Oral history interview with Ed Muñoz (transcript)

Ed Munoz discusses growing up in Nebraska and his parents' background coming to Nebraska from Texas. He discusses his family's background as sugar beet workers and how they started working after seventh and eighth grade. He details his perspective as a sociologist as he recounts his family's experiences with redlining and discrimination. His mother encouraged him to attend college, and he returned to university after several years of blue collar work for a variety of businesses. He reflects on current events and his former students.

Munoz_Ed Wed, Dec 29, 2021 12:09PM • 1:10:46 SUMMARY KEYWORDS Salt Lake City; Nebraska Panhandle; Laramie, WY; Catarina, TX; Manchaca, TX; White Chicano; Relearned Spanish; Mexican Civil War; Sugar Beets; Teamsters; Unions; Reagan Recession; Metate; Corn tortillas; tamales; Boston Celtics; Nebraska Cornhuskers; Apollo Moon Landing; Laverne and Shirly; James Bond; Single Parenting; Western Nebraska Community College; University of Nebraska; Redlining; Beet Shack; Outhouse; Ninth Street; Rancho Market; Criminal InJustice System; Strip Search; Graduate School; Ford Fellow; School for Cultural and Social Transformation; COVID-19 SPEAKERS John Valdez, Ed John Valdez 00:17 Today's date is December, 27 2021. This oral history is for the Construyendo Latinad class project. The oral history with Ed Munoz is being conducted via Zoom. My name is John Valdez. Ed 00:37 Do you have oh you don't have the new one. Where I sent- I put an extra sentence in there, the narrator lives in. Okay. So I live in Salt Lake City. Ed 01:11 I was born September 13, 1959. In the Twin Cities of Nebraska in the Panhandle of Nebraska about 20 miles from Wyoming border about maybe 50 miles north of the Colorado border and we're probably about two hours from Rapid City, South Dakota. I say the Twin Cities that's Gering, Nebraska G-E-R-IN-G that's where I was raised, but we didn't have a hospital and Gering the hospital was located in Scottsbluff, Nebraska, S-C-O-T-T-S B-L-U-F-F. The hospital was there, So I was born there but born and raised in Gering, Nebraska, and, I identify as Chicano primarily, but I also identify as Nebrasqueno, which is Spanish for Nebraska, my created Spanish term for a born and raised Nebraskan, you know, but also kind of letting folks know that I'm Chicano and whatnot. Like I mentioned with regards to race, that this both race, I always have a trouble which box to check off because I am kind of white complected and stuff and sociological research does show that white Latinos do better socio economically and don't experience discrimination as much as well. I would rather kind of identify as Native American, but I don't want to mess up those statistics either in whatever way. Then when I do enter Hispanic ethnicity in the census or whatever else, and if they let me I identify as Chicano and I'm about 70%, bilingual and I re-taught myself how to speak Spanish to tell you the truth, because I lost my language for the most part. By the time I was in kindergarten, and, but kind of slowly, re-taught myself I retained quite a bit because I spent a lot of time with my grandmother, my dad's mom, but then I also retaught myself in college, and also when I started working as a blue collar worker in the railroad -1- Transcribed by https://otter.ai with a lot of migrantes from Mexico and stuff. So we sing songs and you know, we worked, I worked on the railroad, but I'll wait to tell you that story. John Valdez 03:47 Can you tell me about your parents? Where they were from and their parents? Ed 03:54 Well, my dad's side of the family, my parents are Tejanos and so sometimes I even use this phrase Soy Nebrasqueno por rumbo de Texas, okay, by way of Texas. My dad was born in Catarina, Texas, a product of an illegitimate relationship my grandmother entered into when she became a domestic worker, and she became a domestic self employed domestic after her husband died, who was Munoz and my grandmother was a Torres. So and this guy was a Castilleja and my dad never took that Castilleja name because he was shunned by his biological father and his family. So he always took the name Munoz and my grandmother came to the Cartarina region I'm not sure if it was directly Catarina or they went to Laredo first because, Catarina is about 60 miles North of Laredo, Texas. She came with her family during the time of the Mexican Civil War during the early part of the 20th century and, I'm assuming that they were escaping all the violence that was going on in the country at that time. John Valdez 05:18 And where was she from? Ed 05:19 From Guanajuato, Mexico. My mom was born in Manchaca, Texas, which is now becoming part of South Austin, and becoming pretty gentrified, from what I understand. Her mother was born, we don't, I don't know much. Well, I did talk about my paternal grandfather a little bit. But I don't know much about my paternal great grandparents and I don't know much about my maternal great grandparents either. Except that my great grandmother was also kind of from that region of Central Texas where my grandmother was born. She was born, I think, in Manchaca as well. She's got a long history there in that Central Texas region. I have this metate that was passed down on my by my mom, she gave it to me, since I'm kind of, you know, Latino Studies professor. You know, sociologist by training, but specialize in race and ethnicity and criminology, and then within race and ethnicity, I specialize on Latino Studies, topics and issues, and that's kind of primarily what I teach and things. But my great grandmother, there's a good chance that she, her, you know, parents might have been born in Texas before the US Mexican War. I don't know, but you know, I'm just speculating that there's a good chance that they were from from Texas to begin with. John Valdez 06:57 You mentioned, you mentioned a metate, can you explain that or describe it? 07:03 A metate is like when, for you know, the old days, they used to grind corn on the stone, flat stone surfaces or whatever. This one that I have has three legs to it and it's kind of like, how do you explain that rock? Kind of like a ashey, coolish kind of rock looking thing, whatever. It's like a mortar and pestle -2- Transcribed by https://otter.ai Kind of thing. whatever, but made out of stone. And I have one, it's probably about six inches wide or No, maybe about eight inches wide by 12 inches long. John Valdez 07:43 And they would ground the corn on that in order to make tortillas or bread. Ed 07:48 Yeah, and it was my great grandmother's and then she gave it to my grandmother and my grandmother. She kind of left her family. That's another interesting story. But when she left her family, she left that metate behind to my mom. So it became my mom's. It came into my mom's possession and my mom gave it to me about like, I think like 20 years ago, when I started my career as a professor and stuff. My oldest daughter even did a presentation about the metate as well, and whatever, a grade school presentations and things like that, she told about the history about it and stuff like that. Of course, I had to carry it to the classroom John Valdez 08:38 That's a great heirloom, with a nice family story Ed 08:41 It is, it's great. Maybe I'll send you a picture of it okay! John Valdez 08:45 That would be good that we could include it. Ed 08:47 Right, I'll sent you a picture of that. John Valdez 08:49 Okay, along the same lines, how about your parents and their education? Ed 08:54 Okay, my mom made it to eighth grade and that's, and I think I'm not quite sure but I think that's when she met my dad and then they fell in love and she became pregnant with my older sister. Then they got married, so I think that's how she ended her school