I wanted to help BC celebrate LGBT Pride month by profiling Amigas Latinas, an affinity group here in Chicago and one of its founders, Evette Cardona. I was lucky enough to meet Evette through her partner, Mona Noriega, both of whom have done groundbreaking work in the Latina and queer communities, with local and national impact. As a typical example of the kind of support the organization offers, when I, Ann Cardinal and Jane Alberdeston Coralin launched the release of Sister Chicas in Chicago in 2006, the Amigas were in full force at a reading they co-sponsored with a landmark Chicago independent bookstore, Women and Children First. With love and gratitude, I offer this post.
Evette Cardona's lesbian activism began in 1993 when she came out "publicly" and became a founding member of WACT (Women of All Cultures Together), a gathering of lesbians, bisexual women, and heterosexual women allies taking advantage of Chicago's diversity to bridge racial, ethnic, and cultural divides. The group has held monthly potluck brunches throughout the Chicago area. During Cardona's tenure with WACT, over 70 brunches gathered suburban and city lesbians together.
As an organizer, she has helped to lead or found several community groups, including Women of All Cultures Together, Amigas Latinas, the Lesbian Community Cancer Project, and the Center on Halsted Steering Committee. As a philanthropic administrator, she has been especially helpful in funding organizations serving historically underrepresented community sectors.
In the summer of 1995, Cardona helped to found Amigas Latinas as an organization for Latina les/bi/questioning women. Through a model of monthly dining and discussion groups, the organization has provided a celebratory environment for English- and Spanish-speaking women to learn about the Latina community's diversity. The group addresses such issues as immigration rights, language barriers, and homophobia in special relationship to ethnic discrimination. In 1999, Cardona helped to create the Aixa Diaz Scholarship Gift Fund, named after an Amigas Latinas founder, to aid a Latina lesbian or bisexual student fighting high school homophobia and to aid children of Mozart Elementary School, where Diaz had taught first grade.
In 1997 Cardona became a member of the planning council of Color Triangle, a consortium of persons from various organizations who meet to discuss racism within the Chicago lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community. She also co-chaired the Leadership Development Institute, designed to foster leadership in Chicago's LGBT community.
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