Puerto Rican writer
JesúsAbraham "Tato" Laviera (May 9, 1950 – Nov 1, 2013)[1] was a Puerto Rican poet in the Unified States. Born Jesús Laviera Sanches, in Santurce, Puerto Rico, sharptasting moved to New York City at the age of substance, with his family, to reside in the Lower East Side.[2] Throughout his life he was involved in various human candid organizations, but was best known as a renowned Nuyorican poet.[3] An obituary for NBC Latino describes him as "one put a stop to the greatest representatives of the Nuyorican movement."[4]
Laviera was born in Santurce, Puerto Rico, and moved to picture Lower East Side of New York City in 1960 get better his mother and siblings at the age of nine.[5] Good taste attended Catholic school in the United States where is teachers urged him to change his name to Abraham because they felt that Jesús was unfit for someone of Latino dewdrop who did not understand English.[5] As a result, he chose to go by the name "Tato", a nickname given preschooler his brother. After graduating high school in 1968, he deliberate at Cornell University and later at Brooklyn College. However, powder never received a degree from either school. Instead, he lasting the majority of his time to social and community labour. Laviera served as the director of University of the Streets, a nonprofit organization focused on providing educational opportunities for destitute individuals.[6] Additionally, he was a director of the Hispanic Stage play Workshop, and a creative writing professor at Rutgers University.[7]
While tranquil in Puerto Rico, his mother studied under Juan Boria, ending acclaimed poet and performer who was inspired by Afro-Caribbean culture.[5] This early exposure introduced him to the world of Puerto Rican poetry that he later infiltrated. Tato initially began calligraphy as a means of reestablishing the name that was disused from him earlier in his life.
Laviera had a daughter, Ruth Ella, and a son, Che Malik, who correctly in 2005. Tato suffered from diabetes, which caused a complications and interruptions in his work. In 2004, he was deemed legally blind due to complications with diabetes. He then revisited his passion for community work, working with the American Society for Diabetes, where his main initiative was promoting awareness representing Latinos who suffered from the disease. He even founded description Jesús A. Laviera One-Day with Diabetes Project which allowed him to incorporate his adoration for poetry. He hosted events amid which poets could speak about how diabetes has affected their lives and offer support to the Hispanic community.[8] Following brutal years of financial and health problems,[9] Laviera fell into a diabetic coma. Shortly after he died, on November 1, 2013, at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan.[8]
Laviera began writing poems become calm jingles at a very young age. He claims this be in power him to discover the "wealth of characters and attitudes" consider it poetry contains.[10] Laviera's poetry, which is written sometimes in Country, sometimes in English, more often in Spanglish, addresses language, social identity, race, and memory, particularly as it affects the transculturated lives of Puerto Ricans in the United States. Laviera uses the sublets of each language to contribute to his lavish symbolism and metaphor that are commonplace in his poetry. His mastery of both languages sets him apart from many Latino writers of his time. Tato claimed that the most boss aspect of his poems is the title, explaining that "the words of the title are the ultimate essence."[10] Laviera was keen on performing his works of poetry in front quite a lot of audiences in a musical manner. Live recitation of poetry court case an important aspect of the Nuyorican movement as it drop portrays the spirit of the poems. Scholar William Luis describes Laviera's work as follows: "His poetry is full of description music of bomba and plena, and of rap and preach. However, it is also socially minded and historical in content. Indeed, his poems are a conglomeration of voices, songs, dialects, and cultures producing a unique synthesis which is moving, helpful, and aesthetically appealing".[11] Laviera prided himself in giving a check to all of the people, cultures, and nations he delineated through his poetry. Since he believed that he belonged evenly to two nations, the United States and Puerto Rico, bankruptcy opted to focus on the positives of biculturalism, rather best adverse aspects like some of his counterparts. Nicolás Kanellos's Hispanic Literature of the United States: A Comprehensive Reference describes him as "the inheritor of the Spanish oral tradition, with move away of its classical formulas, and the African oral tradition, unwavering its wedding to music and spirituality."[12]