career, basically, and then my father, he made it to seventh grade. But before they finished the seventh grade year, that's the I think that's the first year that they went more to work in crops, they became part of that migrant farmworkers stream. And they went to Wisconsin at first and then when they came back that first time my dad's family didn't settle out right away. They went north and came back to Texas about two times before they they finally settled out. But when he came back from Wisconsin that first year and he went to school the first day of school in eighth grade the administrators told him that he couldn't go to eighth grade because he had missed too much school, seventh grade, which was just the last two weeks of school when, he was pulled out of school to go to, to go north with his family because like the recruiters, and this would be like this, the sugar beet recruiters, they would recruit families. And so then my parents, like my dad didn't have no choice but to go with his mom and his stepdad up north with the rest of the family. You know, it kind of -3- Transcribed by https://otter.ai draws parallels to what happens today, when you think about the dreamers, the DACA kids, you know, that it wasn't their fault that they came, they came with their families because of certain circumstances. The circumstance for my dad is that the the principals didn't let him go to eighth grade, they said you have to take seventh grade over and my dad showed me his seventh grade report card He probably kept it for this very reason and I was young when he showed me that report card. It had all the top grades like he passed everything with flying colors and he refused to take seventh grade over. Administrators told him that if he didn't take seventh grade over that he wouldn't be able to go to school at all. He said okay, and he walked home and he started working for the rest of his life. John Valdez 11:22 Do you recall any stories from him? You know how the human nature is to overthink things and dwell in the past, Did he share with you any frustrations because of that? Ed 11:41 Yes and no. Well, maybe not frustrations because for my dad and my mom when they were coming of age is when there were still a lot of unionized jobs available. Even though my parents came as sugar beet workers and you know, they got married young and this and that. My dad as a young man like in his early 20s He kind of started jumping around to these different jobs and worked with you know, there was always agricultural work available from you know. Early spring to late fall, mid fall and then he started working at the Sugar Factory, Great Western sugar factory like working during the campaigns when they were harvesting sugar beets and processing sugar. Probably when he was like shoot, I was five years old he might have been 25, maybe a little earlier than that he got on full time at the sugar factory which is a teamsters job as well. My mother after she finally you know had six kids and stuff and had them in a spot where they could take care of themselves she entered the workforce as well. I think I was 10 years old when that happened and she got a job at National Drinks Incorporated which bottled Coca-Cola products and Coca-Cola, 7UP even like Goody pop, I don't know if you remember Goody pop you know, it was bottled pop then. She would inspect bottles she was kind of like the LaVerne and Shirley. I don't know if you remember the LaVerne and Shirly sitcom, the beer distributor or whatever. So yeah, she worked there and that was a union shop as well. They were able to prosper and and did a good, they made a good living, you know, they, you know, bought when they were able to buy a house. We lived in a beet shack what they call a beet shack. Probably my first five years what I remember as a child is we live in this beet shack it was a four room house. Four room shack, really, you know, and I didn't realize it was a beet shack until I started reading a lot, you know, sociological historical accounts of migration farmworkers and stuff and basically it was, you know, shacks that were tar paper, you know, keep the wind out and stuff. Oil stoves, wood burning stoves. I remember one of my best memories of when I was a kid too is you know, my grandmother patting the corn tortillas and stuff and throw them on the wood burning stove it would smell so great and stuff like that. Even though we were probably poor, I've never felt we were poor. My mom always made the best with you know, housing or whatever that she had. She'd make it warm or whatever. I don't remember being cold. We I remember having an outhouse. we didn't have indoor plumbing until I was 10 years old when we moved, when my when my parents finally bought a house in town. When they were able to buy they bought on the other side of tracks, not in the barrio. My dad just recently told me the story of why we ended up on the other side of the tracks is because when they went to go borrow money, they told him that they wouldn't lend him money to go to buy a house that was in the barrio. So the redlining shit was, it was redlining. You -4- Transcribed by https://otter.ai know, I'm a sociologist so I read about all these different types of systemic racism, structural discrimination and all that. It wasn't that big a deal because they can afford, you know, out of there. It wasn't that, he said, It wasn't really by choice. It was because I think he probably, if we probably could have, they might have bought a house in the barrio, and which is fine, too. But we ended up on this side whatever. I'm the only one that made it to college out of my siblings, and my sisters really just didn't want to go. My mom and dad said that they paid for whatever, you know, they'd help us whichever way they could and they did that for me. I was always good in school, always a top student, you know, Honor roll National Honor Society. I sang in the choir, I was in the musicals, I played football, I was varsity Letterman. Two years, I was, you know, lettered in choir for three years, you know, had solos in the musicals, as well as the swing choirs. I had solos in the swing choir, you know, did really well in school. And so I never doubted that I wasn't going to go to college. And probably were, but my mom was probably the one that really got me going on college because when we when I was about five or six, wow, probably five and my sister and I, my older sister, we used to help my parents in the fields. Because we they were still working in the fields at the time. My dad got out of the fields, like I mentioned earlier, probably when he's about 25. Even before he would go to his shift at the sugar factory, like at eight in the morning, in the summertime, he would go out to the field before it got hot with my mom, and he would do like a couple of rounds of thinning with my mom, my sister would help my dad and I would help mom, you know, kind of double team on a row. I remember my conversations with my mother. I said how come I have to do this, you know, as a kid I was, you know, whining, belly aching because I had to come out here, how come my other sisters who were asleep in the car at the end of the at the bottom of the field? You know, because and then when they got before I started getting hot, my dad took off to his shift, my older sister and I had to run herd on my younger siblings and stuff. You know, but my mom would always say, well, if you don't want to work, if you don't want to do this, you better keep in school, or you know, and then you can go to college. I remember telling her, said okay, so when I go to college I'll buy you a brand new washing machine, because she has those old washers, John Valdez 18:04 Yes Ed 18:05 Yeah, she probably started talking to me, uh, you know, all of us about college