Although the term is the source of some controversy, Latino poetry has generally come to identify writing by different groups 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."...

 heritage within the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, including 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...

s, Puerto Ricans, and Cuban-Americans.

Latino poetry is best characterized by the works of Lorna Dee Cervantes

Lorna Dee Cervantes

Lorna Dee Cervantes is an award-winning Chicana-Native American poet who is considered one of the major Chicana poets of the past 40 years. She has been described by Alurista, as "probably the best Chicana poet active today." Lorna Dee Cervantes was born in 1954 in California. She grew up in San...

, Giannina Braschi

Giannina Braschi

Giannina Braschi is a Puerto Rican writer. She is credited with writing the first Spanglish novel YO-YO BOING! and the poetry trilogy Empire of Dreams , which chronicles the Latin American immigrant's experiences in the United States...

, Pedro Pietri

Pedro Pietri

Pedro Pietri , was a Nuyorican poet and playwright who co-founded the Nuyorican Poets Café. He was the poet laureate of the Nuyorican Movement.-Early years :...

, Martín Espada

Martín Espada

Martín Espada is a Latino poet, and professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he teaches poetry. Puerto Rico has frequently been featured as a theme in his poems.- Life and career :Espada was born in Brooklyn, New York...

, and Alurista

Alurista

Alurista is the nom de plume of Alberto Baltazar Urista Heredia , a Chicano poet and activist.-Youth and education:...

. It is written in English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

, Spanish

Spanish language

Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...

, or any combination thereof (including Spanglish

Spanglish

.Spanglish refers to the blend of Spanish and English, in the speech of people who speak parts of two languages, or whose normal language is different from that of the country where they live. The Hispanic population of the United States and the British population in Argentina use varieties of...

).

See also

• Chicano poetry
  Chicano poetry
  Chicano poetry is a branch of American literature written by and primarily about Mexican Americans and the Mexican-American way of life in society. The term "Chicano" is a political and cultural term of identity specifically identifying people of Mexican descent who are born in the United States...
  
  
• List of Mexican American writers
• List of Cuban American writers
• List of Puerto Rican writers