Political leaders like Rafael Leonidas Trujillo and Hipolito Mejia are enforcers of such societal norms of masculinity. Many people in the Dominican Republic looked up to them during their time in office. In order for society to possess these ideas of masculinity, there has to be someone who will reenforce it everyday. Trujillo ruled the Dominican Republic for 31 years, oppressing and doing as he pleased. The novel focuses on many aspects of his dictatorship and how it affected Beli. We can also say that Hipolito Mejia also reinforces these ideas of masculinity whenever he says “llego papa” (daddy is here) during his electoral campaigns (Horn Maja 8-9). These words suggest that the father of the house will bring solutions and fix everything is the house once he comes.This goes …show more content…
back to the idea of men thinking that since they are the providers they will fix the household. No one was above Trujillo during his regime, and no one could ever speak against him without getting punish with death.
People had no freedom of speech because he was too much of a man for democracy (36). Democracy will mean that people would be able to question his actions by having a voice in the government which will be threatening to his masculinity. The same thing happen when a woman in a household wants to work. Working will mean gaining knowledge, and too much knowledge is never good for a man that runs the house. Being the only voice, either in the house or in the country, will mean that no one is above your rules, which shows masculinity and portrayed man as the bosses of the house. During his years, “serial polygamy” was the norm where a man would go through different partners throughout their lives and not really form a bond with one women (39). These ideas are portrayed in the novel through Junior, who had many relationships with women and would never settle with only one of them. The idea is also shown through Oscar when he was only seven. Woman would call him a little macho, and saying que hombre and was praised for having multiple girlfriends only at the age of seven (Diaz
14). In the novel, Trujillo would fuck all of the young girls in the island before any other man would. Trujillo was a dictator but he was a Dominican dictator putting emphasis on the level of masculinity of Dominican man and how they good at getting girls (216) . He was also the “NUMBER ONE bellaco in the country”, which essentially means that he was dishonest and was always horny for girls younger than him (217). The novel also points out how all of the “totos in the Dominican Republic were literally his” (217). If the role model of masculinity in the country for many people acted in such ways, other men would try to copy his style of getting girls as well. Even in today's society, we still experienced high levels of masculinity among Latinos and many other men in other countries. Masculinity is not only a problem seen in the Dominican Republic but many other countries that at some point in history have had that one leader that would reinforce the ideologies of masculinity. We often do not think that men in our society are being affected by the same issues that women are affected by. For example, most of the time we tend to believe that domestic violence only happen among women in our society. We are not aware of the fact that men in our society also experienced domestic violence coming from their significant others. Since men are considered to be the strong ones in the family we often think that in order to maintain their status in the house they do it with violence when in reality they can become victims as well. This happens because we tend to see women as weak which makes them the perfect target because they would not be able to defend themselves. Domestic violence goes both ways and anyone in our society can be a victim of it regardless of how masculine you think you may be.
Junot Diaz is a Dominican-American writer whose collection of short stories Drown tells the story of immigrant families in the urban community of New Jersey. His short story “Fiesta, 1980” focuses on Yunior, an adolescent boy from Dominican Republic and his relationship with his father. On the other hand, Piri Thomas was a great Latino writer from Puerto-Rico whose memoir Down These Mean Streets tells his life story as an adolescent residing in Harlem and the challenges he faces outside in the neighborhood and at home with his father. Both Diaz and Thomas in different ways explore the dynamics of father-son relationships in their work. Furthermore, both expose masculinity as a social construct.
