Representation is defined as the action of speaking or acting on behalf of someone. We created the LatINK ERG to represent our Latinx and Hispanic community within Movable Ink, a company that fights for people to have a voice – no matter their race, sexual orientation, gender, language, or nationality. LatINK is the newest ERG created at Movable. Our mission states that LatINK was created to promote, educate, represent and elevate Latinx representation across the diaspora of all Latin American perspectives.
This ERG was born of the need to have a channel to amplify Latinx and Hispanic voices. Through LatINK, members can be heard, listen to others, learn new skills and share culturally significant experiences. According to the US Census, 18.7% of the US population is Latinx or Hispanic, and we have a similar percentage of Inkers who identify as Hispanic or Latinx across the company. At Movable Ink, we also have a Latinx office in Costa Rica, where 100% of the employees’ native language is Spanish. The LatINK ERG, therefore, represents not only the many Latino employees in the US but in Costa Rica as well. We project continued growth in our diverse membership and global programming as more and more Latinx employees and offices worldwide join Movable Ink.
As a group striving to make our culture known, we hope to share the usual: cultural facts, food recommendations, and warmth. But we also want to showcase important artistic creations and icons that have given so much to the great American dream and culture– such as music, art, books, movies, and TV productions made in Latin America, to name a few.
Our LatINK ERG, and the contributions of Hispanic and Latinx peoples, is so rich that we could be speaking about Azteca history in the morning, Mayan edifices by lunch, and for dinner conversation move onto the great Independence Act signed together by Central America in September of 1821 to emancipate from Spain. We could be discussing thoughts from Isabel Allende one day and Octavio Paz the next. We could be listening to Alexandra Ocasio Cortez at the US Congress and learning from Franklin Chang-Diaz, the first Costa Rican astronaut at NASA. Let’s not forget Rigoberta Menchu, Pablo Neruda, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Alfonso Garcia Robles, and of course, Costa Rican ex-president, Oscar Arias Sanchez – all of them Nobel Prize Laureates from Latin America who have elevated our culture around the globe.
LatINK was just born this year, but the footprint we plan to leave will transcend time. We plan to be heard and to help each one of our hermanos. We plan to promote our culture and educate where needed, always as famous Cuban singer Celia Cruz once said, with ‘sabor and azúcar.’
