Yolanda Garcia Identity

If someone were to be torn from everything they know in order to live in a new country with a new culture and surroundings, they would face changes in themselves. Yolanda Garcia from the novel How The Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, by Julia Alvarez, faces these changes in her identity and culture. After immigrating to America from the Dominican Republic, Yolanda is immediately confronted by the new culture that surrounds her. It leads her to feel insecure about who she is, and she feels the need to fit in with the Americans. Being a Dominican immigrant causes Yolanda to become insecure about herself and her culture, confused by the mix of two cultures she lives with, and to lose her sense of identity.
Because of the racism and stereotypes Yolanda has to endure in her new country, she becomes insecure being Dominican. In college, Yolanda begins seeing a man named Rudy. From the start of their relationship, Rudy makes it clear that he only wants sex

with Yolanda, and is surprised when she does not want the same. Rudy assumes that just because Yolanda is “Spanish,” she would be interested in sex, but Yolanda does not feel this way. Because of how she was raised, as a Catholic Dominican, she wants to wait for when she feels it is right to have sex. Rudy does not understand this and gets upset with Yolanda. She begins to doubt herself and her culture: “I would never find someone who would understand my peculiar mix of Catholicism and Agnosticism, Hispanic and American styles” (Alvarez 99). Yolanda feels that no one in America will understand her or her beliefs because of her culture. This, mixed with the insecurity she deals with because of racism, causes Yolanda a great deal of self-doubt. Her identity is affected by this because one of the most important parts of her, her Dominican culture, is causing her insecurity.
The combination of American and Dominican cultures Yolanda has in her life not only causes insecurity, but also causes her to be torn between the two.

Yolanda’s upbringing was strictly Catholic and Dominican, and to be suddenly thrust into a new world with new cultures and beliefs leaves Yolanda confused. For the most part, Yolanda cherishes her culture and religion. But when surrounded by Americans who do things differently than her, and feel confident in the way they do things, Yolanda wishes she could be like them: “For the hundredth time, I cursed my immigrant origins. If only I too had been born in Connecticut or Virginia, I too would understand the jokes everyone was making” (Alvarez 94). Yolanda wants to be an American and to understand their ways. Being different from everyone takes a toll on Yolanda’s sense of identity. She is riddled with conflict between who she is and who she wishes she could be. She sees herself as being worse or worth less than the Americans, and has to face this on an everyday

basis.
Although Yolanda holds her Dominican culture very close to her heart, her American surroundings cause her to lose this sense of her identity. The American conditions Yolanda lives in mean she is also faced with Americanization of many aspects of herself, including important parts of her identity, such as her name. Many people pronounce Yolanda’s name wrong, which she dislikes because she takes pride in her Dominican side and when people Americanize her name, it is taking away a part of her culture. She insists that people pronounce her name in the correct, Dominican way: “...her bastardized name- Yo, Joe, Yoyo. He knew better than to take shortcuts. Jo-laahn-dah, she had drilled him” (Alvarez 97). Yolanda already has to face struggles of racism and more in America, and people butchering her name only adds to this.