In Caucasia, Danzy Senna tells the tale of two young girls, Cole and Birdie. The products of a biracial couple, they struggle with the growing racial tensions in 1970’s America. The sisters share an inseparable bond, always speaking to each other in their own language, Elemeno. “What was the point of surviving if you had to disappear? [Birdie] said it aloud” (8). She soon learns, much like the Elemenos, that she would have to learn to change form in order to survive.…
The six female dancers sit on the ground separately, spread out in three different columns, and begin to feel their bodies gently as they clasp their hands on their chest, neck, and back. They warmly embrace their individual bodies as if assuring themselves that they have beautiful womanly bodies. Next, the six female dancers twist their bodies quickly to the side and stand on their feet as they raise their upper bodies to a straight position followed by their extended arms slowly rising above their heads. The effect of the women being naked with their limbs spread apart widely dramatically helps the audience understand the true beauty of the female body. The female dancers proceed to rub their breasts with both hands as they glide their fingertips and arms across the top and bottom of their breasts in opposite directions. The lighting of the set is focused on the frontal side of all the female dancers in an effort to focus the audiences eyes on the women's bodies. The technique of a stagnant body position, as the dancers are nude, allows the audience to focus on the upper bodies of the female dancers which helps to express and celebrate the true beauty and elegance of the female…
Acculturation is a process in which one transitions from one culture to another, adopting new cultural traits and social patterns. When people of third world countries migrate to North America, acculturation is almost necessary in order for survival and acceptance. The author of “Chicken-Hips”, Catherine Pigott, experienced acculturation first hand after visiting Africa. Catherine is used to a culture where having a slim body style is ideal. When Catherine arrived in Gambia, the other women thought her to be too frail, and thin, and as a result, nicknamed her “chicken-hips”. The women of Africa believe that being curvy and thick is more attractive. Catherine is also used to her own culture where it is considered unattractive for women to over eat. The African natives frowned upon Catherine’s lack of appetite, as she could not keep up with their meal portions. They eat an abundance of food because they do not know when they might run out of food to eat. One way, Catherine’s identity changed was her perception of beauty in Africa. She gained weight and felt “transformed”. Catherine adapted to their ideals of beauty and changed her appearance to what their society deemed acceptable. In conclusion, this essay by Catherine Pigott shows the desire for acceptability that everyone yearns. Catherine adapted to a new culture in order to be accepted and attractive and once she returned home she started the process of acculturation all over again in order for…
Alvarez presents a series of ironic situations to make candid observations about how women are just as capable as men to do what society defines as “men’s” work. In The Time of the Butterflies is set in the era of Rafael Trujillo’s dictatorship in the Dominican Republic, where the Mirabal sisters assist in organizing a rebellion against the regime and are soon known as the “Butterflies.” Despite the bravery they demonstrated, the Mirabal sisters were ordinary wives and mothers who did not take the passive role of a woman but instead rose above their titles. When the Mirabal sisters try to convince sister Dedé to join them in the revolution, Dedé expects charismatic and passionate Minerva to speak up but instead hears littlest sister Mate do so, the little sister…
In a poem of reminiscent adolescence, Sharon Olds defines a young girl who has the capacity to judge adolescent emotion with the benefit of time, for she is now a mother herself. This definitive view of adolescent values and thought is mingled with the mystery of symbolic mathematics, which represents a maturity of this thought and a colorful insight into the development of a young girl as she becomes a woman. This poem also accentuates the mystery associated with the minds of the female gender, and the strength of the adolescent, whose mother recounts a vicarious experience that seems to stand a landmark in the social and sexual development of a young female.…
As Esperanza begins her transition from childhood to adulthood, she goes through adolescence and her hips begin to form. In the chapter “Hips” Esperanza, Nenny, Rachel, and Lucy, while jump roping together, talk about the changes when growing up. Esperanza scientifically discusses hips growing, while Rachel…
Two stories that are abundant with feminist views and stereotypes are Cisneros' Barbie-Q and My Tocaya. In both stories, we see characters struggle with what it means to be a woman. Cisneros explores the standards women are held up to, and the standards they make for themselves. Cisneros does a wonderful job of bringing out the worries, fears, and Otherness that women frequently grapple with in their daily lives. She writes her tales, all the while reflecting and dismantling stereotypes of women. Cisneros, when participating in a project titled Interviews with Writers of the Post-Colonial World, stated: "I guess my feminism and my race are the same thing to me. They're tied in one to another, and I don't feel an alliance or allegiance with upper-class white women" (Jussawalla, Dasenbrock, 74).…
