Drown By Junot Diaz Summary

The definition of masculinity; Is the fact of being a man or having qualities considered typical of a man.

Masculinity is a quality of a man, a man who empowers strength and expertise to achieve goals easier. The essence of being masculine, illustrates powerful behavior, such as courage, and audacity. Stephen, fifteen-year-old pulp-cutter trying to fit into an environment, feeling extremely honored, as his father modeled, "become a man", impels a decent reputation in his father’s

The highly masculine society of Dominican culture does overwhelm the female character of the novel. The Dominican culture is a highly male dominant society in which women are often abused

The traditional definition of masculinity include such qualities as independence, pride, resiliency, self control and physical strength. It can be change into qualities such as competitiveness, toughness, aggressiveness and power. For example, he says that the boy who doesn’t show these qualities and might be called a “fag”. The boy is most likely becoming aware of having feminine qualities.

Diaz not only stereotypes in this story, but he generalizes by race and social class. The way he does this is he predicts what each girl will do or say because of the aforementioned race and social class. He implies that all girls are brought up the same way for example “A local girl may have hips and a thick ass but she won’t be quick about letting you touch.” or “A halfie will tell you that her parents met in a movement” he says this so assuredly and confidently like every girl will say this and every girl does say this. The only way to predict what a girl is going to say, is by putting her into a

Oscar, who was a Dominican man, did not fit the stereotype of a Dominican man. He "couldn't play sports," did not know how to fight, and enjoyed reading science fiction and comic books (Diaz 20). Moreover, Oscar was also not particularly attractive and overweight. Unfortunately for Oscar, Dominican men were "supposed to have Atomic Level G", to "be pulling in bitches with both hands, and be athletic and muscular" (24). Furthermore, they were expected to be extremely macho and exude confidence. It was not Oscar's fault that he lacked some of these characteristics because he "didn't have no kind of father to show him the masculine ropes (15). As a result, he did not have much luck with the ladies and, "everybody noticed his lack of game", criticizing him (24). This illustrates how this stereotype and gender role was widely accepted and how those who defied it were alienated. Thus, life was extremely difficult for Oscar, who struggled with many problems throughout his life because he was not the typical Dominican

Masculinity is a set of attributes, qualities, characteristics, behaviors or roles generally associated with boys and men. Throughout this novel we are faced with different point of view, individual behavior and the perfective of different men in the Dominican society. How they act and their behavior towards their Dominican women. Oscar early days started pretty well, as he was winning his way with girls at a young age of seven years (7yrs), "Oscar was something of a Casanova" (Diaz pg 11) one of those young and charming preschool lovers who was always trying to kiss

Oscar and Yunior illustrate opposing forms of masculinity. While Oscar’s awkward, fat, and nerdy character puts him in conflict with the hyper-masculine Dominican society, Yunior embodies the macho identity required by this society through his sexual aggression towards women. Their values also clash because Oscar shows respect and is faithful in his relationships, whereas Yunior is a womanizer who cannot respect beautiful women (Melissa 281). Yunior perceives no value

Before Diaz even talks about Yunior talking to different ethnical girls in his apartment, he touches on how Yunior changes his living environment to hide his true heritage. In the essay, Yunior hides all of the “Dominican artifacts,” that are in his room. He does this because he knows that

What is masculinity? Answers may vary depending on who you may ask, C.J. Pascoe’s ethnography titled Dude, You’re A Fag: Masculinity and Sexuality in High School targets high school as being the important location where the term masculinity is asserted, defended and defined by the students who roam the halls of River High. High school is a difficult time for anyone, especially when we bring up the ideals of sexuality and gender identity, all topics which are explored in this ethnography. Pascoe spent around eighteen months of fieldwork in the racially diverse working middle-class River High School. Dude You’re A Fag sheds a new light on masculinity as a meaning as well as a set of social practices. C. J. Pascoe 's unconventional approach examines masculinity as not only a gendered process but also a sexual one. Pascoe demonstrates how the threat of the word fag becomes a disciplinary mechanism for regulating heterosexual as well as homosexual boys and how the "fag discourse" is as much tied to gender as it is to sexuality.

