The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao Analysis

When You Are Not Following The Traditions Can you imagine if you are not following the family traditions, what would happen to you? As we grew up, the family plays a essential role in our lives. We are able to learn how to interact with the community and the world unconsciously by our parents. They are the ones we stay with everyday so that it is very simple for us to be impacted by their behaviors and opinions before we touching the real society. Those concepts are called family values that involve traditional ideas about what a family should be like. In Stone Butch Blues by Leslie Feinberg and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, two authors both discuss how the family values shape Jess and Oscar’s ideas and behaviors and

When we read some fairy tales, the girls usually wear dresses and the boys wear pants and shirts. Although there has the same family traditions in Stone Butch Blues, the narrator Jess Goldberg like to wear pants and shirts instead of dresses. However, in her family, the female always wear a dress and people also believes in that. As she argues with her father that she does not want to wear a dress, her father said “Because you’re a girl” ( Feinberg, 19), which indicates what her parents think a girl should do and they want to let she correct her “fault”. Not only her parents think that way, other strangers also ask Jess about her gender. The background of family traditions makes she become a weirdo in others’ view, which causes a big problem to her. She is often plagued by gender identity issues. For instance, she goes to ask animals

In a Dominican family, the boys should be popular among girls or have at least one girlfriend. However, Oscar do not have a girl who likes him. “Anywhere else his triple-zero batting average with the ladies might have passed without comment, but this is a Dominican kid we’re talking about, in a Dominican family… was supposed to be pulling in the bitches with both hands” (Diaz, 24). From here, we also can see the traditions of Oscar’s family. His uncle Rudolfo is glad to teach him how to grab a muchacha. His sister Lora also encourages him to change himself in order not to “die a virgin” (Diaz, 25). However, without a girlfriend makes him look different from other boys and he feels lonely and panicky. And he begins to stay at home and gain weight after breaking up with two girls. Besides this tradition, the family value also influences him on love and choosing a girlfriend. Based on his mother’s attitude, “A puertorican over here? his mother scoffed. Jamas!” (Diaz, 15), Oscar finally chooses Maritza as his only girlfriend. This family also has own values of love. “His abuela placed her hand on his head in blessing…… Know that in this world there’s somebody who will always love you” (Diaz, 32). When he cannot find a girlfriend, his grandmother, his sister, and his uncle all take care of him and give him a favor. Oscar is also concerned about them. They love each other and care about each family member. Those family values give Oscar enough