Acceptance Of The Culture In The Myth Of The Latin Woman And Other Works

Through the readings of this semester, I have been able to identify with some of the stories while some I have not. To begin with, in the essay “The Myth of the Latin Woman” by Judith Ortiz Cofer, the writer has expressed her view on cultural differences and stereotypes some people find themselves in life. She talks of a girl named Maria and the kind of stereotypes that she, together with other women of Latin and Hispanic descent, has had to endure. Cofer, a Latin American woman, also remembers her childhood experiences and the differences in the way people interacted with her and other Non-Latino females. One instance that was so clear to her is the carrier day in their school when she could not know what to wear and how people would react to it due to cultural chasm (Cofer). I can also relate to what the writer and Maria went through because of cultural differences. When I was young, there was a family in our neighborhood of Indian origin. The way of their dressing, their food, their form of worship, and how they interacted with other people was so different from what I was used to. This family was stereotyped and found it hard to cope and adapt to our culture, which took them quite a while. At school, their son was different from other children and had a rough time coping, which stressed him up.

In the essay ‘Sixty-Nine Cents’ by Gary Shteyngart, the author describes how she battled the war between her parents’ culture; the Russian Culture, and that of the American culture where she grew up and was part of after they migrated into the US when she was fourteen years of age. As Gary states in (Shteyngart), their culture and traditions were a bit different, and she kept wondering what was happening. For instance, when they had a family outing, she was set to eat hamburgers, hot dogs, and fried chicken, which were mainly American foods. However, that did not work because she came across food that was of their great-grandmother's culture, and she was in for it. Her menu, therefore, changed from grilled hamburgers to chicken and noodles, mashed potatoes, green beans, and others. I have seen this happen a lot of times with my friends in college because of our different cultures at times conflict. The kind of foods and dressing, especially, are the most commonly affected since no one is ready to desert their culture.

In the story ‘Valley of the Gun’ by Joe Bageant, the writer talks of guns and that not everything about the guns is evil. He explains how guns sometimes represent family tradition and loyalty and thus can be something really precious. According to Joe, there is a correlation between families that hunts together since they tend to stay together. To me, I have not been much exposed to guns, and neither does my family. We believe that guns are mostly meant to be used by the police in safeguarding the nation against criminals and terrorists. Guns may not be all that bad, but I cannot identify with any situation I saw someone use a gun before me or myself using it. Even those that own guns are not supposed to use them recklessly, and thus I choose to stay away from them as it is not a good family culture as portrayed by Joe.

Work Cited

1. Cofer, Judith Ortiz. 'The Myth of the Latin Woman.' 1993.
2. Shteyngart, Gary. 'Sixty-Nine Cents.' 2007.