Mexican American Culture In Bless Me Ultima

Bless Me, Ultima is filled with Antonio's dreams. In these sequences a lot of the boy's fears and perceptions about religion and his family are vividly portrayed. These dream sequences are imaginative and beautifully written. They add a great deal to the novel. They allow the reader of Bless Me, Ultima inside the mind of this little boy, we can now see what he is dealing with. However, in order to do this, the reader must have an understanding of what the dreams mean. I will try to analyze Antonio's dreams.

In this paper I will discuss my reaction to researching cultures that are different than my own. For this experience, I visited The Arkansas Arts Center where there is currently an exhibit titled "Our America: The Latino Presence in American Art". This exhibit includes a six week film series that focuses on the history of Latino Americans. I attended the first film on Sunday, October 18, 2015. The film was titled "Foreigners in their Own Land, 1565-1880". After the film, there was also a community discussion with Dr. Kristin Dutcher Mann, UALR associate professor of history and social studies.

The immigrants entering the United States throughout its history have always had a profound effect on American culture. However, the identity of immigrant groups has been fundamentally challenged and shaped as they attempt to integrate into U.S. society. The influx of Mexicans into the United States has become a controversial political issue that necessitates a comprehensive understanding of their cultural themes and sense of identity. The film Mi Familia (or My Family) covers the journey and experiences of one Mexican-American (or “Chicano”) family from Mexico as they start a new life in the United States. Throughout the course of the film, the same essential conflicts and themes that epitomize Chicano identity in other works of literature

One of the many themes in the novel, Bless me, Ultima is Antonio’s “loss of innocence” throughout the months upon the arrival of Ultima, the curandera. At the beginning of the novel, Antonio is an innocent boy, protected from reality thanks to his age and parents. As the novel progresses, Antonio becomes aware of the bad and the good in life. Antonio’s transition from innocence to experience is shown through particular events.

Assimilation means to adapt into a new culture and become a part of them. “People of different backgrounds and beliefs undergo assimilation when, through living together, they come to see themselves as part of a larger community.” The reason why you see assimilation often in Chicano/a Literature is because many Mexicans try to blend into the American culture. Many Chicanos write stories about what they have lived through the years or stories they have heard from their love ones growing up. Some have had first-hand experience of assimilating into the American culture by trying to blend in and become accepted that they start to lose or deny a part of their identities. In the story of “Aria”, by Richard Rodriguez, being Mexican American was a challenge for him in which he struggled with having two identities. Since he spoke Spanish in an American society,

“The common denominator all Latinos have is that we want some respect. That 's what we 're all fighting for” - Cristina Saralegui. Judith Ortiz Cofer published the article, “The Myth of the Latin Woman,” where she expresses her anger towards stereotypes, inequality, and degradation of Latin Americans. Cofer explains the origins of these perceived views and proceeds to empower Latin American women to champion over them. Cofer establishes her credibility as a Latin American woman with personal anecdotes that emphasize her frustration of the unfair depiction of Latinos in society. Cofer addresses the cultural barriers and challenges that Latinos experience through emotional appeal, anecdotal imagery, parallelism and the use of effective periodic sentences.

Anzaldúa was a Mexican American who was a well-known writer and had a major impact on the fields of queer, feminist, and cultural theory. Her most famous work is Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza which includes poems, essays, and short stories. Anzaldúa was no stranger to the use of literary theories in her writing, which is evident in her short story “How to Tame a Wild Tongue.” Here, the author uses a combination of feminist, reader-response, and psychoanalytic theory to show the struggle of being oneself when they’re Mexican-American. Through the use of feminist theory, she explains how a female is labeled as an “habladora” when she tries to voice out her opinion about something; reader-response theory provides the reader with an understanding of the struggles of self-identity, which they are able to relate to, especially Mexican-Americans; and lastly, psychoanalytic theory illuminates on her childhood experiences, which could explain why Anzaldúa believes in what she does, such as the idea that Anglo people have tried to tame her tongue—in other words, her language. The text is important because not many people know the difficulties of being Mexican-American, especially when it comes to being themselves or the inner turmoil that comes with it; being Mexican-American means following traditions and speaking perfect Spanish, while at the same time having a grasp on American traditions and

