary usage of the term varies greatly, and the broader sense of the term makes its application rather subjective, as not all people of mixed white and black...

s, and zambo
Zambo
Zambo or Cafuzo are racial terms used in the Spanish and Portuguese Empires and occasionally today to identify individuals in the Americas who are of mixed African and Amerindian ancestry...

s or all three combined. Vasconcelos also used the expression, "la raza de bronce
Bronze (color)
At right is displayed the color bronze.Bronze is a medium brown color which resembles the actual alloy bronze.The first recorded use of bronze as a color name in English was in 1753...

" ("the Bronze race
Bronze race
Bronze race is a term used by early 20th century Latin American writers of the indigenista and americanista schools to refer to the mestizo population that arose in America with the arrival of European colonists and their intermingling with the New World's indigenous Native American...

"), in this same sense.

See also

  • Chicano
    Chicano
    The terms "Chicano" and "Chicana" are used in reference to U.S. citizens of Mexican descent. However, those terms have a wide range of meanings in various parts of the world. The term began to be widely used during the Chicano Movement, mainly among Mexican Americans, especially in the movement's...

  • Hispanic
    Hispanic
    Hispanic is a term that originally denoted a relationship to Hispania, which is to say the Iberian Peninsula: Andorra, Gibraltar, Portugal and Spain. During the Modern Era, Hispanic sometimes takes on a more limited meaning, particularly in the United States, where the term means a person of ...

  • Latino
    Latino
    The demonyms Latino and Latina , are defined in English language dictionaries as:* "a person of Latin-American descent."* "A Latin American."* "A person of Hispanic, especially Latin-American, descent, often one living in the United States."...

  • Mexican American
    Mexican American
    Mexican Americans are Americans of Mexican descent. As of July 2009, Mexican Americans make up 10.3% of the United States' population with over 31,689,000 Americans listed as of Mexican ancestry. Mexican Americans comprise 66% of all Hispanics and Latinos in the United States...

  • Mestizo
    Mestizo
    Mestizo is a term traditionally used in Latin America, Philippines and Spain for people of mixed European and Native American heritage or descent...

  • Mulatto
    Mulatto
    Mulatto denotes a person with one white parent and one black parent, or more broadly, a person of mixed black and white ancestry. Contemporary usage of the term varies greatly, and the broader sense of the term makes its application rather subjective, as not all people of mixed white and black...

  • Multiracial
    Multiracial
    The terms multiracial and mixed-race describe people whose ancestries come from multiple races. Unlike the term biracial, which often is only used to refer to having parents or grandparents of two different races, the term multiracial may encompass biracial people but can also include people with...

  • Race in Brazil
  • Race (United States Census)
    Race (United States Census)
    Race and ethnicity in the United States Census, as defined by the Federal Office of Management and Budget and the United States Census Bureau, are self-identification data items in which residents choose the race or races with which they most closely identify, and indicate whether or not they are...

  • Race of the Future

External links

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