Blog Post #4 Topic #4 Amy Joo

In the short story, “Woman Hollering Creek,” Sandra Cisneros depicts the experience of a Mexican woman who immigrated to the United States with her new husband. The woman, Cleofilas Hernandez, imagined her future husband to be like a character in her telenovela before arriving in the United States; however, he was complaining and demanding, often leaving both physical and emotional scars on her. Throughout the narrative, Cisneros clearly depicts the honest struggles that many immigrants experience: the possibility of confronting the disgrace at home country and the problems that language and culture barriers entail.

Cisneros deliberately shows Cleofilas’ initial decision to not give up on her husband in order to depict that immigrants try hard to overcome their struggles to not put disgrace upon their family at home. Despite all of her effort to provide for her family and domestic responsibilities in the foreign country, her husband was abusive, and she could only react passively by feeling stunned and speechless. Cisneros explains that Cleofilas was afraid of the gossips of her neighbors in Mexico such as “Where’s [her] husband?” and “‘Coming home like that with one baby on her hip and one in the oven’ (Cisneros) is a disgrace.” Similarly, when I first came to the United States and had to adapt to this new environment, I was burdened by the language difference as well. But I still pushed myself because I did not want to face the disgrace in my home country due to my lack of perseverance. Although Cleofilas ultimately decided to go back to Mexico, she endured her suffering by reminding herself the possibility of bringing disgrace on her family in Mexico. In addition, Cisneros shows that Cleofilas’ reason to leave for home changed from avoiding her husband’s abuse to adopting the new lifestyle of an independent woman, free from the society’s expectations of women.  

Cisneros illustrates that language and culture barriers lead immigrants to be quiet about their pain, but people with the same nationality assist immigrants to overcome the struggles. For instance, Cleofilas was not able to express her emotional struggles to others and hid all the scars from her husband’s abuse until she met a Spanish speaking doctor. Cisneros uses this incident as an example to show the impact of the Spanish speaking community through Cleofilas’ opportunity to access the support of the doctor and Felice. The author illustrates how communities that share the language and culture provide better comfort to immigrants. As an immigrant myself, my Korean church was a shelter that allowed me to better adjust to the new environment and enabled me to connect with new friends of the same nationality and language. Cisneros effectively demonstrates how the community helps Cleofilas to come out of her own cave and to live with freedom. Given the changing times, my experience parallels Cleofilas’ struggles and her access to getting help.

In addition to Cisneros’ examples of immigrants’ experiences in the United States, I would also talk about Cleofilas’ possible struggle with teaching Mexican culture and the Spanish language to her children if I were the author instead. As a Mexican immigrant living in the United States, Cleofilas is likely to struggle with educating her children to navigate multiple cultures: those of both Mexico and the United States. This is because kids learn English at school and communicate in Spanish at home. Thus, they would be conflicted and need more assistance at home. Having to learn two languages and cultures at an early age, many immigrants suffer from learning cultural and language boundaries; therefore, showing an example of the hardship would illustrate another part of immigrants’ experience.

Throughout the story, Cisneros shows some of the problems that immigrants have to overcome. With the responsibility of succeeding in a foreign country, they tend to become shy to share their feelings. And due to the language barrier, they cannot truly express how they feel, thereby not getting the appropriate treatment for their suffering. Thankfully, at the end of the story, the community of the same nationality helped Cleofilas to be independent from the abuse of her husband and to ignore what others think of her in her town. By illustrating a foreign woman who changes from the shy immigrant who could not stand against her husband ultimately to the woman who is able to shout loudly as she can when crossing the creek, Cisneros does a great job expressing the burdens of immigrants.

Word Count: 735

Blog post #4 topic #2

            Adrienne Rich’s “Diving into the Wreck” is a poem seemingly about a diver as he explores and investigates a ship wreck. Through her use of simple imagery to create the setting of a ship wreck, Rich is able to go further than this initial backdrop to use complex metaphors and symbolism to reflect and criticize her culture. Rich was a political author who expressed her strong beliefs on feminism and civil rights through her poems. In this essay, I will prove that “Diving into the Wreck” is a poem reflecting the struggles of minorities living in the 1960s and 70s. I will do this by, first, describing the cultural movements and personal experiences that inspired Rich. Then, I will analyze “Diving into the Wreck” and how it is a metaphor for the oppression of minorities.

