The Role Of Identity In Gabriel Marquez's Of Love And Other Demons?

In the film “Mi Familia,” we follow the story of the Mexican-American Sánchez family who settled in East Los Angeles, California after immigrating to the United States. Gregory Nava and Anna Thomas introduce the story of this family in several contexts that are developed along generations. These generations hold significant historical periods that form the identity of each individual member of the family. We start off by exploring the immigrant experience as the family patriarch heads north to Los Angeles, later we see how national events like the great depression directly impact Maria as she gets deported, although she was a US citizen. The events that follow further oppress this family and begins separate identity formations. These

You can see how Maria’s El Salvador is empty of people, full only of romantic ideas. Jose Luis’s image of El Salvador, in contrast, totally invokes manufactured weapons; violence. Maria’s “self-projection elides Jose Luis’s difference” and illustrates “how easy it is for the North American characters, including the big-hearted María, to consume a sensationalized, romanticized, or demonized version of the Salvadoran or Chicana in their midst” (Lomas 2006, 361). Marta Caminero-Santangelo writes: “The main thrust of the narrative of Mother Tongue ... continually ... destabilize[s] the grounds for ... a fantasy of connectedness by emphasizing the ways in which [Maria’s] experience as a Mexican American and José Luis’s experiences as a Salvadoran have created fundamentally different subjects” (Caminero-Santangelo 2001, 198). Similarly, Dalia Kandiyoti points out how Maria’s interactions with José Luis present her false assumptions concerning the supposed “seamlessness of the Latino-Latin American connection” (Kandiyoti 2004, 422). So the continual misinterpretations of José Luis and who he really is and has been through on Maria’s part really show how very far away her experiences as a middle-class, U.S.-born Chicana are from those of her Salvadoran lover. This tension and resistance continues throughout their relationship.

Sandra Cisneros’s short story “Never Marry a Mexican” deals heavily with the concept of myth in literature, more specifically the myth La Malinche, which focuses on women, and how their lives are spun in the shadows on men (Fitts). Myths help power some of the beliefs of entire cultures or civilizations. She gives the reader the mind of a Mexican-American woman who seems traitorous to her friends, family and people she is close to. This causes destruction in her path in the form of love, power, heartbreak, hatred, and an intent to do harm to another, which are themes of myth in literature. The unreliable narrator of this story was created in this story with the purpose to show her confusion and what coming from two completely different

In my analysis of this novel, The Adventure of Don Chipote or, When Parrots Breast-Feed by Daniel Venegas, I kept in mind that Nicolás Kanellos put great effort into getting this novel circulated in Spanish and in English. Kanellos argues that Spanish-language immigrant novels more accurately present the “evils” of American society such as oppression of the immigrant workers and deconstructs the myth of the American Dream, which permeates in English-language ethnic autobiographies. I believe Kanellos felt so passionately about circulating this particular novel was due to the fact that in Venegas’ novel we see clear representations of the three U.S. Hispanic cultures that Kanellos presents which are the native, the immigrant, and the exile cultures.

Edited by several scholars such as Gabriella F. Arredondo, Aída Hurtado, Norma Klahn, Olga Nájera-Ramírez, and Patricia Zanella, this book in particular highlights the development of Chicana identities in the twentieth century by showing “how Chicana feminist writings move discourse beyond binaries and toward intersectionality and hybridity” (Arredondo e.al. 2). What is interesting is how the feminist scholars in this book used different epistemologies and methods in capturing the experiences of the Chicanas which include oral histories, poetry, theatrical performance, painting, dance, music and social science survey. Some of the contributors also combine “analytical tools and cross disciplinary boundaries” (5). The approaches used are very unique as they enables to unravel the Chicana experiences thoroughly and disrupt “the notion of Chicana identity as monolithic and homogeneous” (6). Also, the format of the book which presents articles and then the responses by another activist or scholars offers a very distinct way of presenting critical and provocative analysis. Such format allows the editors to “reaffirm the tensions and creativity of individual and group consciousness that underlie Chicana feminism and scholarship” (Salas 122). From this edited volume, I choose three articles along with their responses. Those articles are Cartohistografía: Continente de una voz/Cartohistography: One Voice’s Continent by Elba Rosario Sánchez (response: Translating Herstory: A Reading

　　Natalie Diaz's debut collection, When My Brother Was An Aztec, is a book of poems that accounts Diaz's skills in imaginative and lyrical language. The collection explores her past in unexpected form and images, tackling the subjects of her family, most notably her meth addicted brother, life on the reservation, and being a Native American woman. In this collection Diaz has filled the pages with rich and interesting images that rely on Native American culture, experiences of her own as a Native American woman, and mythology. As I read this collection I was struck by how heavy her images rested on the page and yet how weightless they seemed to fly off.

