Monday, 23 June 2008: Other Hispanic Americans: Immigrant / American Dream story, or Minority?

Junot Diaz, "How to Date a Browngirl . . . “ (IA 276-279); Oscar Hijuelos, “Visitors, 1965” (IA 310-325) Judith Ortiz Cofer, "Silent Dancing" [handout]

Dominant Culture Moments: Other Hispanic Americans

One thing I noticed in our three readings, in terms of the dominant culture was the “product placement.” It seems that all three authors were tied to the dominant culture in the United States through consumerism and the media.

For example:

“How to date a Browngirl, Blackgirl, Whitegirl or Halfie”

277 – “You have choices. If a girl’s from around the way, take her to El Ciabo for dinner … If she’s not from around the way, Wendy’s will do.”

“Silent Dancing”

182 – “And she also bought Colgate toothpaste and Palmolive soap … For many years I believed they were manufactured on the island.”

182 – “By the time I started first grade I could have drawn a map of Middle America as exemplified by the lives of characters in Father Knows Best, The Donna Reed Show, Leave It To Beaver, My Three Sons …”

183 – “On Saturday my family would walk downtown to shop at the big department stores on Broadway. Mother bought all our clothes and Penney’s and Sears … At some point we’d go into Woolworth’s and sit at the soda fountain to eat.”

“Visitors, 1965”

313 – “…took sips from a bottle of Pepsi-Cola.”

317 – “But Hector always refused and got lost in his bedroom … reading Flash comic books.”

321 – “I remember Elvis Presley records. Do you know You’re My Angel Baby?”

322 – “It was Cuban Chocolate. What was it?”

“She thought on it again and her eyes grew big as she laughed … It was Hershey’s syrup and     milk!”

Other examples of the dominant culture in our narratives:

“Silent Dancing”:

181 – “My cousin was wearing a tight, sequined cocktail dress. Her brown hair has been lightened with peroxide around the bangs, and she is holding a cigarette expertly between her fingers bringing it up to her mouth in a sensuous arc of her arm as she talks animatedly.”

I chose this passage because Cofer mentions that her cousin doesn’t have “the stain” of a new immigrant. Living in Paterson, she has Americanized herself. She says the posture, the voice and the humble demeanor are “the stain,” and without that, we can assume her cousin, in contrast to her brother’s girlfriend, is confident and outspoken. Later, the same cousin is discussed having a botched abortion. They later refer to her as “La Gringa.”  This, to me, is demonstrating how the New World ruined her cousin and aided in something so terrible happening but how going back to Puerto Rico, the Old World, was intended to fix those wrongs.

182 – “We were the only ones in El Building that I knew of who got presents on both Christmas and dia de Reyes, the day when the Three Kings brought gifts to Christ and to Hispanic children.”

The family is modernizing by adopting the dominant culture’s Christmas but is also maintaining their own holiday.

185 – “I am an American woman and I will do as I please … I hate rice and beans- that’s what makes these women fat.”

 She asserts herself as an American woman who is free from oppression.  Even denouncing her culture’s food, it is a trait of the dominant culture to be liberated.

“How to date a Browngirl, Blackgirl, Whitegirl or Halfie”:

276 – “Clear the government cheese from the refrigerator… If she’s from the Park or Society Hill hide the cheese in the cabinet above the oven, way up where she’ll never see.”

I found this part of the instructions interesting because it seems the dominant culture wants to show off what they have. When the dominant culture isn’t doing well, they don’t want anyone to know but when they come into money, they buy brand name purses and $100 jeans.

278 - When speaking about halfies: “Black people, she will say, treat me real bad. That’s why I don’t like them. You’ll wonder how she feels about Dominicans.”

I selected this passage because being  bi-racial, even in the United States could lead to discrimination. The dominant culture likes to associate itself with being one thing – white, black, etc. and this “in between” status could lead to discrimination and eventually a reverse discrimination of a race you’re actually a part of.

“Visitors, 1965”:

314 – “The world is going to the devil.”

I liked this part of the story because they’re equating their country’s ruler with Satan. In the dominant culture, we see this often now.