            The 1960s in America was a time of great change and revolution in politics including both the feminist and civil rights movements. The Women’s Movement fought against the traditional, domestic lifestyle that was expected of women. Women were expected to marry, start a family, and take care of the home. She was restricted from many professional jobs in the workplace, only being hired as a secretary or teacher. They were not offered good jobs and were paid drastically less than their male coworkers. The Women’s Movement was an attempt to end workplace inequality. Being restricted in the workplace and at home, women felt as though they had no voice.

            Adrienne Rich was a wife and mother, but was discontent with her home life. She was not fulfilled by the domestic lifestyle; she desired to be heard and became active in the Women’s Movement. After her husband’s suicide, Rich came out as lesbian and has written many influential and progressive feminist poems.

            The 1960s was also defined by the Black Panther Movement, which was a party that attempted to protect African American neighborhoods against police brutality. After the abolishment of slavery, segregation and discrimination of black people continued. They experienced prejudice both in the workplace and on the streets. They were not offered the opportunity for higher education and professional jobs that white people were. They were often physically assaulted based on their race by police officers. Black Panther Party members vowed to protect their black neighborhoods and streets against these racist, violent crimes.

Adrienne Rich sympathized with this movement, because similar to the feminist movement, black people were denied a voice in society. Their stories and history were ignored and disrespected. They were continually discriminated, but continued to rise up and fight for justice and equality.

            In Rich’s poem “Diving into the Wreck,” she describes the inequality in her society through the imagery of a ship wreck. Without deeper analysis, “Diving into the Wreck” is a poem that details the experiences of a scuba diver as he investigates a ship wreck. But the entire poem is a metaphor for the suffering of minorities, such as women and African Americans, as they search for their voice. As the diver is preparing for his descent, the equipment is compared to battle armor, the diver “loaded the camera,” brought a “knife-blade,” and wore the “body-armor of black rubber.” The diver seems to be preparing for a battle or for the dangers to come. The ocean itself represents society that eats away at the ship, “worn by salt and sway into this threadbare.” The wrecked ship is human suffering and is described as a human body “ribs of the disaster.” Rich also describes that during this suffering or ship wreck many people died, saying she is among the “tentative haunters.” She explains that by physically exploring the wreck or suffering, she is one with them. We are all connected by our suffering. But even though we experienced the injustice, “our names do not appear” in the “book of myths.” The minorities opinions and experiences are not told. The women and African American’s point of view were not represented in media and are ignored by the majority. But through writing and poems like “Diving in the Wreck,” Rich suggests that minorities tell their stories and experiences.

Blog Post 4 Topic 4

‘Diving into the Wreck’ by American poet and feminist, Adrienne Rich, was one of the most influential poet during the time, receiving the National Book award for Poetry. She wrote ‘Diving into the Wreck’ in 1971 which tells the story of the narrator, a solo diver who explores a ship wreck, describing their surroundings and actions of entering the ocean and reaching the wreck. At the time of writing this poem, America was going through a lot of change including the women’s right movement during the 1970s in which one of the key figures being Rich. Rich grew up in a remarkably educated family, her father being a renowned pathologist at The John Hopkins university and her mother who was a composer and pianist. Rich herself excelled in academics, attending and getting a diploma from Radcliffe college. Then, she married an economics professor at Harvard and have three children before moving to New York to pursue feminist activism. She would later leave her husband (who eventually committed suicide) and identify as lesbian.

