Read Almost a Woman : A Memoir (9780306821110) Online

Authors: Esmeralda Santiago

Almost a Woman : A Memoir (9780306821110) (52 page)

Comparing
When I was Puerto Rican
and
Almost a Woman:
1. Almost a Woman could be described as in essence a search for identity, as Santiago changes from Negi, the little Puerto Rican girl she once was, to the young adult, part Puerto Rican and part American, whose persona she herself has gone far to create. In what ways are little Negi and adult Esmeralda different? What characteristics, on the contrary, does Santiago keep all her life? At the end of Almost a Woman, do you feel that Esmeralda has become the woman she will be, or is her character still in a state of flux?
2. The Santiagos felt that in New York, they would have a “better” life than they had in Macun. In what ways
does their American life turn out, indeed, to be better? In what ways is it a less satisfactory life? Santiago, at the beginning of Almost a Woman, says that Mami would eventually return to Macun after ten years in New York. Do you think that was the right decision for her?
3. How might you compare the Latino experience of assimilation with those of, for example, Chinese, Jewish, Irish, or Haitian immigrants? How might the cultural barriers between these groups and mainstream America differ? What roles do race and language play in the process?
4. In what ways does the Puerto Rican extended family, as represented by the Santiagos, differ from its American counterpart? Does it provide more support, or less? Is the family more constricting? More powerful? More protective? How do the conceptions and ideals of certain roles—mother, father, daughter, son—differ between the two cultures?
5. In Brooklyn, Esmeralda finds that she wants more things, is more ambitious, than she was in Puerto Rico. Why is this? Is this feeling of wanting, of striving, a particularly American state of mind, or is it rather a characteristic of urban culture in general?
Suggested Reading
Isabel Allende:
The Infinite Plan;
Julia Alvarez:
How the Gar-cía Girls Lost Their Accents; íYo!;
Claude Brown:
Manchild in the Promised Land;
Lorene Cary:
Black Ice;
Denise Chavez:
Face of an Angel;
Sandra Cisneros:
The House on Mango Street;
Judith Ortiz Cofer:
The Latin Deli;
Jill Ker Conway:
The Road from Coorain; True North;
Janet Frame:
An Angel at My Table;
Miles Franklin:
My Brilliant Career;
Cristina Garcia:
Dreaming in Cuban;
Lorraine Hansberry:
To Be Young, Gifted, and Black;
Jamaica Kincaid:
Annie John; Autobiography of My Mother;
Oscar Lewis:
La Vida;
Nicholasa Mohr: Nilda; Pat Mora:
House of Houses;
Rosario Morales and Aurora Levins Morales:
Getting Home Alive;
Edward Rivera:
Family Installments: Memories of Growing Up Hispanic;
Earl Shorris:
Latinos: A Biography of the People;
Betty Smith: A
Tree Grows in Brooklyn;
Amy Tan:
The Joy Luck Club.
about the author
Esmeralda Santiago
is the eldest of eleven children. She spent her childhood in Puerto Rico, moving back and forth between a tiny village and Santurce, a suburb of San Juan. With her mother and siblings she moved to New York in 1961, at the age of thirteen. She attended junior high school in Brooklyn and Performing Arts High School in Manhattan. After the extraordinary years described in her memoirs,
When I Was Puerto Rican, Almost a Woman,
and
The Turkish Lover,
she graduated from Harvard University and received a master's degree from Sarah Lawrence College. Santiago is the also the author of two novels,
América's Dream
and
Conquistadora,
and is coeditor, with Joie Davidow, of
Las Christmas: Favorite Latino Authors Share Their Holiday Memories.
Santiago lives in Westchester County, New York, with her husband and two children.
Copyright © 1998 by Esmeralda Santiago
 
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. For information, address Da Capo Press, 44 Farnsworth Street, 3rd Floor, Boston, MA 02210.
 
Cataloging-in-Publication data for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
First Da Capo Press paperback edition 2012
eISBN : 978-0-306-82111-0
Library of Congress Control Number 2012935752
 
Published as a Merloyd Lawrence Book by Da Capo Press
A Member of the Perseus Books Group
www.dacapopress.com
 
Da Capo Press books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the U.S. by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 2300 Chestnut Street, Suite 200, Philadelphia, PA 19103, or call (800) 810-4145, ext. 5000, or e-mail [email protected].
 

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