How did Latinas empower themselves, their families and communities in 1970s Chicago? We
explore this through the 1979 Festival de Mujeres, a street fair in Chicago’s Pilsen
neighborhood, the cultural and activist heart of the Mexican Midwest. The Festival was
organized by Pilsen’s Mujeres Latinas en Acción, an important, early Latina women’s
organization. It was intergenerational, connected with Puertoriqueña, Anglo, and Black
feminists, engaged with health, labor, and arts groups, and included the seeds of lesbian
visibility and alliances. We address the challenges of conducting this historical research and
introduce our digital exhibit on the Festival. The exhibit is part of the Chicago Monuments
Project, which “develop[s] a framework for marking public space that elevates new ways to
memorialize Chicago’s history more equitably and accurately”(
https://chicagomonuments.org).
Diana Solís, a Pilsen-based teaching artist who was on staff at MLEA in 1979 and helped
organize the Festival, is featured on the panel. A visual artist, photographer, and educator from
Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood, Solís is inspired by Mexican and Chicano culture, memory, oral
and personal histories, and queer identities. With Dr. Hinda Seif and Laurie Matheson, she leads
an effort to envision monuments to Pilsen’s Latina histories for the Chicago Monuments
Project.
Sarita Hernández is a salvadoréxican teaching artist, oral historian, and print/zine-maker.
Hernández is co-founder of marimacha monarca press, a queer and trans* people of color artist
collective based in Chicago’s Southwest Side. Hernández works on the ARTivism workshop
series at the University of Illinois Chicago’s Latino Cultural Center. They are interested in artistic
interventions with the historical archive and imagining alternative forms of social
documentation, preservation, and activation of everyday histories, survivals, and resistances.
Professor Hinda Seif, UIS Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology
and faculty board member of University of Illinois Press, is writing a book on 20th Century social
movements in Chicago and Mexico through the life and photographs of Diana Solís.
Co-sponsored by UIS Sociology/ Anthropology, Diversity Center, Global Studies, and Women’s
Center
