As apart of Hispanic Awareness Month, Ohio University Southern hosted a talk on relations between the United States and Mexico.

Miguel Monroy from Coahuila, Mexico, gave the talk in Bowman Auditorium on Wednesday. Monroy is currently with the Southeast Chamber of Commerce and Employers Association of Coahuila, but has done talks like this one at OU in the past.

“My first time was 15 years ago when we started this program between Ohio University and Monterrey Tech, the university I was working for,” said Monroy.

OU professor Dr. Dave Lucas has known Monroy for many years.

“What I like about Miguel is he’s very objective,” Lucas said. “He’ll talk about what’s good about Mexico and what’s bad about Mexico.”

Lucas is part of the Diversity Committee at OU that organizes talks like the one with Monroy to provide a more global and universal experience for the students.

Monroy said his main goal for the presentation was awareness.

“We are neighbors and sometimes (Americans) know more about the UK and France than the average U.S. citizen knows about Mexico,” said Monroy. “Even though we’re so close, we share thousands of miles of border, we don’t really know each other.”

During his talk, Monroy described Coahuila and its economy, culture, immigration, discrimination and government. He also took questions from the audience, which was comprised of Dr. Lucas’ public speaking class and Dr. Charles Jarrett’s sociology class as well as other students. The group also talked about stereotypes that Americans have about Mexicans and vice versa.

When Monroy spoke about immigration, he said it is important to remember that the problem isn’t cultural and that “we must have the will to sit down and see what’d going on.”

Lucas agreed saying, “Problems are not resolved until you sit down and begin to discuss them point by point, negotiate and sometimes stand your ground and other times you have to compromise a little bit.

“It’s not enough for Arizona to say, ‘No more Mexicans here.’ It’s not enough for Texas to put up a big wall. I think the critical key is to negotiate and talk about it.”

Monroy will speak at the Lawrence County Chamber of Commerce Dinner on Thursday evening.

He will offer a Day of the Dead presentation at Ironton High School on Friday to show the differences and similarities between the Mexican holiday and Halloween.