and stuff like that. My mom was smart, too. You know, she only made it to eighth grade and now when I'm older, and I'm a single parent, and I've been a single parent for about 10 years. There's some nuance to that but, I've been divorced for about 10-11 years, and my daughters have lived with me during the academic year and then they go with their mom in the summertime, but we've never lived in the same town, my ex and I and so I learned what my mom went through with regards to registering children into school every year, keeping track of all the vaccinations that have saved lives, you know, over the years. Yeah, you know, they're about you know, and I raised daughters, so I learned more and more about your menstrual periods and stuff like that stuff that I didn't have very much knowledge about before. Learning how to buy nylons and all that and so I really began to appreciate my mom. I started appreciating them a lot, you know, in my mid 20s. When I started having children, I just realized what my mom and my dad went through, but especially my mom because she had to learn how to navigate institutions and not just educational institutions, health care institutions, and then also like social security because my grandfather, she had to do like all his social security paperwork. She had to learn -5- Transcribed by https://otter.ai about all this, and I had a what do you call it a fictive brother, so to speak, my cousin who lived with us ever since he was born and he was albino he's my cousin by blood but his mom was mentally challenged. After he was born, they decided to put her in a home and he was really albino and he came home to live with us from the time he was born. John Valdez 18:15 Wow. Ed 18:45 Yeah, so my mom had to deal with like, Social Security, SSI, I think social security? John Valdez 19:47 Insurance benefits. Ed 19:48 Yeah. So she learned all this stuff, you know, on an eighth grade education. Here, I didn't start having kids until I had a PhD and I was moaning and groaning and because I got to excuse my language there. But I got to learn how to, I got to register them. I only had 2, she had seven altogether with my, you know, us six and then, my brother. John Valdez 20:46 Yeah. Ed 20:46 Yeah, and then he even had more paperwork because of the SSI. And she worked full time. John Valdez 20:57 Wow. What a what a role model and experiences. She he had six kids, and you had two? 21:05 Yep, and I had all the amenities to you know, car warmers, and my wife had the suction stuff and all that kind of, you know, and my mom had six kids. John Valdez 21:17 Yeah. Well, before we go too far, can you tell us a couple of stories about your family traditions that you remember? Or that really have impacted you? Ed 21:26 Okay, um, well, I guess one of the things that maybe now since were like in Christmas season and, tamale season and all that, and, you know, I learned how to make tamales, myself. I learned kind of over the phone with my mom and you know, how usually when you make tamales, everybody gets together, and it used to be mostly women, you know, and this and that. Well, my mom, she's always been, you know, she worked full time. She was always having hard times, you know, I don't know if there's hard times, but for whatever reason, she ended up learning how to do it. When she learned how -6- Transcribed by https://otter.ai to do it, she just started doing stuff like, oh, yeah, I just make my meat. I make the carne you know, before when she started really learning how to make tamales. They had enough money to buy pork butts and stuff like that instead of having to go and wait for the pig heads and stuff like that. I remember that from when I was a kid. But so you know, we were talking on the phone on how to make tamales and I wanted to learn, I've become a pretty good cook over the years. I make them for my students at the end of the semester and stuff to kind of you know, show this you know, indigenous tradition to tell you the truth, this tradition of you know, steam cooking and corn and grinding corn, you know, and of course it's evolved now you can buy masa at the store pre made masa and and all this and everything, but you know, it's really different from now and when I tell my my students, you know, because now I go to Rancho market and buy that pack of whatever it's like three dozen of cornhusks and stuff. I remember us going out to the cornfields and picking up husks because you know, you couldn't buy a package a cornhusks at the Rancho market or wherever you went, you know, we lived in Nebraska, and so we use the, we have to boil down the pig heads to get the meat my grandmother. That was kind of a source of income for her as well. You know, and so yeah, it was just you know, but over the years I've learned how to make them myself and my daughters kind of know how to do it. I have a new girlfriend or a girlfriend after maybe, I don't date a lot just because I'm a busy single parent or whatever but I have a girlfriend now and she likes to cook and so she's learning how to make tamales now too and so yeah, it was just kind of this mission by my mom, she says I make them by myself. So she was really like well really you know because I remember my aunts and my mom and then getting together with my grandmother and doing it. She goes yeah, because you know all you have to do is make your meat, you can make your meat like one weekend. This is the way I do it not too. You know slow cook a pork roast and let it fall apart and season it up or whatever and she goes, Yeah man. You know now you can buy the hojas he says and I still wash them rinse them off, clean them and just put them in the fridge and then you know when I'm ready to roll them out I'll roll them out. She has a pot and she even bought me a pot at a garage sale. A pressure cooker at a garage sale and then my dad and her I don't know how it is but I kind of call it Mexican rig but they found some metal piece that they put inside and so now it's a steamer. So yeah, my mom gave me that because, you know, she goes, Well, I have some other ones too, but I'm going to give you this one. And now my process, I've got the process down for myself making masa and everything. And I can make four to five dozen, you know, just like that. John Valdez 25:22 That's great, that's a good story, but glad that you're teaching your daughters to do that, too. Ed 25:28 Yeah, and, you know, like I say, it's a story I use in my classes with my students about you know, how we keep our traditions, but they also change you know. So it's, a good teaching instrument as well with my students, particularly students that take my Latino Studies courses. John Valdez 25:46 That's great. It's good story. Well, moving on. Can you talk about any historical events that you remember or that have impacted your personal life, your career life? Ed 25:59 -7- Transcribed by https://otter.ai That impacted personal life and all that? I guess it's interesting, because, uh, my daughters were talking about Spider Man the other day, Spider Man movie, the new one that came out and stuff. She was really excited about it and stuff. And they never want to go watch James Bond movies with me, you know, and I grew up on James Bond movies with my dad, my dad would, you know, was the only male and, it was kind of a bonding thing for us that we would no pun intended. Okay, but I remember going to watch James Bond movies with my dad when I was like, five, six years old and stuff like that Thunderball Goldfinger. You know, all those first ones with Sean Connery and stuff and over the years, I realized just how closely those movies have been tied with, like political events, like, you know, the Russian Cold War, which it was early focus in some of the early Bond movies, and all the technology that was involved