The Chicano community has endured and overcome many struggles since the conquest by the conquistador in 1491 and the eviction from Atzlan. Race has been used by the white community as a tool to structure inequality for the Chicano community by classifying the Chicano community as white but treating them as a minority community. The Chicano activist during the Mexican-American generation found community self-determination by becoming actively involved in their community and taking their destiny into their own hands. Mexican-American activists have created a new way of seeing themselves by taking the term Chicano and making it a symbol of who they truly are and who they want to become. The new ethic of a Chicano's new identity is community self-determination; it is a community that is in total control of its own destiny. The Chicano community was racially profiled based on race and skin color, but they were legally seen as white because of their last name. Spanish surnames like Garcia are what create the misconception that Chicanos are Spanish. Surnames like this were incorporated into Chicano society when the Spanish colonized the New World. Once there, the Spanish gave the locals the option to assimilate or be forced into the lower class and work as slaves to the Spaniards (Gonzalez). In Racism on Trial Ian Lopez tells the reader how the jury and judges “did not recognize Mexicans as a racial group” (Lopez 43). By classifying Chicanos as Spaniards, the judges in a sense denied Chicanos their constitutional rights under the Fourteenth Amendment law. This allowed other communities to continue racial profiling of the Chicano community. This racial profiling has been particularly devastating for young people through… half of the document… the final journey ahead of them have accomplished many tasks such as escaping extreme racial profiling by being active in the community. Chicanismo is more than just a race, it is a lifestyle; Chicanismo must be earned by contributing to the Chicano community. Works Cited "Chicano! PBS Documentary - The Struggle in the Fields." YouTube. PBS, September 30, 2011. Web. November 2, 2013. Gonzalez, Araceli. “Discussion #2.” Chicano Studies 10. University of California Davis. Wellman 229. October 8, 2013. Ian F. Haney López. Racism on Trial: The Chicano Fight for Justice. Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2003Jackson, Carlos. "Lesson #7." Introduction to Chicano Studies 10. University of California Davis. Keliber 3. October 22, 2013. Rosa Linda Fregoso. The Bronze Screen: Chicana and Chicana Film Culture. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993