Gringo Manual on How to Handle Mexicans

Jose Angel Gutierrez is the firebrand civil rights leader of the 1960s and 70s who succeeded in making a minority-based political party a reality in Texas and various other states. In 1970, Gutierrez led la Raza Unida Party to stunning victories in Crystal City, Texas, and surrounding communities, with Mexican Americans winning all contested seats on the city council and school board, seats held for decades by Anglos. One of the four great leaders of the Chicano Movement, Gutierrez, along with Cesar Chavez, Reies Lopez Tijerina, and Rodolfo 'Corky' Gonzales, made national calls for militancy and unity, penned nationalist manifestoes, and forced political and educational reform at national and regional levels. Despite Gutierrez's total commitment to la causa, he found time to write in order to share his political wisdom. Originally self-published during the head of the Chicano Movement, A Gringo Manual on How to Handle Mexicans, now expanded and revised, is a humorous and irreverent manual meant to educate grassroots leaders in practical strategies for community organization, leadership, and negotiation. With tongue in cheek, Gutierrez attacks the authorities and sacred cows that caused Chicanos anxiety for decades. The manual is a classic in Chicano politics and as a political self-help recipe book. It remains as relevant today as when it was originally published in the early 1970's.