in that and stuff, you know, and even today, they always have the latest technology with the phones and weapons and everything. And, you know, and I've also realized over the years to how, you know, kind of misogynist James Bond movies can be as you know, in regards to how they treat women, and this, it's evolving as well. But, and then kind of want to reflect about that some memories I have is the Apollo moon landing in 1969. I remember that and I have vague recollections. I know, I'm pretty sure it happened in the summer. But I think I remember seeing it at school, it could have been that the teachers, because I went to country school for the first up until fifth grade. By the time we didn't move out of that beet shack, like I was mentioning, we didn't move out of there until I was 10 years old. I think I remember seeing the moon landing on TV at the school, which was called Gering Valley school, a small country school, you know, like, and there'd be like two grades per room per classroom andI remember watching that, you know, and in 69 I remember when President Kennedy was assassinated, I was probably about four or five years old. I remember, you know, my aunt's coming. We were I think we were at my grandmother's house, I had this vague memory of my aunts, you know, all crying because Asacinaron El Presidente. This and that whatever, they killed the president and stuff. I remember those types of things and sports. I remember, my dad was a big sports fan, and he was a sports fan of the Celtics and the Yankees. He didn't really have a favorite football team on the pro football. Then Huskers Of course, we were Husker fans. But so I became like a pretty diehard Celtic fan. I remember when Wilt Chamberlain was with the Philadelphia Warriors before the Warriors. John Valdez 29:08 That's correct. Ed 29:12 Yeah, he stayed in Philadelphia because the 76ers or I don't remember how that happened. But yeah, he was part of the Philadelphia 76ers, right? Sixers and the Celtics were always fighting it out for the comp for that Eastern Conference Championship and the Celtics usually won out and then they would always play the Lakers, basically. And so I remember a lot of those early listening to it on transistor radios. Matter of fact, so yeah, and yep. So those are kind of some of the things I remember of politics. The Reagan Reaganomics, you know, that's the first time I experienced the recession, because I went to college right after my freshman year. I mean, right after my senior right after graduation and I did all right my freshman year at the University of Nebraska but I was, I really didn't like it. I think there was more culture shock and a lot of anything. Because and I didn't realize that until I started studying these things, you know, and when I went back to school, and I dropped out my third semester, at the end, towards the end of the third semester, I dropped out and was going to work for a while, save money, -8- Transcribed by https://otter.ai blah, blah, blah. I ended up staying out of out of school for seven years and was a blue collar worker for like seven years I worked at a livestock auction where they sell cows, hogs cheap, pretty good. While I was a good hand with working cattle and stuff, and you know, dehorning, branding, all that kind of stuff. Then I also worked at the sugar factory during the campaigns where they processed sugar, kind of got a job there because my dad was working there and you know, established seniority and stuff like that. Then I also worked as a steel fabricator at the Lockwood corporation where we made trashcan dumps, big trash dumpsters, all kinds of stuff, potato harvesters. So I punched parts and stuff like that. And, I ran into some trouble with the law with drinking and I was it was court mandated, I had to quit drinking, when I quit drinking That's when I went back to school because I had way too much time on my hands because I didn't go to bars and stuff. When I went back to school, I started back to school at Western Nebraska community college and was working at Lockwood Corporation, but it was during those, during the 80s and during the recession, and deindustrialization started hitting really hard. I saw the writing on the board and on the wall, so I started, I was working nights at Lockwood. I started going to class, I took classes part time during the day, and was working at night, like eight hours a night. Then like I said earlier, I've always been good at school, and I just kind of carried over. One of my instructors there at Western Nebraska Community College told me that I should consider graduate school. And I remember specifically saying, well, that's cool, but I really don't even know what you mean by graduate school. Then he explained to me that it's kind of like, while you know, law school, medical school, oh yeah, it was just kind of like that, but it's in whatever kind of discipline that you want to go to. By then, I had figured out that I wanted to be. I liked sociology, because all the theories that I was reading about and so like intro to soc was about, you know, race and ethnicity, racism, discrimination, drug use, alcohol use, you know, labor exploitation, all these kinds of things, because I saw a lot of discrimination in the workplace as well. You know, how white people you know, less qualified White people would get jobs over primarily Mexicans where I worked, you know, because of their skin, not because of any skills they had, and stuff like that. So all those theories that I was learning about sociological theories to explain, you know, social phenomena, I was really into by then, but I had seven years of life experience by then as well. And even within the law with I mean, the criminal justice system, you know, I was strip searched when I was 15 years old. John Valdez 33:31 Wow. Ed 33:32 Yeah, stripsearched. There's I had a gun unholstered by a police officer, and pointed at us while he put us under arrest. And then they when he took us downtown we were strip searched, you know what the charges were? John Valdez 33:48 No Ed 33:49 Minor in possession. And, yeah, minor in possession of alcohol and possession of less than a quarter ounce of marijuana. -9- Transcribed by https://otter.ai John Valdez 34:01 And that was cause enough to strip search? Ed 34:04 Yes strip searched and not only strip searched, but unholstering their weapon and pointing it at us and in telling us that we're under arrest. John Valdez 34:17 So sad. And what's sad about that, too, in a lot of places is it still continues. Ed 34:22 Exactly. Yeah. You know, and, you know, it was, to me it was something that happened, you know, I, I've done interviews before, and people that are afraid to kind of talk about these things or are not afraid, but just, you don't remember these things. But I don't know if I mentioned as well, but I'm a criminologist as well. When I teach courses, some of the things that I teach about I have some experience with and I was reading about, you know, police, you know, misconduct and stuff like that, and how pervasive it is, you know, and how you know, and especially how bad things happen to people of color, women of color, especially as well, you know. They just experienced bad situations in different ways, like a lot of women of color, you know, they get strip searched as well, and probably even, you know, sexually abused. And but in any case, that's when I started reminiscing about, you know, I got a gun pointed at me when I was 15 years old one by law officer, you know? Crazy right? John Valdez 35:25 Yes it is, I like what you said the what it was that term about? No, you didn't say police misbehavior. But you mentioned something shortly. Not long ago about what you called it. Ed 35:42 Police misconduct? John Valdez 35:43 Yes, police