During her research, Betties hung out with the girls and talked to them about their lives, culture, school, family, friendship, makeup… Betties divided the girls into classes such as: smokers, cholas & cholas, Las chicas,Staters, hicks and preps. The “prep” were mostly white student from middle class families. The “hicks” were mostly white students who from farming families. The “skaters” were mostly white who did not consider themselves in any category. “Cholas& cholas” were from hard working Mexican American family, who participated in gangs. “Las chicas” were from hard working Mexican American families, who did not participated in gang but knew people in gangs. According to Betties, class is not just about socioeconomic but also about attitude, race and performance. In the beginning of the book, Betties showed her argument with Pipher who is the author of the book “Reviving Ophelia” which is very popular at the school. Her argument that Pipher hasn’t addressed class and race; as Pipher didn’t pay attention on feminine. According to Bettie, girls have more complex process of identity formation. According to Bettie, girl sense of inequality but they don’t express it in political term. That was why studying girls helps understand social class and help ending…
The House On Mango Street and “ Only Daughter” both prove that being an Mexican- American women is a struggle. As Cisneros shows her first hand experience, and as well shows it through story telling. Yet without telling a biography and going straight to the point she shows emotion by using literary elements. Sandra Cisneros Chose to use metaphors and imagery to express the hard ships of being a Mexican- American women. If Sandra Cisneros did not use literary elements to show the lifestyle of a Mexican-American women, the points that she showed in both the texts would not have been as powerful as they were.…
Her mother’s side of the family is white Americans who believed being skinny was the key to beauty. In America, we have several reminders of what we should look like. Our models are size zeros. All our foods are low fat or reduced in calories producing dieting. We also promote surgery to stay skinny. Hips or la caderas are seen as fat which is ugly, ugly being the antonym for beauty. On the contrary her father’s side believed that the thicker you were or the more curves that complimented one’s body made you more of a woman. That notion highlighted a woman’s beauty. Caderas, often referred to in her explanation, simply translated is hips. In Latin cultures caderas are the stomach, waist, and thighs. It’s all that makes a “real woman”. La caderas are the essence of a woman. Those who don’t posses these caderas are seen as sick. It’s unattractive to the eye. The different cultures that she exemplifies…
George’s work examined how the Lolita trend, along with celebrities, helped fuel young girls perception of themselves. These observations are then adhered and continued onto their adult life. As George writes, “For adult women, that notion of being kind of a girlie and innocent and sexually pure, as well as very sexy, has been in men’s magazines forever” (p.424). The article emphasized that by being exposed to sexually charged advertisement at a young age, adult women are dressing as what they deemed normal. Therefore, there are no difference between girls and women, both are being…
In “The Myth of The Latin Women”, there are numerous stereotypes that Latin women are judged for. Being a Latin woman, Cofer was judged falsely. Clothing in the Latin culture is a means of expression. Cofer explains that woman and girls often wear brightly colored outfits, specifically dresses and skirts. The clothing that Latin women wear also has an influence on how others might see them. Cofer describes that, “As young girls, it was our mothers who influenced our decisions about clothes and colors,” Unfortunately, the media twisted this tradition, making it translate into “Hispanic women as the hot tamale or sexual firebrand” (245).…
Venus de Willendorf is a statuette that first appeared during the Upper Paleolithic period. The exaggerated carvings of the body parts were how the artists of that time viewed women, fat and fertile. History often takes from the past to reinvent the future. Today’s society has the Barbie doll. Ruth Handler created it in 1959. Its long legs and slim figure has been worship by so many, that real women have undergone intense cosmetic surgeries to resemble the doll. Both figurines have gained notoriety based on the representation of women of their era, displayed their own meaning of beauty and cultures’ perception of it.…
In the good life theme of body versus image, Zoe Whittall’s My Hot Fat Girl Manifesto, and Emily Prager’s Our Barbies Ourselves distinguish the idea of body acceptance, and self-image. In My Hot Fat Girl Manifesto Whittall talks about her experiences and how she came to terms with who she was. In Prager’s Our Barbies Ourselves she discusses the impossible beauty standard women try to conform to. In professor Maze’s embodying the good life lecture the class realizes the standard of beauty that both dolls, and technology have set for them. In order to achieve, and maintain the good life one has to accept their own body, and not force another’s image onto themselves.…
In a dream I asked the dancer Eduardova to dance the Czardas just one time more. She had a broad streak of shadow or light across the middle of her face between the lower part of her forehead and the cleft of her chin. Just then someone with the loathsome gestures of an unconscious intriguer approached to tell her the train was leaving immediately. The manner in which she listened to this announcement made it terribly clear to me that she would not dance again. "I am a wicked, evil woman, am I not?" she said. "Oh, no," I said, "not that," and turned away aimlessly.…