Blog Post 5

1.Throughout the novel, Sofia has her life and identity shaped by events occurring in the story. Due to the fact that she is the youngest daughter, her memories of the Dominican are vague, creating a small barrier between herself and her families culture. Being the youngest daughter she often experiments due to the freedom she has. Going through so many boyfriends developed a rocky relationship between Sofia and her father. Her father wanted her to marry a man from the Dominican, but she ends up running away with a German man. She develops new attitudes toward sexual relationships, which is more of an Americanized view compared to her fathers traditional values. Finally when she has children her relationship with her father eases up, but she always had the sexual side which is evident at her fathers birthday when she embarrass him by kissing his ear. It is easy to see Sofia finds sport in upsetting her father because she knows what his views are but consistently goes against them even in front of his face. I  believe these events have actually set Sofia back because she is not learning from these experiences. Instead of understanding her father, she always ends up upsetting him so it is evident she hasn't learned from thee experiences.

2. The Garcia family experiences a variety of conflicts when coming to the United States. They have trouble blending into society and as they grow apart from their culture they began to loose sight of whats really important in life. A true back bone of the Garcia family would have to the the mother, Laura. As her daughters go through tough times blending into this new society between, developing relationships and starting a new life, Laura is always there for support and never shuns them away. She is extremely considerate of her daughters which is exactly what they need as they attempt to manage their life. Though the book has a lot of "negativity" due to everything the girls go through, Laura represents the "positivity". Her actions can be both considered Person to Person due to the direct affect her actions have with he daughters. Her support can also be considered Person v. Society because she doesn't care about what society has done to her daughters, she still looks to better their lives through the love and support she offers them.

3. I have been following the Jeremy Lin story since he got big and truthfully I would say it connects to the book in a variety of ways, but at the same time it differs in a few aspects. For one, Jeremy Lin and the Garcia girls are often looked at and judged based on their ethnicity. Both Jeremy Lin and Sofia want to break free from being identified based on their religion. Jeremy Lin said he just wants to be a basketball player, not an Asian basketball player, just like Sofia wanted to rid of her culture's views on marriage and sex so she could do her own thing. Nobody wants to be identified as their particular race, they want to be unique and have their race not affect their career and popularity. A major difference i think between Jeremy Lin and the Garcia girls is definitely the fact that the girls had to blend into society. They experienced many more hardships understanding this new culture, while Jeremy Lin went to school at Harvard and is truly an American. The only hardships he faced was getting his career to take off which he finally has done as the point guard of the Knicks.