Barbara Trevino

Personal Journey Through Minority Literature

Prior to taking this course, minority literature was a genre that I had very little knowledge of. As a teacher and a mother, I tried to expose my students and children to diverse written text from many different cultures, nations and ethnicities. However, what I failed to provide was a diverse set of works written by authors of minority populations within the United States. While it is important to expose children to a vast array of multicultural literature, it has become clear to me that multicultural and minority literature is not synonymous. Minority literature specifically applies to literature written by members of minority populations within the United States. Throughout this semester, I have been exposed to many different authors that have helped me to learn more about the minority experience in the United States.

          Although my previous experience taking Post Colonial Literature in the Fall of 2009 helped familiarize my self to some of the themes such as self/ other, subject/object, the color code, and double speak, it was still new to me to apply these themes to American minority authors. Having read some of the authors we studied such as Morrison, Douglas, and Cisneros previously for leisure, it was interesting to apply the themes and objectives to these already familiar authors. In addition, while familiar with the authors mentioned, I was almost embarrassed to be so unfamiliar with others such as Erdrich, Anaya, and Neihardt/Black Elk. 

          Sadly, Black Elk Speaks and Love Medicine were my first works of literature to be used for academic study of American Indian Literature. It was through these books that I became aware of the unique form of oppression that American Indians have been subjected to. They were not brought here by slave traders, or forced to migrate here for economic reasons, but instead were colonized on their own soil. Because I loved Dr. White’s Post Colonial Literature class so much, this was completely intriguing to me.  The impact this forced colonization had on their experience was vibrantly displayed in both Black Elk Speaks and Love Medicine. Black Elk Speaks provided a more historical account and view of the oppression of American Indians and the battles they fought, while Love Medicine eloquently portrayed the lasting effects such as poverty, alcoholism, and poor education of the oppression they have faced. However, both also showed the richness of their culture and the tight bonds formed within their community. Hindsight, while I loved learning about American Indian literature within the minority context, I think it would be beneficial to introduce it in Colonial and Post Colonial literature as well. 

          Although a first generation Mexican American, my familiarity with Mexican American literature was poorly lacking. Unfamiliar with the author Anaya, I was aptly pleased after reading Bless Me Ultima. The novel’s protagonist Antonio’s internal struggles of not knowing where he fits in, what’s right or wrong, and search for divinity among old religions and Catholicism is inspiring and exemplifies struggles that are found throughout minority literature. It is through his journey that I found myself asking questions of my own culture, and spirituality. Although I must find my own answers, Antonio’s expedition offered me valuable insight and aid while embarking on my own quest.

          While familiar with Cisneros, the class discussions and lectures offered a whole new insight to her works. While I have read and taught her in the context of looking for literary elements such imagery, theme, and characterization looking at her work in relation to our class objectives has offered me a whole new perspective on her writings. In addition to her experiences as a Mexican American author, Cisneros offers a beautiful voyage through her experiences as a woman also. Cisneros work shows the hardships and struggles that minority women face being a double minority. As a woman of Mexican descent that looks “gringa pura,” Cisneros left me with a sense of guilt because I don’t have the same struggles that some of my darker sisters may face, but at the same time she offered a voice of camaraderie in her writing that spoke to me I as a woman within the pages of her stories. Both Anaya and Cisneros provided a deep learning experience for me within minority literature.

          Gay literature is a genre I was almost wholly unfamiliar with. After reading The Best Little Boy in the World and the poems by Whitman, Auden, and O’Hara an interest and desire to further my understanding of homosexuals as an American Minority culture has intensified. At risk of sounding naive, Tobias’ memoir was truly eye opening for me. As ridiculous as it now may sound, previously I almost viewed gayness as a one size fits all orientation. It is through his words that I truly began to understand the internal struggles he faced. While I may have thought myself liberal and open minded because I was aware of and appalled at the atrocities society may inflict on g ay individuals, I never gave much though to the struggles individuals may face in finding their place in minority society. I thought O’Hara’s poem “My Heart” fit perfectly with the shedding of my one size fits all mentality of homosexuality because I realized probably almost more than any other minority group we discussed, I had prejudged and minimized the members of the gay minority. Further, it was through the poetry we discussed in class rife with emotion and double speak that I was able to see this struggle enduring through time.