WEESR, KHATHERINE. “Tu no Eres Nada de Dominicano”: Unnatural Narration and De-Naturalizing Gender Consruction in Junot Diaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. “Journal Of Men’s Studies 22, no.2 (Spring2014 2014): 89-104. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed November 30,
Upon returning to the Dominican Republic after many years, Yolanda decides to take a trip across the island––something her family views as ridiculous. “‘This is not the states’ . . . ‘A woman just doesn’t travel alone in this country.” (9) This quote highlights the sexism inherent in Dominican society. Yolanda’s family is asserting that women are not individuals capable of taking care of themselves. On another hand, Yolanda’s close friendship with Mundín causes tensions as their mothers confront them about crossing gender lines. “My mother disapproved. The outfit would only encourage my playing with Mundín and the boy cousins. It was high time I got over my tomboy phase and started acting like a young lady señorita. ‘But it is for girls,’ . . . ‘boys don’t wear skirts.’” (228) This is an example of how Dominican societal norms and gender roles have impacted the sisters. Yolanda and Mundín were the only boy-girl playmates out of all the García children, yet this was frowned upon by both of their parents as to not impede the seemingly inevitable growth of Yolanda’s femininity, and conversely, Mundín’s masculinity. Moreover, this shows how societally-prescribed gender roles were instilled in Yolanda at a young age. However, this is not the only way in which women’s freedoms are
Yunior struggles with his exposure to male privilege in a Dominican family, as he is very sensitive. Yunior can not fully comprehend why men took actions that women didn’t attempt to do. For example, Papi made all the decisions in the family. “She and tío Miguel got themselves an apartment in the Bronx, off Grand Concourse and everybody decided that we should have a party. Actually, my pops decided...” (306). Papi decided that a party was obligatory to be thrown for their arrival, but not as his expense or home; Tia and Tío hosted it, despite it being Papi’s decision. Male privilege is shown in the way “the women laid out the food and like always nobody but the kids thanked them. It must be some Dominican tradition or something” (312). Instead of having both men and women lay the food, it is only the women’s job. Helping with the preparations is not their responsibility, nor is showing appreciation with a genuine thank you. Junot Diaz gives a personal example on his family in his
In Junot Diaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, he is telling the story of a Dominican family but mainly about the son, Oscar de Leon. The book opens with the story of Oscar as a child and him having two girlfriends at the same time. The older people in town see him as a ladies man and encourage him. The boy and the two girls all break up and his life seemed to be on a steady decline since then. He grows up to become a nerdy, fat, and awkward adolescence with few friends and even less interest from girls. This phase persists throughout his life and he never develops out of the nerdy boy he was as a child. The Dominican Republic was a hostile and poor place during the time of the novel. The dictator Trujillo controls the lives of the people in the country. This influenced the de Leon family’s present and future. Diaz develops the story by using the superstition, the cane field, and male dominance of the Dominican men
Junot Diaz’s novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao is focused on the hyper-masculine culture of the Dominican, and many argue that his portrayal of the slew of women in the novel is misogynistic because they are often silenced by the plot and kept out of the narration (Matsui). However, Diaz crafts strong women, and it is society that views them as objects. The novel recognizes the masculine lens of the culture while still examining the lives of resilient women. In this way, the novel showcases a feminist stance and critiques the misogynist culture it is set in by showcasing the strength and depth of these women that help to shape the narrative while acknowledging that it is the limits society places on them because of their sexuality
? . . . it made no difference if they studied medicine or had the right to vote, because they would not have the strength to do it, but she herself [Nivea] was not brave enough to be among the first to give up the fashion.? (6, Ch 1) The women in this society are dependant on the dominant male figure to handle political and economical duties. This point of view is intended to mimic the older generation of women ad present a foundation for the growth of an enlightened generation. Allende uses this excerpt to present a foundation of structure to the novel by beginning with the extremes of opinion, which are followed in the novel through different generations. Alba for example, become a very outspoken activist by trying to attend the student protests and follow Miguel on his demonstrations, a sharp contrast to the indifference or shallowness found in her great grandmother.