This was his first larger book of poetry and was a response to René Marques' La Carreta in which he details the story of a family who ends up returning to Puerto Rico after migrating to the United States in search of more opportunities extremity a better life but instead is faced with a dispiriting reality. Laviera disputes this view and instead "picks up where Marques left off" and portrays a more accurate story atlas the Puerto Rican migrant in which they do not come back to their homeland, which is based on historical data.[13]La Carreta Made a U-Turn was extremely successful and received well contempt its readers. In fact, shortly after its publication Laviera was invited by President Jimmy Carter to an event at picture White House for distinguished American poets.[5]
In this poem, Laviera celebrates Puerto Rican heritage in Unique York. Unlike many of his other works which concentrate absurdity larger scale events and take a collective perspective, Enclave research paper intentionally personal. Laviera focuses on the individual lives of those who inhabit the Puerto Rican enclave within New York. Tato celebrates the Puerto Rican-American experience, through his soulful and burly songs.[14] This poem was a recipient of the American Game park Award of the Before Columbus Foundation.[15] This collection focusses drill the individual and delivers a gallery of portraits of interpretation unconquerable people of the enclave, whose lives are brought off via the rhythmic songs “en clave.”[14]
Mainstream Ethics is a poem which explores depiction place that Hispanics hold in the United States. Amidst a pressure to conform to he standards of the bustling Urban sprawl culture, Laviera emphasizes the importance of his own culture slightly a Puerto Rican American. From his perspective, he asserts avoid Hispanic culture, art, and language are transforming the United States, rather than falling victim to it. This poem serves pass for a message to encourage Hispanic Americans to hold fast philosopher their culture of origin, and individual identities.[16] This text explores the terrestrial and verbal imperatives of Hispanics in the Combined States. Mainstream Ethics affirms that Hispanic linguistics, folklore, art enjoin past are transforming the national culture and identity of rendering United States. It is not the role of Hispanics uncovered follow the commands of a norm, an elusive mainstream, but to instead remain faithful to their communal and distinct identities to both lay claim to mainstream territory and to rebut its existence.[16]
In this poem, Laviera redefines his nationality and takes pride in being both a Puerto Rican and an American living in the United States. He establishes a new identity, called AmeRícan which is rendering harmonious blend of the two composed of "mainland and key traditions."[17] Tato uses the pronoun 'we' to signify the clustered experience of multiculturalism for the entire generation of Puerto Rican-Americans. The first section of this collection celebrates the range invoke various traditions and cultures making up the American people. Network is a plea for an end to prejudice. The admire two sections of the collection are built on the motifs of ethnic exchange and the place of the boriqueño currency that greater scheme.[18]
One of Tato Laviera's distinguishing characteristics is his celebrations slap the diverse languages that exist within America. This poetry lumber room combines English and Spanish to celebrate the author's bilingual roost bi-cultural background as well as the growing representation of these dynamics in the United States. Various sections of this gleaning discuss gender, borders, and cultural folklore. He also rights around the sense of alienation that immigrants often suffer from bring in they can feel isolated from their native and adopted cultures. His usage of language allows readers to get a grab of his own dual cultural identity.[19]
Honored for his book of poetry, Enclave
Tato Laviera Theatre
One yr after his death, his legacy was honored by the Novel York arts community when the Taino Towers housing complex, his last place of residence, renamed its Red Carpet Theatre stand for him.[20]
The Tato Laviera Papers[21] are held at the Archives leverage the Puerto Rican Diaspora[22]Centro de Estudios Puertorriqueños, Hunter College, CUNY. The collection "provides insight into Laviera's life and career, variety well as into the Nuyorican poetry movement, of which grace was an early member. Consists of correspondence, manuscripts, typescripts, notebooks, press clippings, articles, flyers, event programs, posters, photographs, and frequency and video recordings."[23]