August /08
Presented during the Latino Festival in Alexandria-VA

The Floating Lab Collective was invited to work with a group of Hispanic teenagers, as part of their internship with Tenants and Workers United. This group was set up for 5 young women during their last years of high school or their transition to college. They are an active group in the Hispanic community in Alexandria, and active collaborators of Tenants and Workers United.

Tenants & Workers United is a democraticallycontrolled, grassroots organization committed to building the power of low-income people- Latinos/as, African Americans, immigrants, tenants, workers, women, and youths - for racial and economic justice in Northern Virginia. The idea came after a series of meetings about their identities as members of the Hispanic community.

In the course of the meetings, they shared stories from their lives as an examples of how they were the source of false associations, or victims of an oversimplified image. They spoke of society's tendency to perpetuate the image of the "Hispanic Woman" as a housekeeping worker, an exotic symbol, and a passive figure. The project began with a writing exercise about the effects of stereotyping. They used this writing for a series of animations, adding their voices and using images from commercial products where hispanic females are depicted in a stereotypical manner.