In this Wednesday, Aug. 30, 2017 file photo, Edwin Quintana, left, dressed as a 17th century Spanish conquistador, dances with fifth grader Kaylee Pacheco and other students at Tesuque Elementary school in Tesuque, N.M. (AP Photo/Morgan Lee)
By RUSSELL CONTRERAS, Associated Press
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — The Spanish conquistador is an image found throughout New Mexico, the most Hispanic state in the United States.
Depictions of such men as 17th century explorers Don Juan de Oñate and Don Diego de Vargas have long adorned murals and been honored at commemorations as a homage to the region’s Hispanic heritage.
In recent years, however, the conquistador and all the effigies connected to it have come under intense criticism. A new generation of Native American and Latino activists is demanding that conquistador imagery and names be removed from seals, schools and streets. They say the figure’s connection to colonialism and indigenous genocide makes the conquistador outdated, highlighting the region’s changing attitudes about its colonial past.
Activists convinced organizers of the yearly Santa Fe Fiesta to abandon “the Entrada”—a recreation of de Vargas recapturing Santa Fe for the Spanish from Pueblo tribes. Under pressure, Santa Fe’s public school district also announced it would limit when conquistador reenactors visit. This month, the University of New Mexico said it’s looking a new design for its official seal following protests from Native Americans two years ago over concerns about the current seal with a conquistador.
In this Aug. 30, 2017, file photo, Edwin Quintana, second from right, dressed as a 17th century Spanish conquistador, motions to a crowd of students at Tesuque Elementary school in Tesuque, N.M., during an annual presentation of Spanish colonial culture and history that honors conquistador Don Diego de Vargas. (AP Photo/Morgan Lee)
Elena Ortiz, president of the Santa Fe chapter of Red Nation, a Native American advocacy group, said the developments come after years of activism and public campaigns seeking to change perceptions about the conquistador.
Activists feel more needs to be done, she said.
“We still have Don Diego parading around,” Ortiz said. “This symbol of genocide should not be allowed in public schools.”
The demonstrations and protests have enflamed racial tensions between some New Mexico Latinos —who call themselves Hispanos— and Native American tribes, who both say the battle is over how to tell the region’s history.
Ralph Arellanes, chair of the Hispano Round Table of New Mexico, said he understands the desire of the state’s many Native American tribes to tell their stories. But he called the efforts to remove the conquistador attempts to erase history.
“It’s a complicated history that needs to be celebrated. If it weren’t for Hispanos, who came to New Mexico first, most Native American tribes would have been wiped out,” Arellanes said. “The conquistador brought people together.”
Spanish explorers were the first Europeans to set foot in the present-day American Southwest, including Texas, California, Arizona and Colorado.
While each state has a few monuments, streets and cities named after Spanish conquistadors, in New Mexico the conquistador has played a unique role in the celebration of Hispanic culture in the state as many continue to identify as Spanish, or descendants of the first Spanish explorers. Latinos in other southwestern states often identify as Mexican American or mestizo, a mixture of Spanish and Native American ancestry.
The Spanish identity has made New Mexico unique in how some Hispanic residents have celebrated the conquistador for decades.
The conquistador image has appeared on university emblems, moving truck companies and once was the mascot of Albuquerque’s minor league baseball team. At an annual festival in Santa Fe, some dress up as conquistadors and ride through town on horses while other conquistador reenactors visit local schools and dance with children.
In this Sept. 5, 2006, file photo, Jessica Lucero, left, dressed as the Fiesta Queen, and Jaime Dean, right, dressed as 17th century Spanish conquistador Don Diego de Vargas, dance and sing at Santa Fe City Hall in Santa Fe, N.M. (AP Photo/Jeff Geissler)
All Pueblo Council of Governors Chairman E. Paul Torres, who is a member of Isleta Pueblo, said he understands that some Hispanics revere their Spanish colonial past and images of the conquistador.
“I’m not offended by it, but I know some (Native Americans) who are,” Torres said. “I’m for us getting together to have a better understanding of each other.”
While Torres said he and other Pueblo tribal leaders were pleased Santa Fe Fiesta organizers changed the Entrada, he doesn’t agree with activists who want to erase the conquistador all together.
“It doesn’t bother me,” former Isleta Tribal councilman Diego Lujan said. “We all need to work and live together.”
Nick Estes, an American Studies professor at the University of New Mexico and a member of Red Nation, said activists want state leaders to stop lionizing the region’s violent colonial past and recognize the history of Native Americans.
The fight is worse than the battle over U.S. Civil War-era Confederate monuments in the American South, he said.
“At least there’s an acknowledgment of this country’s legacy with slavery,” Estes said. “This country has not acknowledged its legacy with indigenous genocide.”
Editor’s Note: In 2018, Latino USA featured the Entrada controversy on its podcast. Latino USA is part of Futuro Media, the nonprofit media company that also produces Latino Rebels.
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Russell Contreras is a member of The Associated Press’ race and ethnicity team. Follow him on Twitter @russcontreras.
Mr. Estes with Red Nation is conflating completely different arguments together. The United States committing genocide against Native Americans has nothing to do with what the Spanish in New Mexico were doing with their Native American subjects. He also isn’t culturally related to any of the Native American tribes of New Mexico whatsoever, and considering the Pueblos here, who were directly effected by the Spanish themselves, at the very most are apathetic or constructively critical to these issues, it makes him look ridiculous. It’d be valid for him to criticize the slavery of Pueblo peoples by the Spanish, Apache, Diné, and Comanche, but he instead chooses to use misleading arguments to make people confuse different histories together to defame Hispanos. I’m surprised UNM would employ someone that someone with so little journalistic integrity to teach their students.
The only case of genocide by definition in New Mexican history was propagated by Popé during the Pueblo Revolt, who ordered the murder of all Spanish settlers unconditionally. That isn’t to defend the atrocities of Oñate or Treviño or any of them, but these people are blind to the historical realities of New Mexico and it’s embarrassing that they’re solely using strawman arguments and whataboutism to push this sweeping assimilationism without regard to the culture they’re doing it against, and they’re actually succeeding. They’re trying for extremely similar results in regards to culture as to what the Spanish and Anglo Americans did towards them. I don’t understand how that irony is lost on them.
The “Hispanic mind” is a piece of work. Classic gaslighting. Its the native peoples that are the true genociders, Can’t even make this up., etc.