ABSTRACT
This chapter examines an important period in U.S. Spanish-language television development between the uncertainty surrounding the legal challenges facing the Spanish International companies (renamed Univision in 1986) and the industry’s increased growth and visibility in the 1990s. If legal processes and ownership struggles dominated the first six years of the 1980s, the last four revolved largely around adjusting to a new competitive environment and efforts to establish domestic program production and its international distribution. The chapter begins by discussing the 1980s’ designation as the Decade of the Hispanic, which, along with the census information discussed in the prior chapter, brought new interest to the population—and by extension a key medium reaching it—by business and political interests alike.
