In today’s society the general attitude towards an individual is conform or be an outcast. It is seen in schools where people who do not fit into specific cliques become outcasts, the weird people. It is seen in the work place as well. People have conformed to standards set by society simply because society has said to do so. Society asks people to change themselves to fit in. However, people do not have to conform to the standards set by society.
In the novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz writes Yunior's narrative on Oscar, his family and their struggles of living as Dominicans in New Jersey in the time of the Trujillo regime. There is a strong emphasis on male gender role and extreme machismo attitude that is expected of Dominican men through out the book. The word machismo derives from the Spanish word macho meaning male or masculine. Diaz brings out the struggles of each character trying to live up to cultural standards. Some of the many manlike attributes Diaz utilizes is Yunior and Oscar's relationship to show how a contrast of identity and masculinity can alienate a person by the society. He uses their relationship to explore dueling
Diaz didn’t understand why his mother would take away from them to give to their family in Santo Domingo, “She chipped dollars off the cash Papi gave her for our daily expenses, forced our already broke family to live even broker.”(114). Junot Diaz continues his memoir by expressing his life as a young Dominican boy living in a low class neighborhood. He struggles to enjoy life as a child because his mother is more focused on providing to their family in Santo Domingo. After a life long memory of his home being robbed Diaz writes in great detail to express exactly what he was feeling as a young Hispanic boy lives through a though moment in his
A unique writer is someone who expresses his or her feelings throughout his narratives. Junot Diaz in my opinion is one of those unique writers. Growing up in the Dominican Republic, raced only by his hard working mother, Junot Diaz learned very valuable lessons in his childhood that helped him become whom he is today. Not only does Junot Diaz write great stories, but he also tends to give us a feeling of what is meant to be an immigrant from the Dominican Republic in his stories. Diaz humbleness and compassion towards others can be seen in this writing. Not only does Diaz write novels and short stories, but he also takes action towards exposing the problems that Dominican people especially women face everyday. There might be some people who consider Diaz to be an Antifeminist and also a disgrace to his country, the Dominican Republic, but the only thing that Diaz is doing with his writing is exposing the reality of what its meant to be an immigrate from another country and how machismo affects Feminism in Latin cultures. Diaz shows his feminism by exposing machismo and what women in Latin cultures deal with everyday.
There are many examples of incidents happened because of cultural differences. Some of them are short, single events, while other follow a person or social group for decades. Professor Judith Cortiz Cofer describes the second example in her essay The Myth of the Latin Woman that was originally published in Glamour in 1992. The author focused on the stereotypical view of Latin women from the perspective of the personal experience as a Puerto Rican girl and woman in the USA. Cofer based her essay on examples from her own life and observations of the problem in a broader sense. It looks like her work targets auditory from different social classes because it explains to both sides (representatives of the mainstream and Latin cultures) their mistakes. Cofer did not use information from studies
As humans, our lives are revolved around the line that separates conformity and individuality. Conformity is a type of social influence that includes a change of belief or behavior to fit into a group. Many people can cross the line too far back or too far forward, thus being too much of a conformist or too much of an individual.Conformity is essential to life. Humans live in a society that functions as a whole. If there is a mistake, the entire system may fail. So, we are obligated conform to social norms and laws to stay together as a whole. There’s several types of conformity; Normative conformity,which is to give into group pressure because a person wants to fit in with the
Cojete that fea y méteselo! Tio Rudolfo had four kids with three different women so the nigger was without doubt the family’s residents méteselo expert” (Junot p.24). Woman is just use as an object for sex in the Dominican culture, it doesn’t matter how much work they do, man believe that they’re superior than woman, therefore they don’t really have a say but to obey man. The novel does a great job on relating machismo and racism, we see how there’s racism on this novel within the same ethnic group of people. The word “Nigger” is the one the set the tone to everything, it’s just ironic how Dominicans denied their Afro background when is something pretty obvious. But again they learned to be this way because Trujillo was a racist himself, he kill hundreds of Haitians because of their skin color, so there’s no surprise that Dominicans were going to follow his foots steps. Throughout this novel I learn how hard it can be to be a woman, because Oscar himself was experience it on how to be a true Dominican man. I think Junot Diaz decided to make Masculinity the main theme because we always talk about how hard it is to be woman especially of color, but man can also have it hard, a perfect example can be
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
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.
In the story, “The Myth of a Latin Woman” is about the author Judith Ortiz Cofer talking about her life and growing up as a Puerto Rican girl. She talks about the struggles she had to go through, like always being under heavy surveillance by her family. She would be under their watch because she was a girl and was expected to protect her family’s honor and to behave like in her family’s terms “proper senorita”.
Yunior observes what his father does to his wife. He learns from his father which causes him to mistreat a woman by cheating. Yunior says, “All of Magda’s friends say I cheated because I was Dominican, that all us Dominican men are dogs and can’t be trusted. I doubt that I can speak for all Dominican men but I doubt they can either. From my perspective it wasn’t genetics; there were reasons. Causalities” (Diaz 18-19). This is a stereotype that all dominicans are cheaters but it is true for Yunior. This makes Yunior a cheater because he cheats on his girlfriends and he is dominican. The relationship Yunior has with his father has a profound effect on him. According to the Impact of Absent Father-Figure on Male Subjects explains that a man needs their parental support and advice in their life. The author, Jennifer Flood Eastin then explains and
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.
In the article “The Sociology of Leopard Man” written by Logan Feys, I agree that society takes people’s individuality to make them fit in and be like everyone else even they should be themselves. There are multiple example, explanations, and resolutions on this situation. People changing their appearance, Leopard Man refusing to give in, conformity trending, and seceding from society are some of the examples and solutions to this problem.
In the the book The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, written by Junot Diaz, the author portrays the character of Beli as a bitter and aggressive mother who is most often times seen in the book acting in a cruel and violent manner towards her daughter Lola. However, her relentless attitude towards Lola is as a result of all of her victimized history growing up in the Dominican Republic. Beli’s is a one of the most complex characters within Diaz’s book, therefore her story throughout some parts of the book is narrated in third person rather than the typical first or second person narration. Diaz sets the book up in this style as a way for the audience to grasp a better understanding of Beli as a character. Although Beli is portrayed as a hostile mother towards her daughter Lola, it is a as a result of her traumatic past and through those experiences show that she possess a caring side to her.
What I found most striking about “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” by Junot Diaz, is that when you take away the Dominican mother, the Dominican abuelita, the fuku , the Spanglish, and the cultural references, Lola and Oscar, appear to suffer the trials and tribulations we all do as teenagers. As Junot Diaz immerses the reader in their tumultuous lives from the Dominican Republic to Paterson, New Jersey, you discover that Oscar and Lola are teenagers navigating the same physical and emotional roads we all did growing up. Oscar does not want to die a virgin and Lola wants to be independent. The mother clamors to provide for her children just like single mothers everywhere. Oscar was a “social introvert”, (Diaz, 2007, p. 22), finding