Diving into the Wreck utilizes conceit (an extended metaphor that compares two unlikely things in a witty way) to express the poet’s emotions regarding her transformation of identities throughout her life and the difficulty of going against the norms of society and patriarchy. Although, the poem does not explicitly state her emotions and has a rather solemn tone, the poet uses a number of literary devices like visual imagery and symbol to convey her thoughts. We see in the first line that Rich is already using a symbol of the “book of myths” which might suggest that the speaker must know the old stories of the journey before embarking them. Rich also mentions “loaded the camera” and “checked the edge of the knife-blade” to point out the importance of recording and being aware of the danger of the journey. The book of myths might particular point to the myths of patriarchy which split the sexes into two factions that have a perpetual battle of the more dominant sex. The knife may be referring to Rich cutting through societal gender roles and discovering her true identity. Rich uses imagery as the speaker descends into the water - “bluer and then green and then black I am blacking out”- to signify the control of the unconscious and the struggle to break away from this controlling factor. The reference to Jack Cousteau can also been seen in a feminist perspective where Cousteau was a prominent figure in underwater exploring who had a diligent team working with him whereas the speaker tells us “but here alone”. This line illustrates the treatment of women who is left alone to fend and explore for herself. In the sixth stanza, Rich uses the words "And I am here, the mermaid whose […] I am she: I am he” to encourage the idea that women must create new myths and new definitions of society which will heal humanity. Women should use their loneliness to achieve success, discover themselves, and explore the female psyche. Lastly, the last line of the poem, "A book of myths in which our names do not appear," shows us the repeated use of book of myths which might suggest a different connotation that shows Rich’s feeling about women not getting recognition in the past. I believe that Rich advises the readers of the concept of Rebirth where one must recognize their journeys in order to change them ultimately referencing the wreck to treatment of women in a patriarchal society.

In conclusion, Adrienne Rich’s ‘Diving into the wreck’ is a poem relating to feminism and the rebirth of women. She used this poem to express her thoughts and emotions regarding conditions of women during the midst of the women’s right movement, the civils right movement, and the Vietnam war. This poem helped bring attention to the situation and progressed the rights of women.

                                 

Blog Post #4 Topic 4

Maxine Hong Kingston’s portrayal of the immigrant experience in “The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts” is part autobiographical and part folktale. Even though times may have changed, it is still a relevant representation. From the excerpt we have read in class, we get the sense that the childhood she faces is one of trying to overcome cultural differences of an immigrant family to adapt to the newfound community. Between the atmosphere of home and schools, she depicts a different lifestyle and attitudes. She is meek and quiet at her American school, but she is able to speak up at Chinese school. This behavior is understandable and relatable because it is like how almost everyone speaks or acts differently depending on where they are and who they are around.

               As a first generation child from an immigrant family, I can sympathize with Kingston’s portrayal of the immigrant experience. Similarly in my childhood, I also have attended both an American School and a Chinese school concurrently. Although I was not as soft spoken while speaking English, I have witnessed other classmates who were, but were also much more vocal when speaking Chinese when comparing between the two different school settings. There have also been those who were the complete opposite. A few were also quiet in both situations and the rest were loud in both relative to the silent ones. Like the boys described in Kingston’s story, I have seen friends who were also more well behaved in the American school, but are audacious enough to talk back to the teachers at Chinese school. At the American school, one would be told to read aloud individually, but at the Chinese school, all the students would read aloud together in one voice. Whenever a student is at the Chinese school passes by a teacher or the picture of Sun Yat-sen, we would bow to them as a sign of respect, but nothing like that was done when the same students pass by teachers at the American school. Like the stereotypes in Kingston’s story, my Chinese American peers and I would always refer to Whites as “ghosts” and African Americans as “black ghosts”. We did this not because we were trying to intentionally be racially discriminatory, but because that was how the adults in our community would talk about others of a different skin tone, regardless of their actual ethnic background.

               Many of the stereotypes and experiences found in Kingston’s story can still be found in the more modern time period (at least from my experiences in my childhood to about 10 years ago). Therefore, I would not write about anything different if I were the author instead. Even if what Kingston wrote was not 100% autobiographically accurate, it is still a relatable and tangible experience that many other Chinese Americans, including me, can relate to. As the author, even if what she wrote about paints a negative perspective of the immigrant experience, they were still most likely the experiences that had the most significant impacts on her life.