The innovators: people moving ideas and action in 2008.

IN OUR SECOND ANNUAL INSTALLMENT, ColorLines profiles a selection of people of color working for justice--and doing it with creativity, passion and humor. We feature among them an urban farmer who wants to feed the world, a journalist taking on racists with satire, a playwright whose monologue sears our collective memory with the experiences of Katrina survivors, and a team of organizers who pulled off an amazing feat of logistical coordination and political discipline to hold the first U.S. Social Forum. Read on for these stories of hope and patience, and enjoy.

GUSTAVO ARELLANO

Subverting racism with humor

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GUSTAVO ARELLANO WRITES a nationally syndicated column about Mexican culture for the OC Weekly in Southern California's ultraconservative Orange County, which alone is a subversive act. Except that the satirical column is called "Ask a Mexican," and in it, readers submit queries about Mexico, Mexican culture, and Mexicans. Questions range from the sincere to the ribald, and Arellano's responses are poker sharp, skewering the racism that underlies many of the inquiries while dishing out statistics and history lessons at the same time. "Ask a Mexican" has even inspired a host of other writers with similar intentions (but less successful results), including "Ask a Cuban American," "Ask a Chola," and "Ask a Korean." Arellano is writing a bold kind of critical resistance: satire to silence racists.

What were your goals with the column when you started?

It actually started as a joke, as a commentary on the twisted immigration debate in Orange County. My background is as an investigative reporter, and for years I've been covering Orange County, the Mexican-hating capitol of the world. We're the home of Prop 187, the Minutemen, and sheriffs and a mayor who proposed making police deputies into immigration officials.