CLUB PROFILE: META making artistic moves, strides at CSULB

By Kristen Wooley
On-line Forty-Niner

With a theatrical production underway and a growing membership, the Chicano-Latino campus organization Movimiento Estdiantil de Teatro y Arte, or META, is going strong.

The club was revived after it died out on campus around eight years ago. Now five years into the new revival of the organization, co-treasurer Lorenzo J. Uribe, says the group is evolving.

"META is not just a club just for Latinos. We encourage anyone to join. The purpose of the organization is to give diverse groups a chance to express themselves through different musical genres as well as in art and theater," Uribe said.

Uribe went on to describe how the original six members got together because they felt that the minorities on campus weren't being able to express themselves enough.

"This campus is big on diversity. We feel that the issues aren't being addressed the way they should be. Minorities are important and I think we can all learn from each other. This year is the year to open the group up to everyone," Wendy Chaves, president of META, said.

Now trying to target other cultures, the group hopes to learn more about other people by uniting as a bigger group, and teaching others as well about the Latino culture, Chaves said.

This semester is the second large play that META has put on. The play, "The Migrant Farm Worker's Son," written by Sylvia Gonzales and directed by former student Emiliano Torres, is about the struggles that immigrants face in America and how the children of immigrants face the challenges of often being torn between two cultures, Chaves said.

"It is a play that I think a lot of minorities can relate to. My family had gone through it when my father didn't want to learn English. It takes a toll on a family," Chaves said.

During the production and preparation for the play which Uribe said was a grueling but rewarding experience, the group expanded to eleven members and including cast and crew the number has grown still to around 20, Chaves said.

Vice president Rudy Marquez said that he would like the Latin community be able to see Latin Theater as well as be exposed to the music and the art of the culture.

"I am a theater major and a few of my friends and I were realizing that most of the plays we were in were European and we wanted to do something to put Latino talent out there," Marquez said.

Future goals, the members say are to create a website to reach other campuses, have an art gallery showing and collaborate with another organization on campus, MEXICA for an even larger theater and musical routine.

The play, "The Migrant Farm Worker's Son," is showing for the next two weeks at the University Theater.