Before Trujillo became dictator, men usually worked and the wife stayed at home and it was a monogamous relationship. During Trujillo’s reign some ideas stayed the same, on the contrary now it became somewhat of a norm for “t triangle of dramatization”, these are relationships that are often described as a husband-wife-mistress triangle. The changes in the households that Trujillo are part of what aided him in legitimizing his career. The people who actually liked him as a person or as a dictator wanted to be similar to his lifestyle, which is the way that gender relations changed between men and
“It’s a well-documented fact that in Trujillo’s DR if you were of a certain class and you put your cute daughter anywhere near El Jefe, within the week she’d be mamando his ripio like an old pro,” and Trujillo “took women away from their husbands on their wedding nights and then would brag publicly about ‘the great honeymoon’ he’d had the night before,” (Diaz 217,
In the age of industrialization when rural life gradually was destroyed, the author as a girl who spent most of her life in countryside could not help writing about it and what she focuses on in her story - femininity and masculinity, which themselves contain the symbolic meanings - come as no surprise.
The Trujillo system in the Dominican Republic, under which the Cabral’s are associated with, exploits women and the Gangster, just like Trujillo did exactly that. This path of life that Beli embarks on is the wrong choice because it is plagued with the fuk. She sees the Gangster as an escape from her current life because he is extremely rich. The Gangster promises her a house in Miami with as many bedrooms as she wants. Beli is nave and does not realize that the Gangster cannot help her escape her life that she is unhappy with.
Sandra Cisneros’s coming of age novel The House on Mango Street, is a good example of an instance where the ‘macho man’ stereotype is extenuated. Esmerelda, the narrator, is growing up in a very traditional patriarchal culture. In this environment, the men are seen as the head of the family, often controlling what his wife and family can do. In the chapter, “Alice Who Sees Mice” Esmerelda tells about a girl, Alice, who was forced to take her mother’s role and care for her younger siblings and father. When she attempts to go to school to escape the life, her father berates her sections and tells her that her
; (Aunt Rosana’s Rocker pg. 81) Castro is a masculine figure and takes on the role of the husband. He supports and takes care of his family, but the character thinks of himself more than a caretaker. He is prideful and arrogant.
In this novel, the society is centered around dichotomies; “youth and dotage” (Balzac 67), “the young man who has possessions and the young man that has nothing” and “the young man who thinks and the young man who spends” (87). Any person who falls outside of either box is called a “[child] who learn[s]… too late” or can “never appear in polite society” (87), essentially meaning they are undesirable in a formal society because they cannot follow expectations. The titular character, Paquita, is an “oriental” foreigner, from Havana, domesticated in Paris when she was sold to a wealthy woman who desired her. She fits into no culture entirely, as she is “part Asian houri on her mother’s side, part European through education, and part tropical by birth” (122). She is bisexual, choosing neither men nor women over the other. She is controlling, dressing Henri in women’s clothing (119), but controlled as she is reduced to a possession. However, there are ways in which a person can still be desired even if they are not easily pigeonholed. With her golden eyes and sensuality, Paquita fulfills both of the main pursuits of this society, “gold and pleasure” (68). Consequently, unlike the Marquis and his irrelevance in society, Paquita is highly sought after, thus making her a valuable commodity. Her desirability is not because of who she is as a human, but instead what
Family is one of the most important institutions in society. Family influences different aspects of a person’s life, such as their religion, values, morals and behavior. Unfortunately, problems may arise when an individual’s belief system or behavior does not coincide with that of family standards. Consequently, individuals may be forced to repress their emotions or avoid acting in ways that that are not acceptable to the family. In the novel The Rain God, written by Arturo Islas, we are presented with a story about a matriarchal family that deals with various conflicts. One major internal conflict is repression. Throughout the novel the characters act in strange ways and many of the family members have internal “monsters” that represent the past that they are repressing. In his article, “The Historical Imagination in Arturo Islas’s The Rain God and Migrant Souls”, Antonio C. Marquez’s implicitly asserts a true idea that The Rain God is a story about repression. Marquez’s idea can be supported from an analysis of secondary sources and a reading of the primary text.