Isla, a poem written by author Virgil Suarez, in 2000, refers to how a young immigrant boy feels, compared to Godzilla. Godzilla, is a series of movies about a “fictitious giant monster spawned from the waste of nuclear tests, and is discovered in the sea and rises to threaten Japan. The only hope of stopping Godzilla is the oxygen destroyer, a weapon as deadly and as morally troubling as the atomic bombs that created the monster”(Encyclopaedia Britannica,2017). Poet Virgil Suárez left Cuba with his family when he was just 12. His family eventually settled in the United States(poetryfoundation.org, n.d). Virgil Suarez is comparing himself to Godzilla. He feels lonely and unwanted ,and how he had known this pain from an early age.
In Los Angeles I grew up watching The Three Stooges,
The Little Rascals, Speed Racer, and the Godzilla movies,
those my mother called "Los Monstros," and though I didn't
yet speak English, I understood why such a creature would,
upon being woken up from its centuries-long slumber, rise
and destroy Tokyo's buildings, cars, people—I understood
by the age of twelve what it meant to be unwanted, exiled,
how you move from one
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country to another where nobody. wants you, nobody knows you, and I sat in front of the TV, transfixed by the snow-fizz on our old black and white,(1-10) This verse focus on Suarez's, experience as a child in the United States.
He grew up watching television show’s like other kids, but one show stood out to him in particular, Godzilla. Suarez wasn’t able to speak english and express himself, but he was able to do so through the movie Godzilla. Godzilla was awoken from the sea, and he started chaos upon Japan, through destruction and is not wanted there. Suarez’s and his family moved away from Cuba in 1962, when he was 12, only to land in the United States. This was the time when the Cuban Missile Crisis was occurring. “The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 was a direct and dangerous confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War and was the moment when the two superpowers came closest to nuclear conflict”(www.history.state.gov,
n.d.). and when Godzilla bellows his eardrum-crushing growl, I screamed back, this victory-holler from one so rejected and cursed to another. When the monster whipped its tail and destroyed, I threw a pillow across my room; each time my mother stormed into the room and asked me what, what I thought I was doing throwing things at the walls.(11-16) Suarez was taking his frustrations out by acting-out like Godzilla, and hollering aloud, as Godzilla did when he destroyed cities. He used the pillows as of they were buildings being knocked over. "¡Ese monstruo, esa isla!" she'd say. That monster, that island, and I knew she wasn't talking about the movie. She meant her country, mine, that island in the Caribbean we left behind, itself a reptile-looking mass on each map, on my globe, a crocodile-like creature rising again, eating us so completely(17-21). The child is looking at how the country has mistreated them in the past and still have the same practices after they left. The island(Cuba), the left behind has nothing that makes people look forward to. Every time he looks at it on the map, all he see Cuba resembling Godzilla.
Vargas Vila’s speech, “Facing the Barbarians” is about his view of American imperialism. The speech takes on a very angry tone. He explains that the Americans revel in their victory of conquest, leaving the Latin Americas weak, defeated, and afraid. He views American imperialism as conquest, invasion and extortion. He believes that the Americans are, “an arrogant and voracious race, hungry for [their] territory, fixed on conquest.” In other words he doesn’t see any benefits to the American’s having power over their country. He believes that as a people, they need to form a union and, “join together to defend [themselves] against invasion and extortion against Europe and North America.” In Vargas’s speech he conveys his disdain for the Americans
Reymundo was born in Puerto Rico in 1963 in the back of a 1957 Chevy. His mother was married at age sixteen to a man that was seventy-four years of age. Reymundo’s father died when he was almost five years old, therefore he does not have much memory of the relationship that they had. Reymundo has 2 sisters with whom he did not have a relationship with, one sister would always watch out for him, but that was about it. After the death of Reymundo’s father, his mother remarried a guy named Emilio with which she had a daughter for. After Emilio, Pedro came in to the picture with his son Hector. Pedro was an illegal lottery dealer and Hector sold heroin.
He grows up to become a nerdy, fat, and awkward adolescent 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 of the country. This influenced the de Leon family’s present and future.
First of all, I can relate to the part in book when Joshua Davis said Luis Aranda’s mom (Maria) felt the only option to give her kid a better life was by coming to the United States (Davis, 82). A Japanese lady Maria worked for offered to adopt him, because she recognized Maria was struggling. Maria knew that Luis
The author of this short story, Sandra Cisneros used this myth to make herself different from other American writers. She used ideas from things and stories she heard growing up as a Mexican-American woman, living in a house full of boys that got all of the attention (Mathias). Cisneros also grew up in the 19...
