Masculinity In Ysrael

Based on a study of a thirty-person Latino classroom, sixty percent said their parents resorted to violence when disciplining them. The definition of masculine can have 2 different meanings. One, being the percentage of male characteristics someone has, and two, how tough someone is. Certain cultures have sets of rules on how to grow and be a man. In the story “Fiesta 1980”, Juniot Diaz writes about a boy named Yunior who has trouble growing up in his Dominican family with an aggressive father that he grows upon. While Yunior struggles with his father, “The mask you live in” directed by Jennifer Siebel Newsom, discusses the current world problems in adolescence with masculinity. Notably, the author Juniot Diaz reflects his personal life in

In the book Ain’t no Makin’ it Jay Macleod presents a theory very on in this book, he calls this the “Achievement Ideology”. From the reading, I understand that in today’s culture that there are still race relations. Even though both groups of boys came from the same educational background and the same impoverished living conditions. I believe his study and findings are still prevalent in today’s society. In this essay, I will be breaking down the parts and discussing social conditions, poverty, self-esteem and motivation between two “groups’’, the Hallway Hangers and the Brothers.

This chapter focuses on the depiction of prejudice, oppression and brutality in the novel under study. By analyzing the content of Black Boy we come to know about the different types of hardships and discrimination as experienced by the Richard Wright.

In his point of view, Diaz provides multiple ideas regarding white, brown and black girls personalities and backgrounds, and his perception on the issue of dating these girls, in which an important element is how to read the trails provided by these females in different occasions or situations such as his

As I read Hunger of Memory, Chapter 4, Complexion; I feel this topic played an important role in Rodriguez’s life. As a child he was always aware of his skin color, due to the fact that his mother was also calling attention to him. His mother was very sensitive to his skin color and always reminding him to stay out of the sun. For example, they were at a pool one day she called in Spanish “to put a towel over your shoulders,” (133) this would prevent him from getting any darker. His mother would even teach him ways to lighten his skin. Complexion weighed heavily on Rodriguez, so much so that he locked himself in the bathroom in an attempt to try and “shave off” his dark skin. Adolescents’ is not any easy time in any child’s life and then

Sula’s and Nel’s friendship is invaluable because they two meet at the time when they need each other the most and this is an important aspect of Sula’s and Nel’s friendship, they are together because they want to, not because they have to; it is also this aspect of Sula and Nel’s relationship which is different from their relationships with their mothers. Sula and Nel meet at the time in their life when they both start to realize that their position in the society is disadvantaged “because each had discovered years before that they were neither white nor male, and that all freedom and triumph was forbidden to them, they had set about creating something else to be”(52). The two girls make friends because they have a lot in common and grew up in the same neighborhood and community; they understand each other’s problems and needs. Some of the undeserved punishments Sula and Nel are facing together, for example, the attacks from a group of Irish boys who are harassing African American school children in Medallion. These attacks make the girls aware of their uneasy position in the society but Sula and Nel need to learn how to protect themselves on their own. Sula and Nel are scared of the Irish boys and try to avoid them on their way from school until one day when Sula and Nel decide to take the shorter route home although they are aware of the fact that they might meet the harassing boys, which they eventually do. Sula takes the lead in this scene and protects herself and

Class and gender/sexuality are complicated in “Drown” by Junot Díaz. Yunior and Beto are ex-best friends who are separated through the complications. Their relationship tenses up when Beto decides to better his life through education. At first glimpse, Yunior’s struggle with class and sexuality could be based within his homophobic fear. The typical understanding that Yunior’s unmotivated attitude stems from fear is flawed because it fails to recognize his stance to not change who he believes he is and where he is meant to be. When examined more closely, this assumption completely overlooks Díaz’s emphasis on different perspectives when it comes to coming of age. Although Yunior is younger than Beto, he challenges expectations, and instead of moving on with his life, he sticks to what he knows. Rather than conforming to the typical understanding, Yunior challenges this role by proving he has already grown up just in a different period than Beto.