In the 1960s, the Chicano movement started to gain momentum. Chicanos began banding together to protect others while discovering their own self-identity. One source says that, a newfound gratitude for Chicano culture was detected. It goes on to state that, a “cultural rebirth was proclaimed” which had been provoked by “rediscovery” and an acknowledgement of their collective indigenous roots. The author adds that, it was a chance to uncover “a positive self-definition” (Rodriguez, "Building Aztlan: Chicano Movement Springs Back to Life"). Furthermore, in the 1960s, nothing could slow down the Chicano movement once it had sparked. So much so, that Rodriguez claims that it “led to colleges and universities becoming targets of protest” and the

Situated near the U.S.-Mexico border during the early twentieth century is the fictional setting of Fort Jones, the outskirts of which is where Americo Paredes’ short story “Macaria’s Daughter” takes place. Emblematic of the disappropriation of Mexican land, as well as the increased marginalization of the Mexican people, the overbearing presence of Fort Jones reveals the struggle for preservation that characterizes the Mexican-American community of the story. “Macaria’s Daughter” is the tragic account of what happens in a small community when the upholding of Mexican values and institutions, and opposition to Anglo-American culture, become more important than a young woman’s life. In this essay, I will argue that “Macaria’s Daughter” is a text

While Barrientos and Marquez in the book, The Norton Sampler, both come from very similar cultures, they both have been raised to view their culture in different ways. In, Se Habla Espanol, Tanya Barrientos writes about how when she was younger she took pride in not knowing Spanish, but later wishes she knew the language. Myriam Marquez discusses in, Why and When We Speak Spanish in Public, that she takes pride in speaking Spanish because it is respectful to her culture. In this essay we will look into the ways in which Barrientos and Marquez differ in the ways they have been raised to view their culture.

The American Dream differs from person to person. Every dream consists of striving towards success for a better future. In The Tortilla Curtain, T.C Boyle delves into what the American Dream is to the middle class American family, the Mossbacher’s, and to the illegal immigrant family, the Rincon’s. Throughout the story, it becomes apparent that that the ability for the poverty-stricken Rincon family to achieve their dream is unrealistic. The American Dream is presented to be close to unobtainable to those who need it the most through the use of the coyote, the Arroyo Blanco community, and Cándido’s luck.

The novel “Bless Me, Ultima” is authored by Anaya Rudolfo. This novel is an autobiography since the author utilizes his hometown, Highway 66, church, little villages, the school and ranges around the town to present the story. The autobiography describes the cultural aspects of the Chicano in the rural sides of New Mexico in 1940s. In this essay, Rudolf describes the cultural aspects and landscape of the New Mexico during that particular time with an emphasis on the influential ways of the indigenous cultural aspects. Antonio Luna Márez is this novel’s main protagonist who in this story describes the environment in which he was brought up and all those that were involved in his upbringing. The story is set in a specific town within the eastern side of New Mexico, where the author’s real home is also placed, Santa Rosa, New Mexico. The novel’s main theme is the conflict of culture and the church and how the inherent differences are leveraged.

It is a type of informative paper which is providing basic information about La Raza Unida which was movement by Mexican-Americans.

societies in the world. These sub-cultures include Whites, African Americans, Asians, Irish, Latino, and European among others. Chicano refers to the identity of Mexican-American descendant in the United State. The term is also used to refer to the Mexicans or Latinos in general. Chicanos are descendants of different races such as Central American Indians, Spanish, Africans, Native Americans, and Europeans. Chicano culture came as result of a mixture of different cultures (Shingles and Cartwright 86). Despite the assimilation by the majority whites the Chicanos have preserved their culture. This paper seeks to prove that Chicano culture has deep cultural attributes that would appeal to the larger American culture, leading to strengthening of