Junot Diazs Work Fiesta, 1980 - Book Report/Review Example

This short fiction tells the story of a boy, the son of immigrants, who grows up in New York City. He attempts to deal both with his family and with the expectations of the white society that surrounds him, not ever fully being able to make sense of either of them. One of his greatest struggles is the use of language – his family grew up speaking Spanish, but the expectations of him in American culture requires him to speak predominately English. The author uses this conflict to great power by the intermingling of Spanish and English words in the main character’s dialogue, revealing him for what he is: a mix of both places.

Fiesta, 1980 written by Junot Diaz is a short story of a dysfunctional family told from the point of view of a teenage boy Yunior. Diaz ingeniously combines both English and Spanish languages into this narrative to capture the true voice of his main character.One of the best examples of Diaz’s mixing of languages to show the state that his main character is in rests in the main character’s name: Junior (Diaz 73). This is the name the character goes by throughout the entire text. Firstly, it is an English word – showing the importance of the adopted country in the development of Junior’s identity – his very existence is tied to English, rather than to a similar word in Spanish.

This shows a necessity or a desire to adopt the dominant cultural traits of the area that his family moved to, in that they identified their son using terminology that would only exist in that context.