“I Know I Can’t Wait to See My Name in Lights”: Nickelodeon’s Taina and Latina Television History

This essay explores the production, content, and reception of Nickelodeon’s sitcom Taina (2000–01). Created by Maria Perez-Brown, a Latina pioneer in cable television, Taina ran for two seasons and foregrounded a Puerto Rican teenage girl at a performing arts high school in New York City. Guided by an intersectional feminist media studies analysis, I argue that Taina presages the rise of girls’ tween and teen shows on cable television and paved the way for contemporary representations of Latina girlhood in mainstream broadcast, cable, and streaming television. Taina is rarely cited in the history of Latina/o television or children’s television. This essay re-centers Taina as a critical intervention into children’s television and as a leading forerunner in Latina television production. I also highlight the labor of fans in shedding light on Taina’s obscured history, creating new ways of engagement with television of the past, and demanding new representations of Latinas.