Analysis Of Philippe Bourgois's In Search Of Respect: Selling Barrio

The author Victor Rios explains his youth. He and his friend Conejo had a business to make money. Rios was 15 and Conejo was in his early 20’s. The product they sold was heroin in balloons. This is a dangerous way to earn money but they justified why they decided to sell this.

The Reading this week “‘Handlin’ Your Business’ Sexual Respectability and Peers” by Lorena Garcia reveals how Latina girls understand and discuss sexuality. The reading describes how the girls try took take the role of the good girl in the “good girl/bad girl” dichotomy. In the girl's process to prove to be a good girl they just embrace and justified the “good girl/bad girl” dichotomy even more. Along with the “good girl/bad girl” dichotomy was the discussion of the double standard for men who can be more sexual than women. The girl's idea of safe sex was also a way to protect themselves from being labeled as dirty or the bad girl.

The story Andale Prita, is a memoir by Mexican-American, Yasmín Ramírez from El Paso, Tx that wrote this book to grieve her late grandmother talking about her many life experiences. Throughout the story we can see how the book covers a lot of important and delicate subjects such as violence towards women. Yazmín’s grandmother who she would call “Ita” (short for abuelita, grandma in Spanish) suffered a lot during her lifetime, and violence was one of the many hardships she encountered. Ita was hurt physically by more than one man and more than twice in her life which shows how hard it was for her.

Second, the thesis is shown through the perspective of Ernesto Vera. Ernesto Vera was the eldest child in the Vera family. His two younger siblings, Lupe and Ray, otherwise known as Payasa and Lil Mosco, are both heavily involved with gang violence and all types of gang activity, but not Ernie. Ernesto said, “When I’m passing houses, I only hear TVs on, and all the anchors are talking about is looting and fire and Rodney King and black people and anger and that’s cool, whatever, because I’m focused on something else.” (6).

Puerto Rico, an unincorporated island of the United States, have their own set of cultural beliefs. The foundation of the Puerto Rican structure is family. The word “familismo” is a Puerto Rican word that means close family connections, and it emphasizes the concern for the well-being of the family (Maria de Lourdes B. Serpa, Ed. D, 2005). Although I was born in the United States, my family is from Puerto Rico (Kay, 2018).

Sandra Cisneros, the author of the book The House on the Mango Street, conveys that girls or women do not have as much freedom as guys do, the girls or women are always ruled or controlled by someone mostly male, and they always have to be the one to follow the rules. As Esperanza grows up she observes many girls who are in the conditions that they are not supposed to be in. The girls have no freedom and they are always supposed to listen to the guy in the family. One observation Esperanza observes is that girls are controlled by men all the time and because of listening to men those girls are locked inside. For example as Esperanza says, “And then Rafaela, who is still young but getting old from leaning out the window so much, gets locked indoors because her husband is afraid Rafaela will run away since she is too beautiful to look at” ( Cisneros # 79 ).

This show that she doesn 't like being ignored and wants someone so she can talk about the things she could have become. This book shows how people all want to belong and have a friend always there. Candy, crooks and Curley 's wife demonstrate how a belonging place for them is not what it seems like to other people and how it 's difficult for anyone to live life with a friend or a place to belong. Because of that people should respect the people around them because people have place

The schools in undeveloped communities, such as the community Esperanza lives in, are not funded as much from poor families which means they don’t have as many resources as other schools in richer neighborhoods have. Esperanza’s neighborhood consists of a “laundromat, junk store, drugstore, windows and cars and more cars” (Cisneros 16). In essence, it is evident that the school in Esperanza’s neighborhood is likely not as developed either and is meant for kids whose families cannot afford private schools. In such communities, teachers may also not choose to work in schools because of the salary. Since education is not a priority for Esperanza’s family, Esperanza is sent to any random school without taking into consideration the quality of the education.

The Myth of The Latin Woman Analysis Latin American women face challenges every single day and moment of their lives. They are strongly discriminated against in all sectors of employment, in public places, and even while just walking down the street. In her essay, "The Myth of the Latin Woman," Judith Ortiz Cofer describes her own experiences using illuminating vignettes, negative connotation, and cultural allusion to exemplify how she used the struggles in her day to day life as a Latin woman to make herself stronger. Cofer uses illuminating vignettes to illustrate the different situations she encountered as a Latina while growing up and living in America.

Díaz illustrates throughout the novel how significant gender roles matter in Dominican culture. It is expected of men to exaggerate qualities of masculinity, this is known as machismo, whereas for women, it is important

In Mexican American society , women are deemed inferior to men, evident in traditional family roles, the male is the head of the family who provides for the family , while the woman stays at home to look after the children she is expected to provide for her husband . In the third vignette of ‘The House on Mango Street’ titled ‘Boys and Girls’ the reader is informed of the division between men and women when Esperanza refers to herself and her sister Nenny , and her brothers, “They’ve got plenty to say to me and Nenny inside the house. But outside they can’t be seen talking to girls”. The male dominance begins at a very young age.

Before we even meet Curley’s wife Candy criticizes her for flirting with men other than her husband , leaving readers with a negative impression of her. With no real companionship on the ranch, however we later learn that she simply yearned for attention, using the only weapon she had: her sexual

“No, this isn’t my house I say and shake my head as if shaking could undo the year I’ve lived here (Cisneros 106).” This quote shows Esperanza’s unwillingness of accepting her poor neighbourhood because of the violence and inequality that has happened in it. In the House on Mango Street, the author, Sandra Cisneros, shows that there is a direct link between inequality, violence and poverty. The House on Mango Street shows women are held back by the inequalities that they face. Cisneros shows that racism prevents individuals from receiving job opportunities which leads to poverty and violence.

This perspective highlights how little power women possessed at that time. The characters in Candide seem to accept the rape as an unfortunate, but common occurrence. Paquette is the only woman who seems to view her situation with any sort of bitterness. After she was kicked out of the baron’s castle she became a prostitute in order to make a living. She was “forced to continue this terrible profession that you men find so pleasant, while to us women it is but an abyss of misery.”

According to Bourgois, he explained that he felt structural oppression was the main cause of what affected Primo and Caesar’s life choices and opportunities. Structural oppression is when people of a society identity group are mistreated and the treatment of these people are supported by society and its institution. Throughout the book, we see several cases in which Primo and Caesar and mistreated in various ways. In the beginning, Bourgois talks about the history of Puerto Ricans and how the immigration from Puerto Rico to New York City consequently affected the growth and development of their own culture in El Barrio.