This Is How You Lose Her Analysis

The books, “This Is How You Lose Her” by Junot Diaz, and “Ten Little Indians” by Sherman Alexie illustrate certain narratives that minority groups in the United States are exposed to on a daily basis. Diaz, “This Is How You Lose Her”, is the collection of stories of people coming from the Dominican Republic and also of people who live in the United Sates but have a Dominican background. The book is primarily deals with Yunior; a young hardhead who’s yearning for love is only equaled by his recklessness. While “Ten Little Indains” by Sherman Alexie is a collection of nine short that deals with the many aspects of contemporary American life as experienced by Native Americans. Both of These books share similarities in the way in which minority’s groups are portrayed. Running throughout both of these stories is the central issue of self-esteem. Both books run through the ways in which minority groups are forced to fit in and become familiar with American customs. Even while these books are written through the lenses of two different race; they offer similar insights as to what effect being non-American has led to self-esteem. Also, both of these books illustrate the ways in which self-esteem issues affect can natively affect the familial and romantic
relationships of the people that these books talk about.
To begin with “This is How You Lose Her” by Junot Diaz is a collection of stories that describe the lives of people from the Dominican Republic living in the United States. Though are many characters in this book, Junot Diaz focuses a large portion of it on Yunior and more or less his family in different points in time. Yunior’s character revels an array of ways in which his race and gender affect his self-esteem and consequently his ability to survive and thrive in America. In many ways Junior is stuck in stigma of stereotypes that was a consequence of of his childhood upbringing. This resulted is much of Yuniors problems if life. The fact remains that many Dominican men have been conditioned to act a certain way when it pertains to women, but by doing so there is a negative effect that follows these perceptions.
Consequently, Yunior character illustrates the negative consequences that result from embodying stereotypical Dominican men ideologies. At one point in his life Junior is madly in love with the women he is about to marries, but destroys this relationship by cheating and thus she leaves him. Yuniors self-esteem has had a profound negative effect on much of his life. His race has created a self- esteem that has led Yunior to his insane cheating habits. He feels the need to act upon his pride of being a Dominican man and judges with worth on being able to sleep with as many women as possible. All Yunior really knows is how to be a man that goes after women because of his upbringing and his race; he even calls himself a sex addict. He feels the need to be this way, but the result nearly destroys him. Junior states,” he feels terribly guilty and terribly alone”(183). Junior feels again abandoned that his own mother won’t even talk to him. As a consequent of his musicality and the perceived notions pertaining to his race and women, Yunior has lost a lot and it seems as if he will live the rest of his life alone as a result of his escapades.
Having considered the role self-esteem has in “This Is How You Lose Her”, Alexis book also illustrate the effects self-esteem has a person as a result of a person’s race, socioeconomic status, and gender. Alexis, “ Ten Little Indians”, is a collection of stories that capture the lives of Indians living in Seattle. Through these stories Alexis runs through the struggles tangled between being an indigenous Native American in a tribal culture and dealing with living in the contemporary, mainstream white American Culture.
The first chapter “The Search Engine” gives us insight as to how race effects self-esteem; as well as portraying how self-esteem results from a person race and how this effects them in their familial and romantic relationships. "The Search Engine” describes the affairs a young and gifted Indian girl who is a student at Washington State University. Corliss has a strong interest in poetry, but her family does not share the same interest; in fact, her family constantly wonders why Corliss chooses to continue to read these poems, and constantly tell her that she is wasting her time. Corliss is very different in that she has enough self-esteem to live alone at college. Conversely, Corliss’ parents do not embodying the same self-esteem. It is clear that they do not due to their hatred of white people and desire for their daughter to become successful in which they mean becoming anything except the poet she wants to be. We can see an example of this on page 13; here we have a conversation between Corliss and her uncle. Corliss’ uncle stats” I bet you’re reading one of those white books again” (13). The poems she reads are mostly the works of the white man and given all that the “white man” have done to Indians it is easy to see why Corliss’ traditional family do not care for what a white person has to say. Corliss responds to her uncle, “ His name is Gerard Manley Hopkins”. Mantely Hopkins was a poet in the 19 century. Her Uncle responds once more and stats” White people were killing Indians in the 19 century. Corliss parents and uncle self-esteems play an interconnected role in their race. As a result of being Native American; they feel the pride to hate and fear the Whiteman.
Furthermore, the example of self-esteem comes up again when she meets Harlan Atwater. While she admired Atwater for being a poet that seemed to have idealized the courage of self-esteem she later finds that could not be further from the truth. She meets Haralan Atwater and find that his self-esteem is gone or had never even existed. She found him to be simply a bitterer old man. His failed attempts to write poems and gain respect as led him down this path and as a consequence Awater is a lonely old man. His familial and romantic relationships have failed him and he embodies self-loathing a result of the lack of self-esteem.
Even though Corliss has been brought up in an environment where she has been taught to fear and hate white people, she displays much more of an open mind. For example Corliss states, “ it was easy to hate white vanity and white rage and white ignorance, but what about white compassion and white genius and white poetry”(14). Corliss differs from her family in that she feels for white genius and white poetry; she is willing to acknowledge that some white people are capable of creating something beautiful instead of always something destructive. Corliss is also more opened minded, in that she is open to hearing what white people have to say unlike most of her family. Thusly, Corliss is much more likely to be successful in her relationships. Her self-esteem is in a place where she can look past the negative affects her race, gender and socioeconomic status, can have on her.
While the book differ in that one is primarily about Dominican American life and the other is about Native American life; they both still share the a common theme relating to self-esteem.
Diaz’s “ This Is How You Lose her” explores the ways in which Yunior in negatively effected by living up to be the man that his race demands him to be; while “Ten Little Indians: explores how being native American and having to live in a American mainstream culture as both negatively and positively effected characters in the book. Both books effect that race, gender, and socioeconomic status have on self-esteem. In addition, both books explore the effects that self-esteem can have on a person’s familial and romantic
relationships