Latin America, extending from the deserts of northern Mexico to the icy wilds of Tierra del Fuego in Chile and Argentina, encompasses many diverse countries and peoples. Though most of these countries are largely Catholic and Spanish-speaking, thanks to a shared history of colonization by Spain, they have at least as many differences as they do similarities with each other. In the United States the terms "Hispanic" and "Latino" (or "Latina" for a woman; sometimes written as “Latinx” to be gender-neutral) were adopted in an attempt to loosely group immigrants and their descendants who hail from this part of the world. The terms are often used interchangeably, though the words can convey slightly different connotations. It is important to clarify that the categories refer only to a person's origin and ancestry. A Latino/a or Hispanic person can be any race or color.
In general, "Latino" is understood as shorthand for the Spanish word latinoamericano (or the Portuguese latino-americano) and refers to (almost) anyone born in or with ancestors from Latin America and living in the U.S., including Brazilians. "Latino" does not include speakers of Romance languages from Europe, such as Italians or Spaniards, and some people have (tenuously) argued that it excludes Spanish speakers from the Caribbean. Although people from French Guiana are sometimes accepted as Latino since French shares linguistic roots with Spanish and Portuguese, there is much debate about whether people from English-speaking Belize and Guyana and Dutch-speaking Suriname truly fit under the category since their cultures and histories are so distinct.
"Hispanic" is generally accepted as a narrower term that includes people only from Spanish-speaking Latin America, including those countries/territories of the Caribbean or from Spain itself. With this understanding, a Brazilian could be Latino and non-Hispanic, a Spaniard could be Hispanic and non-Latino, and a Colombian could use both terms. However, this is also an imperfect categorization, as there are many indigenous peoples from Spanish-speaking countries who do not identify with Spanish culture and do not speak the dominant language.
To simplify (or perhaps further confuse) matters, the 2010 U.S. Census listed both terms together and specifically mentioned the Spanish-speaking countries/territories of the Caribbean but vaguely excluded non-Spanish speaking countries (many Brazilians, for example, were unsure whether to check the box). In day-to-day life, many Latin American immigrants and descendants simply prefer to state their countries of origin directly.
Some have drawn sharp distinctions between these two terms – saying, for example, that Hispanics are people from Spain or from Spanish-speaking countries in Latin America (this excludes Brazil, where Portuguese is the official language), while Latinos are people from Latin America regardless of language.
Hispanic vs. Latino
You might think of Hispanic and Latino as terms used to describe racial categories, similar to the terms White, Black, or Asian. However, the groups that comprise Hispanics and Latinos are actually diverse in terms of race.
The terms "Hispanic" and "Latino" refer to ethnicity, culture, and identity. They are groups based on shared culture rather than skin color, race, or other physical features. However, the groups are also broader than ethnicity, which can make the terms confusing.
Hispanic
Hispanic refers to people who speak Spanish or who have a background in a Spanish-speaking country. In other words, Hispanic refers to the language that a person speaks or that their ancestors spoke. Some Hispanic people speak Spanish, but others don't.
For this reason, people who are Hispanic may vary in their race and also where they live or originate. For example, a person from the Dominican Republic and a person from Mexico might both call themselves Hispanic because they share in common a spoken language and a legacy of Spanish colonies.
Latino
In contrast, Latino refers to geography: specifically, people from Latin America including Central America, South America, and the Caribbean. Like being Hispanic, being Latino says nothing about your race; Latinos may be White, Black, Indigenous, Asian, etc.
However, it is important to note there is some discussion about whether people in the Caribbean actually identify as Latino in the case of non-Spanish-speaking countries.
For example, the majority of Haitians do not identify as Latino despite being part of Latin America. Jamaica, an English-speaking nation, isn’t always included as being part of Latin America either, and Jamaicans do not tend to identify as Latino.
The Bahamas, Curaçao, and Dominica are also places that are occasionally lumped into Latin America but are not Latino or Hispanic.
Some have drawn sharp distinctions between these two terms – saying, for example, that Hispanics are people from Spain or from Spanish-speaking countries in Latin America (this excludes Brazil, where Portuguese is the official language), while Latinos are people from Latin America regardless of language.
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