The story how to date a brown girl (black girl, white girl, or halfie) by Junot Diaz is a manual on how to date someone or be involved in sexual relations. The audience the article is directed to is high school and college readers able to handle the mature language. These actions are then suggested after the author suggests he fake being sick as to stay home with his girl. Diaz gives multiple options as to what the girls reaction could possible be. Young men and women from poor families feel the need to hide certain things from their home such as the government cheese. Diaz also describes how these girls will react when put into certain situations.

When a teacher says, “We’re going on an all day field trip next Friday!!!” students get excited. A field trip means getting out of school and going somewhere fun. Sadly, then they say, “We’re going to the park to pick up trash for Earth Day! And then we will write an essay on why it is important to keep the Earth clean. Five paragraphs!” then all their dreams of having any fun next Friday are gone. This is similar to how the boy with the jacket felt in Gary Soto’s “The Jacket.” He was hoping for a leather jacket that was cool enough to “hold down a small town”. Sadly, he instead got a ugly greenish brown jacket, that looked like “day old guacamole”. Soto uses literary elements, such as conflict, setting and symbolism show that one can often let their expectations get in the way of their happiness.

In Dominican culture masculinity is an expectation in every male. Oscar is a Domincan male, and being that he is Dominican many people expect him to be a person that he is not. The definition of being a Dominican male in this book is about the looks and women a man attains. Oscar is pressured into fitting in

Victor Rios begins chapter six by describing the way the Latino boys he studied used masculinity as a rehabilitative tool. He describes how the boys are constantly “questioning” each other’s manhood as a way of proving their own masculinity. “The boys’ social relations with one another and with community members were saturated with expressions and discourses of manhood” (pg.125). Rios continues to describe the affects criminalization and its gendered practices has influenced these young boy’s mentality of what it means to be masculine.

They way a person reads is greatly influenced by their personal background; their story, their culture, anything that led them to who they are today. When reading How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents written by Dominican-American Julia Alvarez, many controversial points are brought up that can be interpreted in many different ways depending on who is reading. In many scenarios, it’s the matter of where the reader comes from, in this case the Dominican Republic, or the United States. By having written from both Dominican and American perspectives, Alvarez teaches how a character’s sexuality or sexual tendencies can be perceived differently depending on the reader's personal background.

In the novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, the Dominican culture is told through a stereotypical Dominican named Yunior. As stated in the title, the novel discusses Oscar Wao’s brief life through his family’s curse called Fukú. The history of his family is presented through their downfalls in love, which overtime accumulates into a burden for Oscar to experience the same events his family members had once experienced. This Fukú that has been lurking within the Cabral family’s history from the Dominican Republic to the United States is commonly found through dysfunctional relationships between men and women. The known concept in relationships called love transforms into a corrupted power source for abuse based on the

In the novel a typical Dominican male is portrayed as powerful, full of charm and physically attractive. Oscar, weighing over 300 pounds, and living an extremely nerdy life is a complete opposite of the Dominican stereotype. According to the book’s narration the most important part of DR masculinity is sex and this is again something that Oscar struggles to experience, but no matter what he does, he can’t. On the other hand, Junior is the exact representation of a Dominican male. He possesses all the properties that a DR man is supposed to have and even these are extraordinary potent. Junior seems to be superior to Oscar in every aspect of their lives, as narrator wants us to believe. However,

In the novels, We The Animals by Justin Torres and Soledad by Angie Cruz the narrators’ relationship to men is influenced by the behavior and interactions with their families. The role that men play in the life of the unnamed narrator in We The Animals is based around his coming to terms with his sexuality, and how his sexuality makes him an outsider within his family. Likewise, in the novel Soledad, the titular character’s perception of men is shaped by not only her family, but also Dominican culture. Similarly, Soledad like the narrator from We The Animals is also an outsider in her family because she is distant and she is pursing higher education.