Dignidad Inmigrante en Athens (DIA) hosted Athens’ 16th annual LatinxFest celebration just five days after the start of Hispanic Heritage Month on Saturday, Sept. 19.
Established in 2010 by Beto Mendoza of DIA, LatinxFest is an annual celebration that aims to highlight the cultural contributions that the Latinx community offers. The festivities took place between Pulaski and Lumpkin on Washington Street from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. and featured a variety of activities, performers and vendors.
Gloria Ramirez, a 74-year-old immigrant from El Salvador and a human, women’s and Hispanic rights activist, opened the festival with a speech about belonging and soul.
“I give everyone a warm welcome of peace and love,” Ramirez said. “It is important to see this Latino blood here gathered and celebrating our ancestral celebrations.”
The first two hours of the festival were marked with lively music and dance, with performances from Alys Willman, an Athens-based singer-songwriter and El Tepeyac Folkloric Dance, a dance group centered around Mexican folklorico dance.
As the spirit of festivalgoers rose, some attendees tried their hand at dancing cumbia, a traditional dance with Latin American roots, with TIMBAthens, a dance studio that teaches Cuban dance to Athens residents. Tonalli and Aklla Sumaq, two other dance groups, took to the stage and streets later in the day.
Los Potros del Norte perform onstage during the 16th annual LatinxFest in downtown Athens, Georgia, on Saturday, Sept. 20, 2025. (Photo/Caroline Newbern)
Other performers included Bichos Vivos, Consentidos de Mich, La Flor, Los Potros del Norte, Alongtime Ago Go, El ChupaSKAbra and La Suegra. All performers were based in the Latinx music or dance scene.
Four-year-old April Romero from Dublin, Georgia, rides the mechanical bull at the LatinxFest in downtown Athens, Georgia, on Saturday, Sept. 20, 2025. Besides food and art vendors, the festival also featured activities for children, including a mechanical bull and a bounce house. (Photo/Susanna Johnson)
The festival also had a Kids Zone, offering various stations including a pinata, a mechanical bull, and a bouncy house, as well as a community mural that attendees could paint and decorate.
Aline Loza, a 25-year-old coordinator with DIA, assisted in the organization and execution of LatinxFest. Loza said that DIA hosts other Hispanic events throughout the year, including celebrating all major Hispanic holidays, hosting art classes for kids and moms and hosting posada, a gratitude-focused Christmas event. Loza noted the importance of the festival and DIA’s mission.
“This is my third year doing it and every year the responsibility of having the festival gets bigger — especially this year,” Loza said.
LatinxFest also hosts a variety of charitable organizations, such as Athens-based nonprofit ULead Athens, an organization that supports immigrants and the children of immigrants in accessing higher education.
A volunteer tabling for ULead Athens, Kelly Medina, highlighted the importance of exposure for immigrant resources through festivals like LatinxFest.
“Knowing that it’s like a nice place to come by, even for a few hours, you feel like you’re not so alone,” Medina said. “And there’s lots of great resources here, too.
The festival places a spotlight on Hispanic-owned local businesses through its support of vendors. A local bakery, Honeybee Baking, featured a wide array of desserts from across Latin America, including alfajores from South America, pastel de elote and Salvadoran quesadillas.
Nilah Deletto-Howard, owner of Honeybee Baking, infuses her bakes with cultural and food sensitivity. She said that encouraging cultural inclusion through baking is important to her because her mother is from El Salvador.
“It’s a nice way to break down barriers, because we all eat food, and I think food is a communal experience,” Deletto-Howard said. “It’s nice, because if you meet someone from that other culture, you can say, ‘Hey, I’ve had this, and it’s great.’”
The display of culture and unity was important for attendees as well. Wezddy del Toro, a Ph.D. student at the University of Georgia, is originally from Michoacán, Mexico. Del Toro brought her friends to the festival, viewing it as a great opportunity to share her culture.
Del Toro also noted the importance of involving those outside the Latinx community in order to promote “a wider vision of other cultures” and to “understand a little bit more about our culture.”
The Tonalli dance group perform on stage during LatinxFest in Athens, Georgia, on Saturday, Sept. 20, 2025. Tonalli is a Mexican folkloric dance group routed in Athens. (Photo/Hosanna Worku; @Hos.an.na)
This sharing of culture is a main vision of Hispanic Heritage Month, which takes place every year between Sept. 15 and Oct. 15. The month recognizes the contributions and influence of Hispanic culture to the nation’s achievements, culture and history. LatinxFest takes place every year around Hispanic Heritage Month to contribute to the local Athens immigrant community and share culture with Athens residents.
“Every year it feels like it’s important for the Latinx community to be represented,” Loza said. “This year… I’ve never felt it as much.”