misconduct Ed 35:45 Yeah, and you know, and it carries over. That's where it kind of starts because they over police us, you know, as soon as they you know, like I also mentioned to that I'm white passing, but as soon as they see the name "Munoz", then all the stereotypes and all that implicit bias comes in, and you're treated differently, you know, and I've also been, you know, mistaken for being Middle Eastern, and that comes with a whole different set of problems as well. John Valdez 36:13 No doubt. Yeah. So could you give me an idea about your college experience? Where did you start off first Did you say at the University of Nebraska, Ed 36:28 - 10 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai I went to University of Nebraska, right after high school, I completed my freshman year and did well, I had like, close to a 3.5 GPA. But it was just, you know, Nebraska, particularly eastern Nebraska at the time, was very white, very white, you couldn't even find a Latino community, basically, you know, compared to I mentioned earlier about, you know, sugar beet workers and migration to the Panhandle. We made up probably, you know, even at that time, when I was growing up, we probably made up about 20% of the population in the county, in the city, and that, and so we had like our own communities we had, you could go every weekend, you could go to a baile, just about every weekend, there was a couple bars down on Ninth Street in Scottsbluff, Nebraska that, you know, had, you know, live music, Mexican music, and, you know, all kinds of stuff just and then, there was baptisms and, you know, confirmations and you know, there's always a party for those things with compadres, and, you know, all the cousins and stuff like that and quinceneras. I remember being in quinceneras when I was younger as well, that's when they used to have like 15 couples in, you know, in a quincenera and stuff, with the tuxes and all that kind of stuff. So I remember all those kinds of things. But so I missed that when I, when I moved to Lincoln, I didn't have that I didn't really realize it until and then I also lived like back then. That's when the speed limit was 65 miles an hour on the interstate, remember the gas shortage, surprisingly. And so it would take like eight hours to get from my end of the state, like I mentioned earlier, right next to Wyoming, all the way to Lincoln, Nebraska, which is like 400 miles. So it would take like eight hours to get there. So I couldn't go home on the weekend. Like a lot of folks in my dorms or whatever they you know, sometimes students can go home for the weekend, get some home cooking, do my laundry and stuff like that. I was stuck there until, you know, we had a three day weekend, even some three day weekends, we couldn't go because it costs a lot of money for gas and stuff. John Valdez 36:28 Yeah, sure. Ed 38:46 Then we'd only be there a day, you know, and it'd be time to go back the next day, you know. And so, it was culture shock. I felt guilty for not my parents, I had some scholarships, but I still felt guilty that my parents were paying, you know, they never complained about it. But I think you know, because I still had sisters at home and stuff. I had this kind of guilty conscience of you know, taking money away from the family. So I started working quite a bit, I moved out of the dorms and started living by myself in an apartment. So I became isolated, I started working too much because I wanted to pull more of my weight with regards to finances for my college expenses. This kind of confluence of factors came together and I dropped out towards the end of my third semester. When I went back, you know, school became my job because then I had realized what it was like, you know, to work and then studying became my job. And it was interesting because the you know, I mentioned how I started working too much to help pay for college. When I went back to school I wasn't, you know, already pretty much independently on my own and stuff. And so I was able, oh, and my parents, I mentioned that they had union jobs. So when I signed up when I did my FAFSA, what they call FAFSA now, I don't even know what they called it back in those days. So when we signed up for that, I was not eligible for any type of federal aid at all. John Valdez 40:21 - 11 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai Because of their income? Ed 40:22 Yeah. John Valdez 40:23 Wow. Ed 40:24 You know, and that was in the 70s, late 70s, when there was a ton of federal money, for students. And my parents made too much money together. But I didn't qualify for any federal aid at that time. Because of their income, and they were both like I said, Union workers and stuff but I still I kind of felt guilty. When I went back, and here's the deal too is, I had worked. So you know, I never even though I was experiencing this bouncing around to different jobs, I always had pretty decent jobs that, you know, I would get unemployment benefits and stuff like that. Even like on the railroad, I remember on drawing unemployment and working at the sale barn, like I mentioned earlier, and I would get paid under the table, cash money drawn unemployment. I used a similar strategy. When I went back to school, I was independent and so I was able to qualify for some of the Pell Grants, then and also qualify for work study. I also was still able to draw unemployment. John Valdez 41:34 Wow. Ed 41:35 Yeah. So I had like three streams of income, I kept two streams of income, in addition to Pell Grants, because I was because I even realized that I could work like so many hours a week and still draw like, half of my unemployment check. And so and then on top of Pell grants and stuff like that, so when I went back, I worked the system, because I knew I could get more. Then when I went to, I majored in sociology, and again, I had some white professors like the white professor at community college, when I went back to school, I started in western Nebraska, community college, and one of the professors there told me about graduate school. That's how the idea of being a graduate student kind of started seeping into my mind. When I was getting close to graduating at University of Nebraska, Lincoln, 1989, or whatever, that was the fall semester, and some of my sociology professors, were starting to encourage me to apply for fellowships. And for graduate school, there at the U. So we can go anywhere, but you should, you know, and they had just started, like these minority fellowships for graduate students there at the university of Nebraska. You could probably get one of these fellowships and stuff. I didn't really want to go to graduate school, either. I wanted to come home and work, start working, you know, after graduation, and then they mentioned this fellowship, what's the difference between a fellowship and an assistantship? They said, well, fellowship is kind of like a scholarship, you just study and as long as you get good grades, you won't have to be like a teaching assistant, you won't be a research assistant, blah, blah, blah. And I said, Okay, all right, whatever. So, and they just kept pestering me. So I applied, I did the graduate school application, I did the fellowship application. I did all those applications and I was accepted into graduate school and received a fellowship before I even took the GRE. - 12 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai John Valdez 43:48 Well. That's great. Congratulations. That's a big achievement. Ed 43:53 I told my, I told my graduate school advisor, do I have to take it? He goes yeah, you have to take them, it's kind of like so they can be on record. I said, okay, but I never studied, I never studied for the GRE and I don't even know, my scores were and I didn't care because I was already in