Expanding Directions, Exploding Parameters: Culture and Nation in LatCrit Coalitional Imagination

The articles and commentaries in this Symposium are excellent points of departure for reflecting upon the advances thus far achieved in the evolution of this still very young community of scholars. The articles and commentaries that follow this brief Introduction comprise the second “free-standing” law review Symposium on LatCrit theory organized specifically in response to student interests and initiatives. The timing is fitting, for this Symposium also coincides with the fifth anniversary of LatCrit theory’s emergence in the American legal academy. Since then, five annual conferences and four additional colloquia have produced, in total, nine published symposia in both mainstream and “of color” law journals. This record reflects and affirms LatCrit theory’s original commitment to collaboration with student law review editors, especially those of color, in the production of this new critical legal discourse on Latinas/os, policy, and society. This textual recordincluding this very Symposium-also attests to LatCrit theory’s expanding directions and exploding parameters. Indeed, this Symposium effectively celebrates and continues the LatCrit experiment that, in 1995, was, like Carlos’ dreams, little more than a will to imagine and believe.