Although each work of Latino literature is unique and distinct from every other work, there are a few common themes that tie many of the novels together. My theme for the integration project is that identity is a struggle between cultural/familial values and choosing one’s own path in life. More specifically, coming of age is a vital part to the reconciliation of this struggle. Bodega Dreams by Ernesto Quiñonez and Dreaming in Cuban by Cristina Garcia are two of the books from this semester that exemplify this theme through their characters, Blanca and Pilar, respectively. Although both Blanca from Bodega Dreams and Pilar from Dreaming in Cuban must select different aspects of their cultural and familial identities to adopt as their own, each character goes about discovering which parts are most important on their own.
In Dreaming in Cuban, Pilar provides the best example of this in her struggle to become her own person. Pilar is disconnected from her immediate family, and does not find much value in her relationships with her mother or father. Although she does not get much out of that relationship, she does find great worth in the relationship she has with her grandmother, and respects and wants to adhere to her grandmother’s cultural and familial values. For example, when Pilar learns at a young age that her grandmother is an atheist, she quickly decides that she will be one as well, without knowing what all that would entail (Garcia 175). For Pilar, her deep connection with her grandmother is enough to determine at least a part of her direction in life.
In Bodega Dreams, Blanca struggles between the values of her Pentecostal culture and her family’s culture as she chooses her own path in life. We can see her internal struggle with this as she yearns to help one of her sisters in Christ find a husband and stay in the US, and how she wants help from people that her family, specifically her husband Chino, knows, but how she is unwilling to ask them herself. She instead asks Chino to go “husband-hunting for Claudia” for her (Quiñonez 95). Here, we see Blanca realize that both parts of her life are valid and can possibly work together. In this sense, Pilar and Blanca differ—Pilar seems yet unaware of the good that can be found in her immediate family’s way of life, but Blanca is reaching an awareness that there are valuable aspects to all parts of her life.
In conclusion, it is obvious that both Pilar and Blanca struggle between becoming their own person and pleasing those in their immediate family and community. Blanca struggles more with the realization that the life of the street, of the less prestigious, is just as valuable to her life as is the life of the Church. It is difficult for her to justify both of them, but eventually she realizes that both Chino and Jesus are people she loves and represent ideas she needs (whether to help a friend or to acquire eternal salvation). Pilar, on the other hand, still seems young and immature in her awareness of the good that could be present in her immediate family. Instead, she still agrees with her grandmother Celia, and avoids any connections with her mother. Pilar is still very much of the absolute view of her grandmother; she has not learned that there is a black and white area of beliefs. Although Blanca and Pilar both struggle to find their own identity, Blanca is advancing much faster than Pilar as she has already acknowledged the reality of grayness between either end of the absolute beliefs of her past. Both Pilar and Blanca need to come to a happy medium between the different backgrounds that they have to create their own identities.
Lavonne, your essay topic is really intriguing. I think the idea of showing the connection between how the characters in different novels struggle to form their own identities from different parts of family and cultural values is also present in most of the literature we have read so far in this class. Identity is difficult to achieve when these values are conflict, as it is for Blanca and Pilar.
ReplyDeleteI like how you mentioned that most characters eventually realize that both family and cultural aspects of their life can work together to create a molded identity, but that this only works when values are in-between black and white. Learning how to give and take, as Blanca finds in "Bodega Dreams" is a sign of growing up! Great topic!
I find this comparison between Blanca and Pilar interesting. You make a good point that they both go from rather dogmatic young women who learn to drawn on their family's resources. However, your essay leaves me with a question. I'm wondering why you don't take into account the growing that Pilar does at the end of the novel when she realizes that she can't really accept her grandmother's life, but yet she doesn't totally reject it either. Certainly we see Blanca learning to make compromises, and even to adapt to Chino's tendencies to associate with those of whom she disapproves, throughout the novel. Pilar's adaptations come more at the end of the novel, which shows that she has come far from the thinking of the girl who tried to run away to Cuba by taking a bus to Miami.
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