In Diaz’s novel we see the boy Oscar who seeks for love but cannot receive it, a woman who is self assured and tough due to the lack of love from a parent as a young girl, and a boy who is afraid to devote himself to another woman, and lets go of the greatest gift when he had it laying in the palm of his hands. Oscar, due to his deep depression, allows a few men to lead him to his death, because Oscar, in his mind, was dying for a woman he “loved”. Love makes you do crazy things, it makes you irrational, it makes you reckless ,like Oscar, vulnerable, as Lola once was, and it could even make you end up alone, like Yunior. It is the greatest force of nature, it is what makes the world go round and spin as it does. We love, love, we need love, and we seek love because it is what makes us feel alive, it gives us courage, happiness, fulfillment and an endless list of what every human being wants. It is the

“The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” by, Junot Díaz explores into many issues in the Dominican community. One issue, he shows the audience is the sexim in the community. Throughout the story, one can see how men and women are treated in the culture. Also, one can see the hypocrisy in the culture between men and women.“The Brief Life of Oscar Wao”, shows that in the Dominican community, men believe they have the right to abuse and be deceitful to women and women think it is fine to endure the abuse due to the community’s belief which influence their upbringing, however, characters such as Oscar and Lola broke these norms of the community proving that people have the choice to make their own decisions.

In Junot Diaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Dominican men are judged via their embodiment of the hyper-masculine ideals and a number of women they sleep with. Outliers such as Oscar de Leon are therefore criticized, humiliated and emasculated by fellow members of society. Diaz characterizes Oscar’s plight as his struggle to lose his virginity: a major accomplishment of the Dominican, male ideal. Yunior, on the contrary, is the epitome of a Dominican man. He is able to sweep women off their feet and sleep with them. He constantly brags about his sexual conquests and encourages Oscar to pursue a lifestyle which would make him appealing to women. This machismo culture is constantly reinforced by Yunior and other male members of

Junot Diaz’s novel truly does tell the brief story of the wondrous life of Oscar de Léon, our Dominican-American protagonist, better known as Oscar Wao. Weighing in at 245 pounds, our hopeless romantic loves comic books, writes science-fiction in all of his spare time, and, as described by our homodiegetic narrator Yunior, is a “loser with a capital L” (Diaz 17). While the title might allude that this is a story solely about Oscar, Diaz also delves deep into the lives of those closest to him. This narrative tells the epic journey of Oscar, as well as his family members, and how their experiences in the United States and Dominican Republic come together full-circle at the end of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, with the help of some postmodern techniques. As an immigrant himself, Diaz is able to use his journey to bring attention to the cultural stereotypes of his characters, but unlike many bildungsroman writings, our character’s coming of age story does not provide him with enough spiritual learnings to give him the quintessential happy ending. The overall growth of Oscar only reveals the flaws in his culture, a fatal flaw in his case. Because Oscar does not comply with the Dominican standards, he faces heavy repercussions in his life.

Another important theme that was analyzed and included in Diaz fictional writing is social class & structure. In chapter six of his personal story, Diaz comes across a couple whom he refers to as boyfriend and girlfriend. When overhearing the arguments between these two individuals Diaz gets impressed by the girlfriend acknowledging her impression. As Diaz mentioned “Homegirl was too beautiful, too high-class for a cou-ple knuckleheads like us. Never saw her in a t-shirt or without jewelry” (Diaz, P.112). In this part of his personal story, Diaz acknowledges the idea of high class by describing the girlfriend as a girl who is superior and sets high standards. Another idea where Diaz demonstrates social class and structure is when he talks about his childhood memories describing his living conditions. In chapter eight of his critical fiction Diaz outlines, “We lived south of the Cementerio Nacional in a wood- frame house with three room. We were poor … We didn’t eat rocks but we didn’t eat meat or beans, either… Mami worked at Embajador Chocolate, putting in ten-, twelve- hour shifts for almost no money at all” (Diaz, P.70-71). Although his mom worked ten to twelve hours a day the money that she deserved for her job was not