          Overall, this class has helped me to gain a better understanding of minority literature as an enduring and dynamic genre. In my second research post, my intention was to incorporate minority literature into middle grade classrooms. Although this class is a graduate course, it has offered me new insight into themes and elements of minority literature that I may incorporate into my curriculum next year. In addition, it has brought to my attention issues such as the cultural and socio-economic factors should be included when teaching minority literature. The objectives in this course were clear and concise providing a reference for evaluating and analyzing the texts. Objective 5 was especially helpful to me because it seemed to encapsulate exactly what I am looking for to develop a dialogue about minority literature in my classroom. I feel that this class in conjunction with my previous Colonial and Post colonial Literature class have aided me with tools to critically analyze, evaluate, and appreciate literature written by members of non-dominant cultures.

Self/Other in Minority Literature

          The concept of the self/ other in minority literature refers to the view that any body different than the self, is “other”, or an outside. In the novels we have read in the latter half of the semester, this paradigm is seen and represented in a myriad of manners contingent upon the author or minority group. While literature of the dominant culture often indicates the protagonist who is of the dominant culture as the “self” or the accepted, while members of other ethnic groups are the other and therefore different or unaccepted. However, in minority literature the roles of the other seem to fluctuate and depend on the role of the protagonist’s place in society. Objective 7b refers to the shifting names or identities of the dominant culture in relation to different minority cultures. It is apparent that through the portrayal of the self and other in our readings that the roles of the dominant and minority cultures in American society are not static, but instead ever changing and transforming.

          It is safe to say that one unique trait of American Indian culture is that they were not brought here, nor came here on their own free will. Instead, bloody battles were fought and they lost land that had originally belonged to their ancestors. This is interesting because in both Black Elk Speaks and Love Medicine the self is portrayed as the American Indian characters while the “white” people were given the role of other. The whites are seen as the different ones with crazy ideas, bad manners, and false notions of their importance. In Black Elk Speaks, the grandmother has created a type of bogeyman out of the white man. Throughout the story, the white men are seen as ignorant and the underlying message seems to hint that eventually they will get what they deserve. In Love Medicine, the self/other dynamic is a little more ambiguous. On one hand you have the older generation who seem to be tied to their beliefs and reservation viewing white’s as the other, but then you have the younger generation who were schooled in American schools and seemed to have acclimated a little more to the dominant culture. However, ultimately the ties to their community and family would leave the reader viewing those of the dominant culture as the other. When gambling is described as “one of history’s small ironies… to take money from retired white people who had farmed Indian hunting grounds, worked Indian jobs, lived high while their neighbors lived low, looked down or never noticed who was starving, who was lost” (327). It is clear that white man is viewed as separate and an other. It seems that because their land was taken from the American Indians, those who took it are the interlopers no matter how long it has been. When one is viewed as being somewhere illegitimately, one is never accepted and is regarded as an outsider.

          In Mexican American literature, the roles of the self and other take on a different form. In both Bless Me Ultima, and Woman Hollering Creek, the role of other seems to be self inflicted, while searching for the self. In Bless me Ultima, Antonio seems to constantly be on the outside, the other. He does not fit itnto any one religion, social group, or even family. As he struggles to find himself, he is constantly beng reminded of his otherness. In Woman Hollering Creek, the other is often the voice or narrator of the many short stories. Whether admonishing her love for abandoning her, or seducing his son, she is constantly reminding the reader of her lack of place in the society she lives in. The image that is portrayed throughout her short stories is of one looking for him or herself while maintaining their status of the other. Because the Mexican American experience is often one of choice and change, it would follow that the characters in Ultima and Woman Hollering Creek are still trying to find their “self” within the confines of the dominant culture, thus making them the other until they succeed.

          In The Best Little Boy in the World, Tobias presents an interesting adaptation of the self/ other conflict. Instead of portraying either a self or other persona, Tobias seems to be the other in a world of others. Instead of him being a member of a homogenous culture, he portrays himself as a member of a society of individuals. While at first, he struggled with ensuring he fit in, as his story progressed, it became obvious that because everyone is different on such as massive scale it almost seemed impossible to narrow down the norm. This was enlightening because it created a more realistic and accurate view of him as a protagonist, person, and member of a minority culture working to develop his “self”.

          While the continuum of the self/other paradigm is found throughout minority literature, several factors contribute to how the self and other is represented in novels, memoirs, or historical accounts.  It is often through the search for acceptance, self discovery and identity that the true relationship between the self and other becomes apparent to the reader.