To Add Diversity To The Conference Circuit

Saturday, June 26, 2010

My friend and colleague Kety Esquivel, wrote up a great post on The Huffington Post:

For the last two years I have had the distinct honor and priviledge to be a panelist at SXSWi. Unfortunately, I have been one of the only Latino panelists and potentially the only Latina panelist….On the conference circuit, the response that I get often for this dearth of Latino and Latina panelists is: we don’t have any other Latino/Latina panelists because there is no one else out there. My experience has been that many of the conference organizers blame the digital divide.


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  • http://www.josehuitron.com Jose Huitron

    The word definitely needs to get out which will help garner the attention and participation of key thought leaders in social media and those with insights into the online activity of Latinos. You and Kety are definitely making headway.

  • http://www.estudoray.com Joe Ray

    Yes, diversity not just for inclusion but for realism too. How can yesterday’s mainstream ignore today’s number, soon to be tomorrow’s majority? I’ve spoken at marketing conferences but have felt marginalized because it seemed limited to a Latino/Hispanic conference. I’ve asked at proposal time about the US Latino market and representation, is anyone representing, etc., and the response is pretty much a canned mid-90s retort of “oh, that’s our Latin American market” or a blank stare or two. I’ve also asked similar questions while in attendance at at conference while listening to a panel discussion. More blank stares. Or if there was a black panelist, the others would look at them with that look in their eye of “we have a minority, isn’t that enough?”

    Que la chingada?

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