Ortiz: The Myth Of The Latin Woman

Through dealing with stereotypes, the motivation of my mother to be better, and constantly switching environments, I have become an individual in American society. Through these experiences, it has helped me to fit into society as my own person.

Being a brown Mexican-American, I am constantly stereotyped. Instead of letting these situations break me down, I used them to inspire me to be greater than the world thought I could be. People believe me to be a certain way based on my ethnicity, this has led to several incidents of discrimination.. For example, I was once walking home from school and I walked behind a building. I continued walking and suddenly a police officer pulled up next to me and put me in handcuffs. Apparently he had received a call that something happened in the area, so he assumed me guilty based on my looks. This is similar to what happened with Ortiz in The Myth of the Latin Woman. She was automatically stereotyped because of her ethnicity. Ortiz states,”I

thought you Latin girls were supposed to mature early.” That showed how she was automatically set with standards due to stereotypes. From situations like these, I have used them to push me to move past those stereotypes and show people that I am more than that.
Along with dealing with stereotypes, I have created a desire to be better due to my mother’s motivation. People see my mom standing with 4 children alone and turn the other way thinking she didn’t amount to anything. Things like that helped me realize to look past what we see and see the potential in people instead. My mother made something out of her life despite what people thought of her, and she has helped me to reach my potential as well. Just as in Mother Tongue, Amy Tan uses these incidents with her mother to inspire her, so have I. In the story she describes how her mother was cheated many times (Tan). Amy used things like that to fight to be better so she could help her mother and make sure people didn’t treat them that way anymore. Things like that helped inspire and motivate me towards a certain values.
My mother helped inspire me, but so did all the places I come from.

I was initially born in Nevada but moved to California soon after. In California I learned many things. A couple of years later, I moved to Virginia. It was a complete change of environment and people. Again, a couple of years later I move back to California, then eventually back to Las Vegas. Being in different places, felt like a change of worlds. I had to learn new things and adapt, just as Frederick Douglass did in Learning to Read and Write. He faced many struggles in learning these new skills but he persisted and eventually was able to do it. “I continued to do this until I could write a hand very similar to that of Master Thomas (Douglass).” This again showed how even though he faced these challenges, he continued on and learn those skills. That is what I had to do with going to each new state. I had to learn to adapt to the change and it has shaped me today to be able to adapt and fit into any new

environment.
Through the stereotypes, my mother’s motivation, and my constant change of environments, I became an individual and part of the American society. All of these things have put me through experiences which led me to be who I am today. They helped me to not only fit in society, but be an individual.