In 2011, the Los Angeles Times made it official: The term [Latino] in virtually all cases is the appropriate choice over Hispanic. In response, readers chimed in with personal preferences, public attacks, and historical explanations going back to the Aztecs.

Over the last few decades, these terms have become contentious as politics change and identites shifts. Below is a primer on the terms themselves and reasons they manage to elicit such emotion.

Origins
Hispanic generally refers to people who speak Spanish, are descendants of (not from) Spain or countries that were once under Spanish rule, which is why some consider Brazilians Latino, but not Hispanic. Latino generally refers to people who are descendants of “Latin” speaking countries and cultures once under Roman rule. The fact that Rome annexed the Iberian Peninsula explains why the term excludes people from Spain and Portugal.

These descriptions aren’t totally satisfying and leave ample room for loopholes and confusion. They also aren’t used much beyond the United States. But here, the umbrella term “Latino” was popularized during the social movements of the 60’s. While the 1970 census asked people to identify according to nationality (e.g., Colombian), “Hispanic” grew in prominence. By 1980, “Hispanic” became the official government term, used in federal, state and municipal employment applications and school enrollment. Still, the 1980 census tried to have it both ways with the phrase Hispanic or Latino.

Preferences
Whatever the government deems appropriate, individuals show different preferences. According to a 2008 poll[1] by the Pew Hispanic Center, 36 percent prefer Hispanic, 21 percent prefer Latino, while the rest have no preference. The poll also showed that Cuban immigrants in Miami and conservative Mexican Americans in Texas strongly identify as Hispanic, while Democrats use Latino more often than Republicans.

Many prefer Latino because it is a Spanish word, while Hispanic is a more Eurocentric term. Of Hispanic, Sandra Cisneros once said, “To me, it’s like a slave name. I’m a Latina.” But others argue that the term Hispanic has allowed the government to acknowledge discriminatory practices and enforce civil rights. Because Hispanic is more likely to be seen in the news and in research, some say it carries more political weight than a term like Colombian.

Solutions?
One recommendation is to use Latino when referring to personal, political, or social topics, and use Hispanic for statistics and demographics. The position of The New York Times is to use, what the individual they are writing about prefers, or use a more specific references (e.g., Mexican-American) if it’s pertinent to the story. The poll cited above found that about half of Latino adults generally describe themselves by their country of origin first and almost a quarter call themselves American on first reference.

We should accept that there’s no way of pleasing everyone; we may likely offend someone with our choice. But before you get offended, remember this: George Lopez doesn’t like the word Hispanic because it has the word panic in it. In other words, it’s possible to take ourselves too seriously.