graduate school and had funding and so and then my mentors encouraged me to apply for a Ford Foundation Pre Doctoral Fellowship, which is one of the prestigious elite fellowships that you can get one of the most prestigious, and I applied and I have my application had to do with you know, kind of socio historical work on migrant farm workers in the, you know, the rural Midwest, blah, blah, blah, which, you know, start literature was starting to come out on that, but it wasn't really extensive. I got a letter saying, oh, you know, we got so many applications and only so and so we're accepted, however, you are an alternate, and I said, cuz I wasn't actually expecting to get it. I really didn't need to know what alternate, like I knew what alternate meant, but I didn't know what alternate meant, you know? And I said, okay, and I told my professors Oh, cool, that's really good. You should try again next year because they like this, okay, whatever, you know, just kind of like another they just throw the letter away or whatever and stuff. And then about two weeks later after that letter, I got this phone call, that's when we didn't have cell phones you know, so I saw the phone. And they were like is this Ed Munoz? and I go yeah, You go to school, university of Nebraska? and I go Yeah, this is so and so from the Ford Foundation office in Washington, DC. And I go what? And he go, this the So and so, you applied for Ford Foundation Pre Doctoral Fellowship. So I said yeah, this is, well, somebody turned down their fellowship offer and you're as an alternate, we want to offer it to you. John Valdez 45:58 Wow. Ed 46:02 Yeah, okay. Yeah, that sounds great. You know, and at those days, I was walking from my apartment to campus, which is about a 20 minute walk from where I live. And on the way that walk, I was still, like, stunned, I was like, did I get this phone call from so and so? Or, you know, or am I still hungover from the night before or whatever, you know, my graduate school days, every night, and every now and then we go and debate all the theories after our seminars and stuff like that, and down at the nearest pub, and stuff, and, you know, theory, typical, stereotypical kind of graduate students every now and then. But, you know, but that was kind of like, wow, you know, and then I went to the chairs office, because I, you know, I hadn't shared an office with other graduate students. I'd go in just about every day, you know, I went to the chair, and I said, you know, I had this phone call from this the office in Washington, DC, and they said that, I got the pre doctoral fellowship. They knew I was an alternate, and they go really really. Yeah. They said, somebody turn down their offer. I was like, you know, and he started laughing at me. He goes Congratulations, because yeah, and it really happened. It really did. So then I was on fellowship for three years, the pre doctoral fellowships provide a support for three years. So I came out of graduate school only owing about $10,000. - 13 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai John Valdez 47:27 Well, that is great. So you got all three degrees at the University of Nebraska. John Valdez 47:32 All three degrees at the University of Nebraska Lincoln, I was, I've kind of been this anti establishment kind of person, most of my life, I would say, even today, I really, you know, I'm surprised like I tell students when they I have students come in, not often but enough where we go we have an assignment and they want us to interview somebody that has gone far in education, you know, especially if they're a minority, bla, bla, bla, you know, all that kind of stuff. And so every now and then, so yeah, I got some time. Because so when did you learn? When did you know that you were going to be a professor, I go, it was all by accident. I said, and I'm still shocked that I'm doing what I'm doing now. I would have never, ever thought that I'd be doing what I'm doing today. That being said, I enjoy teaching quite a bit a lot more than the research part of it. I used to like research a lot more. Now, I kind of like teaching a bit more, but I became an administrator as well as in administration for 15 years, I was a head of Chicano Studies program at the University of Wyoming for 10 years. That experience kind of landed me a job here at the University of Utah, which, when I applied while I was kind of recruited and submitted my application for the National Search and got the job, and I came here in 2013, and I headed up the Ethnic Studies program. And during my tenure, we became a division, which meant that well as a program, you aren't able to hire tenure lines and when we became a division I helped with the paperwork and you know, push it up through all of the governing bodies of the institution, you know, Academic Senate, graduate school, blah, blah, blah. So we were doing that during my tenure as well and us and Gender Studies became divisions which gave us like departmental status, which then allowed us to hire tenure line faculty and we could hold tenure in our own respective departments divisions. We also together we became the School for Cultural and Social Transformation, so in essence became our own college as well. John Valdez 49:57 Great congratulations back to your degrees. Is it unusual for an individual to get all three degrees at one Institution? Ed 50:06 That's why I was trying to say I was an anti establishment. They said, Why? Why do I have to go somewhere else? I said, you know, especially and the thing was to at the time I was going to go through this, we were kind of, you know, like, with the Chicano movement, I became involved with Chicano Studies, and this and that, and we were still and even today, we're still the same thing fighting for more and more representation in higher education and stuff. And we were like, you know, this needs more graduate students here, you know, so Raza this, Raza that, you know, and it's like, well, if we're trying to get more minorities to come to University of Nebraska, why am I like, wanting to go away? You know? I think I just kind of didn't want to go further away from my family. John Valdez 50:55 Mm hmm. Yeah. Ed 50:57 - 14 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai I think a big part of it, too, is, you know, I come from a working family, a blue collar, working class family. Then I spent seven years in the blue collar workforce. And, you know, we used to really, you know, talk crap about suits, and talk crap about professors and, you know, talk crap about you, you know, all these, you know, and I still kind of have some of that in me. I've usually kind of, you know, what, you know, publish here publish there, you know, who in the hell reads this shit? Your own little circle of friends that cites you too and this and that? No, it makes a difference. Yeah, I'm not saying it doesn't. It's part of you know, what helps kind of drive change as well. I do believe in the scientific process. Definitely. You know, I'm a social scientist. And so, you know, I believe in science, and I believe, you know, in vaccinations, and, you know, and I believe in masks and all that kind of stuff. It's kind of like, I don't believe in those time age traditions that you have to go somewhere. You have to be at the biggest Ivy League school is crap, there's dumb people, or maybe not dumb, but there's like some crazy people that you know have different political beliefs, difficult political ideologies at Harvard, and all those kinds of things. Harvard and all those Ivy schools, were born on slavery, you know? Yeah, Standord university made their money on exploitation of Chinese and other non white workers building railroads and stuff like that, you know, and so, yeah, you know, it's kind of like to me a, it's my way of kind