Jose Antonio Vargas’s article on My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant is a writing about his childhood journey from the Philippines to the United States as an Undocumented Immigrant. Vargas writes this article to emphasize the topic of immigrant and undocumented immigrant in the United States. He uses all three appeals: pathos, ethos, and logic in his writing, in specific, he mostly uses pathos throughout of his entire article with a purpose for the reader to sympathize and to feel compassion for him. The use of these appeals attract many readers, they can feel and understand his purpose is to ask for others to join and support other people who undocumented immigrant like himself. In addition, it gives other undocumented immigrant people courage
Even from an early age, Rodriguez is a successful student. Everyone is extremely proud of Rodriguez for earning awards and graduating to each subsequent level of his education. But all his success was not necessarily positive. In fact, we see that his education experience is a fairly negative one. One negative that Rodriguez endures is his solitude. Education compels him to distance himself from his family and heritage. According to Richard Hoggart, a British education theorist, this is a very natural process for a scholarship boy. Hoggart explains that the ?home and classroom are at cultural extremes,? (46). There is especially an opposition in Rodriguez?s home because his parents are poorly educated Mexicans. His home is filled with Spanish vernacular and English filled with many grammatical errors. Also, the home is filled with emotions and impetuosity, whereas the classroom lacks emotion and the teachers accentuate rational thinking and reflectiveness.
Fable —A deliberately false or improbable account, well, so says Merriam-Webster. Can a love story be a fable? Sure thing —not only did Roberto Benigni’s Life is Beautiful does not just fall into one genre, but into many. The remarkable film can be considered as a romantic comedy, a drama, but most of all, a fable—The story of a man, winning the heart of his “princess” and his own son.
He begins his book with his short story, The Boy without a Flag. This story is really touching, especially for very patriotic people that live in the United States, but that come from other parts of the World, in this case Puerto Rico. In this story the reader can see exactly how, many Puerto Ricans feel when living on other grounds. Throughout time the boy that Rodriguez presents us realizes he has his culture and that he wants to preserve it as much as he can. “Because I’m Puerto Rican. I ain’t no American. And I’m not no Yankee flag-waver” (Rodriguez 18). All of this starts when he begins reading books about his culture and important figures like, Pedro Albizu Campos, this makes his culture feeling increase, not wanting to follow the American standards.
Jimmy Santiago Baca’s poem sends out a powerful message without the use of a strict structure. The modest wording and simple structure helps the writer send his message across. In addition, with the use of imagery, symbolism, diction, and tone, Baca is able to argue and ridicule American stereotypes on Mexican immigrants coming to the country and robbing them of job opportunities. The use of figurative language helps support Baca’s point of view on how the American misconception is irrational and prejudice.
The language of Gloria Anzaldua’s “We Call Them Greasers” can be used to disseminate the culturally constructed codes and conventions which influence the realities of both the author, and the poems’ fictional speaker. The poem illustrates the intolerant and brutal nature of border rangers as they sought to rid Mexican border towns of their inhabitants. As well as its language, the subject matter of the poem, too, is telling of the author’s cultural influences, which influence the stance she takes on the subject matter. Anzaldua constructs the poem’s speaker, however, to be a person who holds views which are in staunch opposition to her own. This use of clear contradiction helps readers identify underlying messages meant to be conveyed and understood beyond the text of the poem itself.
Miguel resides with his mother, father and grandmother. He is a 16 year-old male Latina of Mexican ethnicity. His parents are legal immigrants from Mexico but met and eventually, got married after they arrived in the United States. His mother is pregnant, which means that Miguel will soon have a sister. Miguel has been struggling academically even though he loves literature and writing. At home Miguel’s family speak Spanish but Miguel is fluent in both English and Spanish. He has been having challenges with his identity, which is the reason he identifies himself as “Chicano-American and not Latina.
( Starts walking around the stage ) in the day October 14th, 1959. The prime minister of Cuba, Fidel Castro sent out a message that change how citizens felt and made them feel hopeless. Fidel Castro told America that he wants to take it over and telling them to surrender. Everybody felt scared and hopeless. Fidel Castro was going to use ballistic nuclear missiles,
He spent his younger years on his father’s farms, along with spending a lot of his time in Catholic boarding schools. He always liked sports therefore he always played them at recess in school. Castro began law school at the University of Havana in 1945 and became involved in politics. In 1947, Fidel Castro met up with a group of political exiles from Caribbean countries. These exiles planned and wanted to get rid of dictator, so they joined a group.When Castro joined, he planned to stop dictator Generalissimo Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic although, he cancelled from doing so because there was too much international pressure. In 1948, Castro traveled to a city in Colombia named Botota. His plans were to disrupt the American Union Conference which also had Batista in it. However, riots broke out, nevertheless Castro just grabbed a rifle and joined.
Santiago Alvarez is honored in the world as the pioneer of revolutionary Cuban filmmaker as well as his documentary masterpieces also contribute a remarkable achievement in Latin America films. Santiago was given birth on March 8, 1919, who is the son of an immigrant Spanish family in Cuba. He was involved in learning politics at his very early age since his father arrested as a result of anarchistic activity. Subsequently, at the age of 15, Santiago began to work as a printer’s apprentice and then he became a strike planner speedily after he participating in the workers’ union. At the end of 1930s, during the American Great Depression, Santiago travelled to United States and then found a job as coal mineworker and cleaner. Additionally, he was admitted as a student in Columbia University in New York City. After Santiago returned to Cuba, he devoted himself into a covert struggle against Batista’s dictatorship, which made him arrested for several times.