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Zoot Suit Research Paper

1990 Words8 Pages

Mayra Diaz
Professor Chavez
Music 008
February 15, 2018 Zoot Suit As a young woman growing up in L.A also known as Los Angeles as a Mexican-American ethnicity living in that neighborhood we were called "Chicano" by American people. It 's the 1940s and it’s all about zoot suiter, the music, the style, and the aesthetic. Zoot suiter is a men 's suit that is high-waisted, wide legged, with tight-cuffed, and a long coat with wide padded shoulders. That style of clothing was popular around that time and my brother was one of them who wore it too. My parents fear of me being " too American" because of the way I dress and how I socialize with others. But also, the fear of others that I …show more content…

It’s their race and their choice of clothing. A trial that is full of discrimination. A life where no one believes what you say even though there is no evidence just words, no prove. Sarah Elizabeth Howard writes “zoot suit expressed the rebellion by young people against drab slum life through the colorful costume that identified them as members of their own society” (Howard 113). Essentially the evidence points out that anyone including myself want to be in group, to fit in, and have their own thing that represent who we are. By expressing ourselves and being in society that we create for our own entertainment purposes. From what I can recall the events that took place at that time that led up to the Zoot Suit Riots in Los Angeles was the Sleepy Lagoon Murder that lead the death of a Mexican-American fellow who was murder by someone and they put the blame on the zoot suiter because they were close by or that they happened to be there. I don’t know the specific because I wasn’t there at that time I was at home, but I heard it from my brother, who knows what really happened and who actually murder the fellow. But from what I read from Sarah Elizabeth Howard’s …show more content…

Also that they were using a lot of fabric and that was used for the war. The Navy was out to get them and including myself but they were more aggressive towards the boys since the beginning and as I ponder thinking why did they do such a thing and also why does anyone do anything? For attention, for revenge, the anger that they develop causes them to take it out on us, the emotions they are feeling. I don’t know even know myself but I guess I want to believe that there must be a reason someone does a thing. But then it occurred to be that as my memory is coming back to me was that it was illegal to have the suit manufacture. Sarah Elizabeth Howard writes, “Owning a zoot suit in wartime was not a crime, but it was a crime to manufacture the suit. The War Production Board placed a $10,000 fine on tailors who ignored the restrictions on cloth and material to make them” (Howard 114). In this society wanting to make something unique causes problems, but that doesn’t give them the right to punish us for what we thought wasn’t as harmful at that

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