of saying, you know, the hell with that, I'll do it my way and I've been pretty successful. John Valdez 52:58 Yeah, you have, along your trail of your life. Have you experienced discrimination, both to you personally, and what you saw happen to people, the account that you mentioned about when you were 15, with the police department, anything along those same lines. I don't mean violent, but, you know, just oppression? Ed 53:28 Well, you know, when I think about growing up in Nebraska, I remember, you know, I wasn't always looking for fights. But I got into my share of fights and stuff like that. When I look back and reflect on that, a lot of it was because of, you know, people would treat me like, you know, some dumb Mexican, or whatever and I would hear shit because again, getting to this kind of being able to cross as white and I also lived on the white part of town. I went to elementary school with in a primarily white student body, and so I would hear shit being talked about Mexicans a lot. I would, quote unquote, dispel those myths, those rumors, you know, and I didn't care who it was, you know, if it was the biggest kid on the block, or whatever, they started giving me crap treating me bad because of what I perceived to be my ethnicity and lots of times it was, I would get into fights. John Valdez 54:34 Would you go home and share that with your mom and dad? Ed 54:37 Oh, yeah. Then I also wanted to quit football, I was pretty good football player. When I was a sophomore, I felt I was getting passed over because of class issues. The way that I think I know that to be the case is, you know, my position coach, I was offensive lineman. My position coach always wanted to, you know, put me in over this other person, but this other person's mom was like a secretary to high school. I remember him always getting chewed out because he didn't always, I was center and he gets chewed out for not knowing his plays for you know, and it would always be like the first team - 15 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai defense against, you know, or whatever and I would win most of my battles against the first team nose guard than the guy ahead of me. I got so pissed off at one point when I was a sophomore, I told my dad I wasn't playing anymore. You know, and I think as part of his experience remember when I was talking about him getting pushed out. John Valdez 55:43 Yes. Ed 55:46 He didn't let that stop him, so he kept pushing forward. You know, we measure success in different ways. He became a success as a union worker, you know, and so, when he, when I told him I was gonna quit, he goes why are you gonna quit? I said, because they're racist in, he goes ya know, but are you gonna quit anytime you experienced that? Because if you do, you're not going to go get anywhere. I kind of like, Yeah, whatever, dad, yeah, this and that. But it in any case, I realized what you know, I think I also realized how much it meant to him. Because, you know, again, going back to like, he never got to experience this stuff. He knew I had an opportunity and he was kind of just saying, you know, to me, in his own way, he was trying to tell me, you're going to waste an opportunity. So I stuck it out, my junior I lettered as a as a varsity letterman played more, I still should have been starting. But I stuck it out and then my senior year, I made honorable mention all conference. Not bad, you know, and I had a good time. That's the way it went, but and then, you know, and then I started noticing, you know, what we call structural discrimination, after I started studying about, you know, and how people with less skills that you had would get passed over and stuff like that for jobs that you probably should have had, you know, based on your skill set and your education. I seen that happen a lot, you know. So yeah, I kind of have seen this, the structural discrimination aspect of it as well, too. But yeah, I've seen a lot of that, mainly in probably the most in with regards to the criminal justice system. Because, you know, my study, my dissertation was on disparate sentencing outcomes in felony court cases in Scottsbluff County, as a matter of fact. Over a five year period, in 19, I think it was 1989 to 1994, Scottsbluff County was sending a disproportionate amount of individuals to the state prison, even outnumbering places like Omaha and Lincoln. With how many people were being sent to prison, Latinos, and based a lot of disparate outcomes in drug charges. So but it was kind of fitting the stereotypes. It's a lot more nuanced than that. But yeah, and that's kind of what I made tenure on was looking at publishing research on disparate criminal sentencing decisions. John Valdez 58:46 Well, that's great. Are your parents still alive? Ed 58:50 Yeah, my parents are alive John Valdez 58:52 Do you see them often. Ed 58:54 - 16 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai I haven't. I try. I've been getting it back more recently. My parents health is not very good right now. But it's hard to get back when you live about eight hours away. It's, you know, expensive on top of I still have a 14 year old daughter that I have to, you know, plan around for school and stuff. I can't take her out of school all the time. John Valdez 59:22 Right. Ed 59:23 All that and no, and then COVID, COVID's Kicking everybody's ass, John Valdez 59:27 That's right. Yeah, but you've made your parents proud. I'm sure they loved your story, your journey. Ed 59:33 Yeah, and again, you know, your parents did a lot to help you get there and stuff and you know, I wish I could do more at this point in time. I do what I can and most of the time it's, you know, kind of financial, you know, I can do something financially that kind of relieves my guilt from not being there and helping out with my sisters. I have a younger sister, well two younger sisters that are doing probably a disproportionate amount of the work taking care of my parents. Yeah, you know there's still living my mom's Oh, she asked just recently she barely retired about a year and a half ago. John Valdez 1:00:14 Wow Ed 1:00:15 Yeah, I know she just kept working and she quit working and then she's been diagnosed with cancer. John Valdez 1:00:21 Well I wish him all the luck, you know, as our parents age, and yeah, I lost my dad in 2000. He's way older, like I told you, you know, that my mother, but yeah, you know that with all of the things that they were exposed to, especially my dad working at the Depot. John Valdez 1:00:21 Oh no. Ed 1:00:21 Yeah cancer, she got that removed and was pretty successful on that but still going through chemotherapy and most recently had some vertebrae cracks and about three vertebrae that they did some procedures cementing those vertebrae together. She's doing a little bit better and stuff. My dad's been immobile, probably for a year and a half, something like that. Ed 1:01:06 Right. - 17 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai John Valdez 1:01:07 But he was diabetic and although we took good care of him, and you know, did all the follow ups with his doctor and stuff, but exposed to a lot of different kinds of things. Ed 1:01:22 Right. John Valdez 1:01:22 With the ammunition, You know, that took its toll. But I think you know, we look back whether I could have been your counselor, you could have been my student, teacher, parent, but what we did for ourselves to turn around and make our parents feel proud. And yes, we, thank them for all of the things that they did the suffering, but they found it. I think, like, in the case of my parents that they wouldn't have done it any differently. You know, we've may look at it as sacrifices, but it was something that they wanted to do for each one of us. Ed 1:02:03 Yeah. John Valdez 1:02:05 But you've