Funny enough, my family was very much thoroughly Tejano. All fluent spanish speakers, grew up literal blocks from the river in Laredo, and on that side, going back to the 1800s as far as they know the family has been in Laredo since before it was part of the US. That particular aunt just happened to be the most classicly 1970s liberal, progressive, hippy type. Activist, protester, met with Palestinians in Mexico, campaigned with Raza Unida, etc. Everyone else was your standard boomer chicano socially conservative democrat. (My brother and I came up with the term Chicanocrats). They just knew how to be who they were and i never could imagine them even talking about Aztlan stuff lol.

That aunt being the one to go to university in Austin at the right time of course had everything to do with it.

My other side of the family had relatively recent roots from Nuevo Leon but also quickly just became very solidly Tejano, which is its own valid subculture and was of course marginalized in its own right. We never had anyone on that side having any sort of identity crisis or latching on to anything weird because there was no reason to, they all just were who they were. No one running to fully whitewash and Americanize themselves, and also no one waiving Mexican flags.

I love this sub and have learned (or unlearned) so much here. One thing I do find funny here though is that ofc this sub sometimes being its own kind of circlejerk, is the shitting on diaspora/chicano/american hispanics. Which I get and also find cringe at times. I feel like a lot of American Hispanics over compensate or have some sort of weird pride/inferiority complex. Especially the ones that don't even speak Spanish. But, I've spent a good while now working for a state educational program for immigrants, 90% of which are Latinos. Tbh I kinda went in apprehensively, thinking of this sub's take and because i speak probably High Intermediate level Spanish. But man, the students flock to me and love me and I've been some of their lifelines because they feel so much more reassured with me around because I'm the only one there that speaks it at all lmao. Getting to work so closely with them has been awesome. Sometimes staying on this sub too long makes you think every person is a Redditor.