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Latinx Literature (Love & Sex (Masculinity & Femininity (One of…

- - - - Although Piri Thomas has made a significant impact in helping fight against racism and discrimination, he never seems to readdress his treatment towards women.
        
        "Look, baby, I don't want you to drink too much. Like it don't look good... You sure ain't but that's how I want it. Okay?" (111)
        -Piri to Trina
    - - Piri has sex with a white woman while he is in the south as a method of empowerment against racism
      - Like Beli, Lola is subjected because of her looks. At first she feels like she loses her strength after having sex for the first time but eventually uses it to her advantage. Rather than being a burden, she uses it to strengthen herself.
  - - - Marriage is a prominent theme in Latinx literature in terms of the stereotype that women need to marry and depend on men.
      - "I looked at the ring. My almost-engagement ring. A ring that said, you're a good investment" (211)
        -Lizet after Omar gives her a promise ring
  - - - In "We The Animals", we see glimpses of homosexuality but it all seems forbidden:
        The punkhead neighbor shows a secret video of gay pornography
        The narrator goes to a rundown bus stop where men would secretly hookup
        Once the narrators family does find out he is gay they don't know how to handle it and put him into some sort of psychiatric facility
      - Early on in "Down These Mean Streets" there is this really hazy scene where Piri and his friends go to Antonia, Concha, and La Vieja's apartment.
        What is most interesting is that the events take place as a result of Piri and the rest of his crew trying to prove their masculinity by not backing out of hanging out with gay men.
        After the group gets to the apartment and begin drinking and smoking they are seemingly drugged and Concha and Antonia begin having oral sex with Piri and his friends.
        As it happens Piri has a mixed reaction saying "it both scared and pleased me" (61) and after he says "I felt both good and bad. I felt strong and drained" (61-62)
        Although it's obviously sexual assault, there is an interestingly mixed reaction from Piri. We see a quick transition from stereotypical masculinity to this completely different sexual experience.
        Like many other homosexual experiences in Latinx Literature, the topic is swept under the rug and Piri doesn't mention it again.
      - "'He made me!' I screamed. 'I'm made!'" (115)
    - - A similar scene takes place in "We The Animals" when Ma's coworker Lina comes over to check up on Ma and there is the brief intimate moment:
        "Then she put her lips on Ma's lips and held them there, soft and still, and nobody- not me, not Ma, not Joel or Manny, nobody- said a word. There wasn't a word to say." (32)
        This is another example of maybe where two women understand the subjection that they undergo as females in this culture and it creates this compassionate and intimate connection.
        But like in most of these other literature's, it is brief and never mentioned again
- - - - The relationship of the family members in the novel highlights the overall complexity of the families in Latinx Literature. Each family seems to struggle with abuse and disconnect. However, this also highlights the importance of family since they love and depend on each other
  - - - For Esperanza, the visual concept of home is very important to her. In a way it seems to represent social class and self-worth.
        "You live there? The way she said it made me feel like nothing. There. I live there. I nodded" (5)
      - There is never a doubt that Harlem is home for Piri. He leaves his family in Long Island to go back and live in Harlem because it is home to him. Home for Piri is less about family and more about his Puerto Rican roots and culture.
        "The ride through the Barrio was stone-great. It was like all the bright bulbs in the stores, windows, and lampposts were screaming just for me. I heard all the noises I'd missed for so long-screaming broads, crying kids, hustlers, dogs yapping, and cats making holes in mountains of garbage. The stoops of 104th Street were full of people" (313)
      - Lizet struggles with what home is to her. There are times where she is at school and misses being back home with her family in Hialeah but sometimes when she is home, Lizet wants to go back to Rawlings. Home seems to be more of an emotional concept for Lizet since she focuses so much on her family. Even though she has fights with her Leidy, Lourdes, and her father, Lizet is constantly trying to be close with them. The complex relationship that Lizet has with her family makes "home" an unsure concept for Lizet.
  - - - There is an ongoing stereotype through the novel where female characters like Esperanza, Sallie, Marin, and Lizet are essentially expected to become house wives and wait on the men.
        
        "Sally got married like we knew she would, young and not ready but married just the same. She met a marshmallow salesman at a school bazaar, and she married him in another state where it's legal to get married before eighth grade... he won't let her talk on the telephone. Ane he doesn't let her look out the window. And he doesn't like her friends, so nobody gets to visit her unless he is working." (101-102)
        
        Lizet is encouraged by her mother and sister to get married to Omar so that he can provide for her
        
        "There were many things Ruthie could have been if she wanted to.Not only is she a good whistler, but she can sing and dance too. She had lots of job offers when she was young, but she never took them. She got married instead and moved away to a pretty house outside the city." (68-69)
    - - This goes back to an embedded sexism in the Latin American culture where the women are expected to stay home, have kids, and do as they are told.
      - "Simple. You're not seven; you're six plus one." (16)
        -Ma to the narrator after she tells him that she doesn't want to grow up and become a man like his father or brothers because he will lose his innocence and love towards her.
- - - - Alcoholism and drugs are a means of escaping conflict, oppression, and other personal struggles in Latinx literature.
        It also appears to be a part of this masculine identity in Latin American culture because Piri feels obligated to try heroin in fear that his friends would think he's less of a man if he doesn't
  - - - In almost every novel or piece of Latinx literature we read, there is at least one female character that experiences some kind of mental or physical abuse
        
        "Her eyes searched, wild and desperate, for something to grab, and for just an instance she looked at us with the same pleading look- she looked at us for help, but we stood there, out of her reach, watching." (66)
        -Ma is physically abused and sexually assaulted by Pa several times throughout "We The Animals"
        
        The Wound of Femicides:
        "the act of killing a women or femme, particularly on the basis of their gender and presentation" (5)
- - - - Racism is one of the biggest issues in Latinx literature, whether it be through social economic discrimination (we see this with almost every family in each novel), racism against Latin American cultures, and racism within the Latin American culture itself (anti-blackness)
  - - - A negative stigma towards "blackness"
        
        "I ain't black, damn you! Look at my hair. It's almost blond. My eyes are blue, my nose is straight. My motherfuckin' lips are not like a baboon's ass. My skin is white. White, goddamit!" -Jose to Piri
        
        In Junot Diaz's "Monstro" the diseases spreading through Haiti can be seen as a negative stigma of "blackness" spreading through Latin America and the Greater Powers
    - - Subtle differences are seen between the narrator and his brothers:
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kl-60z0Ns4Y