laid nice groundwork for your students all along the way. I'm sure they look at you and you've set the standard, you know, a model for them to be able to proceed with their lives. And hopefully, that will continue with the rest of you. Ed 1:02:24 It's a hard time for Latinos right now, man, big time. You know COVID's kicking our ass on top of, you know, the discrimination, you know, we fought pretty hard in the 60s 70s and early 80s to kind of overcome these barriers, these obstacles, and now, you know, you get some asshole like Trump and others like that, that come in for a little bit. And I don't know what your political affiliation is. John Valdez 1:02:50 Well, you and I are in the same. Ed 1:02:53 You know, that's, you get somebody like that, and things change overnight. My daughter who's 14 now, and this is probably the story I'll end with. You know, some people want to believe this shit doesn't happen still. But my daughter when Trump was campaigning, she came back from her mom's after one of her visits from her mom's. She says, Dad, are we going to move to Mexico? And I looked at her and i said what? She goes, are we going to move to Mexico? No why, because mom say we're going to have to move to Mexico. She probably overheard her mom talking politics, her mom's a professor too. She's also in academe as well. So she probably heard some of the similar conversation she hears, here with me and some of my colleagues and friends and stuff. And but you know, she, they're not immune to what goes on on TV. Their their friends in school, talk about the same stuff, too. Her mom is originally from Mexico, and so she's got relatives there and she probably might have said, well, I'll just move to - 18 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai Mexico if Trump, you know, just totally off the cuff. Yes, she was, you know, she was so concerned that she came and asked me if we were going to move to Mexico, and I told her, Mija, I said, Trump isn't the first person that hated Mexicans, and he's not going to be the last. John Valdez 1:04:17 That's correct. Ed 1:04:18 That's just the way things have worked out for us, our ancestors, you know what, though? And said, well, we're going to do what everybody else, including ourselves, we're gonna do what people have done before us, we're gonna fight for civil rights. She goes, yeah, just like Martin Luther King? and I go yeah. Just like women's rights, and they go exactly, mija. You know, cuz I've started them off, you know, young and about, you know, this is a right this is, you know, just because you're a woman and you know, this and that or whatever. You know, I had to re-learn a lot of stuff as well. I probably wasn't the best feminist early on in my career and stuff and you know, there's nothing wrong with being a feminist. You know, it's just believing that women have the rights, the same rights as men. John Valdez 1:05:06 But life is about adapting to right, we change. And if we don't change, that's the sin. Ed 1:05:12 Right. And that's what Chicanismo is about, you know, social justice for everybody, not just your own self. John Valdez 1:05:18 Did you tell me one time that you had some familiarity with people at UNM? Ed 1:05:25 Um, yeah. Well, I know some faculty there. Not really, personally, again, probably through like, Chicano studies, but Trish Martinez. John Valdez 1:05:36 The girl from Wyoming, right? Ed 1:05:38 Yeah, yeah, she was my student at one point in time, and now she's got her PhD and working on that book project, as well as with Following the Manito Trail. I think she's one of the lead researchers on that, or whatever coordinators or something like that. And then a Cici Aragon. I don't know if you know, Cici. She's a professor at Wyoming right now, but I think she's originally from Albuquerque. And who else do I kind of know? Oh, Vanessa Fonseca. John Valdez 1:06:13 I see her name often. - 19 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai Ed 1:06:15 Yeah, she's the one that I think that kind of got a lot of the funding for that Following the Manito Trail, or whatever. And it was interesting, I know her because when I was my last year as the chair, as the director of the Chicano Studies program, that's when we hired her to work at university Wyoming. John Valdez 1:06:36 Interesting. Trisha interviewed me for the Manitos Project. Because she told me that I remember her telling me that her parents were from the Arroyo Seco area. There in the Taos County area. Ed 1:06:51 Uh huh. And they moved to Cheyenne. John Valdez 1:06:54 Yes, that's correct. Ed 1:06:56 Right, and then she became my student. When she was, you know, living there. She was a single mom and, you know, I think she still is, but that doesn't matter, either. But in any case, you know, yeah, she was one of my students and stuff. John Valdez 1:07:10 Wow, that's great. Well, we'll have to meet one day and you have convinced me and early on about interviewing people in mine, our generation too. There's a Danny Quintana, who's a lawyer in Utah, in Salt Lake. He was born in Costilla also, his dad and mom were like, like my parents, you know, they migrated out of the small villages, you know, for economic reasons. His dad was hired at 12 like a lot of other people. So many northern New Mexicans, you know, had moved to Tooele and then later on and, but Danny went to college at Utah, and is a lawyer and he's got a foundation. I can't remember what disease hit him quite a few years ago. So he's paralyzed from the waist down, so he's got a foundation in making available to third world countries, wheel chairs. Ed 1:08:21 Okay. Wow. John Valdez 1:08:23 So yeah, I'll interview him too, he's got quite a story to tell as well. Ed 1:08:28 Okay. Sounds great. John Valdez 1:08:29 Yeah. Well, it was a pleasure Ed now, I would like to suggest that on Wednesdays meeting, If you can walk us, especially me through a whatever mistake I made at the beginning for not being able to connect with you, you know, oh, yeah, whatever I did wrong. - 20 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai 1:08:50 Okay. With the the zoom. Yeah, yeah. Okay. You have a Zoom account, though, right? Yes. Okay. You what you can do is you can go in there and play around a little bit with it. Like, you know, you can like schedule a meeting, you know, because there's this, once you get in there, I think it says, you know, join a meeting or start a meeting. John Valdez 1:09:17 And I did click on schedule a meeting. Ed 1:09:19 Yeah. And then well, you can schedule it, but then you have to send it to like the invitation at the bottom once you kind of create a Zoom meeting. Then you have to go all the way to the bottom and click on Save meeting. That will save it and then you can do like the copy in which I usually do a copy invitation and then put it in an email and send people to the email information. John Valdez 1:09:44 I mean, invite and I did copied I did click on that and then I I got your email and I send it to you Did you not get it? Ed 1:09:53 Let me check real quick. I turned my email off. I have two email accounts and so you might have sent it to my work email. I don't know for sure yet. John Valdez 1:10:06 It could have been Ed 1:10:16 Oh, here we go. Okay, I see it now. Yeah, okay. You want me to click on that? And so you can see. John Valdez 1:10:25 Yes. Ed 1:10:26 Okay, well, I'm gonna get out of this one. Okay. I'm gonna end this meeting and then I'll, I'll click on the other one, right you could do is you could go into your account and start the meeting. Okay? John Valdez 1:10:39 Yes. Ed 1:10:40 I'll leave this one. Okay. John Valdez 1:10:42 Okay. - 21 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai Ed 1:10:42 All right. Bye. John Valdez 1:10:43 Bye. - 22 - Transcribed by https://otter.ai