This narrative speaks volumes about the author’s culture, which describes her religion, as well as the lifestyle of typical Hispanic families. In Latino or Chicano culture, we find that gender as well as religion plays a huge role in the lives of many individuals, causing them to shape a stereotypical kind of culture. Catholicism is one of the major forms of religion in Hispanic and Latin countries due to the influence from the Europeans. This made many of the Latin American Countries adopt this religious practice regardless of their belief. To this day, many practice Catholicism as a way to appeal to cultural norms. We see the importance of religion to the girl’s family, especially her father. Throughout the story we see the girl’s search for her own religious relationship through her abuela instead of the one forced upon her by her parents. The other influence that culture has is on gender roles within the family dynamic. Throughout the story we see the girl made fun of for her hands and for being different. This is because in latin culture girls are supposed to be dainty and gentle. They were not meant to be violent or rash, like the young teenage girl was. The gender roles constructed by culture were what her father tried to assign her into, and her mother enforcing them,

The story illustrates the overlapping influences of women’s status and roles in Mexican culture, and the social institutions of family, religion, economics, education, and politics. In addition, issues of physical and mental/emotional health, social deviance and crime, and social and personal identity are

Currently Sandra Cisneros resides in San Antonio in a purple house and she describes herself as “nobody’s mother” and “nobody’s wife.” Both Frida Kahlo’s and Cynthia Y. Hernandez’s works convey the idea of having one’s culture limit one’s freedom and individuality. Cisneros and Esperanza are both victims of this idea and realize that the only way to live one’s life freely is to defy the roles and limitations created by one’s culture.

Demetria Martínez’s Mother Tongue is divided into five sections and an epilogue. The first three parts of the text present Mary/ María’s, the narrator, recollection of the time when she was nineteen and met José Luis, a refuge from El Salvador, for the first time. The forth and fifth parts, chronologically, go back to her tragic experience when she was seven years old and then her trip to El Salvador with her son, the fruit of her romance with José Luis, twenty years after she met José Luis. And finally the epilogue consists a letter from José Luis to Mary/ María after her trip to El Salvador. The essay traces the development of Mother Tongue’s principal protagonists, María/ Mary. With a close reading of the text, I argue how the forth

One thing all human beings, have in common is the struggle for self identity. Children are raised by parents or guardians who have struggled and fought for their own identities. In many cases, parents are still trying to figure it out, while raising their own children. Such is the case with the characters in Junot Diaz’s, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. The theme of identity is conveyed through the characters’ Dominican culture, social standing, and in finding love. Oscar, Lola, and Yunior are three central characters in Oscar Wao, who’s Dominican cultural and family expectations were major obstacles as they struggled to establish their identity.

“Beautiful and Cruel” marks the beginning of Esperanza’s “own quiet war” against machismo (Hispanic culture powered by men). She refuses to neither tame herself nor wait for a husband, and this rebellion is reflected in her leaving the “table like a man, without putting back the chair or picking up the plate (Cisneros 89).” Cisneros gives Esperanza a self-empowered voice and a desire for personal possessions, thing that she can call her own: Esperanza’s “power is her own (Cisneros 89).” Cisneros discusses two important themes: maintaining one’s own power and challenging the cultural and social expectations one is supposed to fulfill. Esperanza’s mission to create her own identity is manifest by her decision to not “lay (her) neck on the threshold waiting for the ball and chain (Cisneros 88).” Cisneros’ rough language and violent images of self-bondage reveal the contempt with which Esperanza views many of her peers whose only goal is to become a wife. To learn how to guard her power

Living in Mexico throughout her teen years was very rough. Unlike other teenagers where their parents constantly provide for their children, Marisela’s life was a lot different than the usual parent- child relationship. She lived with her Abuela ( Grandma) Lupe, along with her 3 brothers and sister. She constantly had to take care of her brothers and sister at such a young age, that she became the mother-like figure of the

As a woman, Angela Vicario is the epitome of a traditional Colombian woman. A traditional Colombian woman is expected to be virgins when they get married; but Vicario defys this social custom causing Vicario to get “softly pushed his wife into [her house] without speaking,” (46). These details emphasize the idea that women are given different standards than men. The details help highlight Marquez’s criticism of how the traditional Colombian woman is treated as and thought of as. From a very young age Vicario and her sisters were taught “how to do screen embroidery, sew by machine, weave bone lace, wash and iron, make artificial flowers and fancy candy, and write engagement announcements,” (31). These skills were taught to better prepare the girls for marriage; displaying the difference in gender roles. Marquez uses parallel structure to emphasize the amount of skills one has to learn before they can be considered as good and pure. Many years after Bayardo San Román returns Vicario she still does “machine embroidery with her friends just as before she had made cloth tulips and paper birds, but when her mother went to bed she would stay in her room until dawn writing letters with no future,” (93). The diction of the words “no future” and “still” suggest that Vicario’s life is stuck in

In Gabriel Garcia-Marquez’s Chronicle of a Death Foretold, the concept of appearance versus reality is manifested in three of the major characters around whom the novel revolves. The surface impressions of Santiago Nasar, Angela Vicario, and Bayardo San Roman are deeply rooted in Latin culture; underneath the layer of tradition, however, lies a host of paradoxical traits which indicate the true complexity of human nature.