Wizards of Waverly Place

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      Wizards of Waverly Place is a children’s television series that ran on Disney Channel from Fall 2007 to Winter 2012. The show focuses on the half Mexican/half Italian Russo family, owners of the Waverly Sub Station in New York City, who appear to be ordinary but have to hide the fact that they are wizards with magical abilities. The three siblings – Justin, Alex, and Max – have to prepare to compete against each other in the family wizard competition while grappling with typical issues of adolescence.
      Wizards is the first Disney Channel Original Series to feature an interracial family. Three of the show’s actors (Maria Canals Barrera, Selena Gomez, and Jake T. Austin) have made positive contributions to the portrayal of Latina/os in the media, and have been nominated for several ALMA Awards for their work on the show. Wizards has won 3 Primetime Emmys for “Outstanding Children’s Program” in 2009, 2010, and 2012. The show ended as the longest-running Disney Channel Original Series with 106 episode over four seasons, and reached over 175 million unduplicated viewers in 163 countries and 32 languages. Disney Channel considers Wizards one of its most successful series ever.
      In Quinceañera (Season 1, Episode 20), Teresa Russo is planning a quinceañera for her teenage daughter Alex. However, Alex – rough and rowdy, far from girly – does not want to have a quinceañera, and Jerry is not ready to accept that his daughter is growing up. I have provided you with the full episode for your viewing pleasure, and have pulled out a few scenes that demonstrate some of the themes we discussed in class:

  • Mothers may play a more active role in planning the quinceañera
  • Mothers may plan for a quinceañera as a way to live vicariously through their daughters
  • Fathers may have trouble coping with the idea that their daughters are growing up
  • Daughters may want to deviate from the traditional elements of a quinceañera
  • Daughters may not feel as if they are the real focus of the quinceañera
  • Families may tolerate greater financial charges than what is reasonable

Wizards of Waverly Place
Season 1, Episode 20: Quinceañera

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgPMVzrH4eY&w=480&h=360]


(4:00 – 4:09)
Teresa: “There are rituals symbolizing your becoming a woman, that you go through with your dad.”
Jerry: “What?! I didn’t give anybody permission to become a woman!”

(4:57 – 5:30)
Teresa: “There’s a ritual where you change from a flat shoe to a high heel shoe”
Alex: “Well, maybe I change from these high tops to even higher high tops”
Teresa: “No, Alex. There are certain things that people do at a quinceañera and we’re going to do them.”
Alex: “If I can’t wear my sneakers and I have to wear that [dress] then we’re not.”
Teresa: “Alex, you can’t just cancel, a lot of work has gone into this.”
Alex: “It’s my party, I can cancel if I want to.”
Teresa: “It’s not just your party, it’s OUR party.”
Alex: “Oh yeah, well it seems like it’s mostly just about you!”

(6:56 – 7:20)
Magdalena: “Well, I haven’t seen her this upset since she was fifteen and she asked if she could have a quinceañera, and we couldn’t afford it…maybe she figured at least she’d get to have one for you.”

(7:52 – 7:58)
Teresa: “I mean, it’s not like I have another daughter I can give my hopes and dreams to, you know?”

(14:47 – 14:56)
Jerry: “I will put these high heels on Alex to symbolize a girl becoming a woman.” [and begins to sob]

(21:14 – 22:00)
Jerry: “You really are growing up. You did all this for your mother, and look how happy it made her”
Alex: “I’m glad we did this too, dad.”
Jerry: “You really are turning into a wonderful woman, just like her. I’m so proud of you, honey.”
Alex: “Even when I break the rules and use magic behind your back?”
Jerry: “Even then. Oh, honey, are you crying?
Alex: “Yeah, but why aren’t you? You’ve been crying for days.”
Jerry: “Well I think I’m all cried out.”
Alex: “Really? What if I told you how much this quinceañera cost?”
Jerry: “OH MY GOSH! Here it comes again…” [and begins to sob loudly]

#CHST302 : Cervantes and Viramontes

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The Moths and Other Stories

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In “birthday” by Viramontes, the story describes a character named Alice, who is pregnant. This is not uncommon for young women in the Latin community. This is definitely something that is a coming of age moment. This is a wake up call for Alice. Alice grows and changes in the way she views on Love. “Love was satisfaction, happiness, and all that other bullshit, not babies.” (Viramontes 47)
If that is not serious enough, now she must make the decision to go through with an abortion. This is a very serious and life changing decision to have to make. Instead of discussing this with her parents, she is getting advice from her “mature” 21 year old friend. This is the case for many young latinas. It depends on how things are at home because many young women would rather consult friends instead of their parents. Especially when it comes to being pregnant.

Ana’s mom in “Real Women have Curves,” stresses the importance of being a virgin and was furious just when she thought Ana was pregnant.

“Snapshots”, another story by Viramontes, is about a woman who is obsessed with reminiscing on the past. Everyday she wants to do the same routine she has been doing for 30 years. This involves getting the food and clothes prepared for her husband and daughter. Throughout the story she lets you know what has happened to her after this thirty year routine. Now, she is divorced and her daughter visits her everyday. Her daughter Maggie brings her new balls of yarn to knit but she just stares at her. Her daughter makes dinner for her but she just stares at her. In her reminiscing she recalls working part time as well as being a wife and mother.

Many latina wives and mothers do not have it easy. The demands on many mothers are great, and they must physically labor as well. This is very similar to the movie “Real Women Have Curves.” Ana’s mom had to work at a sewing shop. In Moraga’s autobiography, “Loving In The War Years” she mentions how she had to serve her brothers even though she had many other responsibilities under her belt. The Mom, in snapshots, later mentions that she was eventually divorced. She did not take it well.

It is important to note that in these coming of age moments ,such as getting married and\or getting divorced, one has the opportunity to grow or and become more or become less. There is always change, but one may not make a positive change. This story made it clear that she did not make a positive change. She was depressed and was always looking at photos from her past. She would ignore her daughter Maggie and not eat the food she made for her.

In the story “growing” by Viramontes, a girl must be chaperoned by her younger sister by orders of her father. Her father said it is because “tu eres mujer” (Viramontes 36) or because you are a woman. Many young latinas are very protected and have little freedom. This is similar to the other stories we have read like “House on Mangos St.” Wives could be locked up in the house by over protective husbands. The girl in “growing”encounters some old friends playing baseball but says she is to big now to play because she is in high school. We find out in this story that she left her sister on a ferris wheel to go make out with a boy amongst other high school kids. Her younger sister tells her father and she gets punished for leaving her. Around this age many young latina women discover their sexuality and explore it. Moraga began to discover her Lesbianism. Ana from Real Women Have Curves had sex for the first time shortly after high school. Sexuality plays a huge role for young latinas coming of age.

Photo from NCSL website: http://www.ncsl.org/issues-research/health/public-health-herald-5th-issue.aspx

Mexican Women Coming of Age in the Early 19th Century

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The first wave of Mexican women was in the early 20th Century, however it is known that Mexican women had been migrating beforehand.  Women escaped poverty, violence, etc. and found refuge in America with hopes of a better living situation.  Many did not find this prosperous America, instead they faced discrimination, racism and marginalization.

Jesusita Torres, was a child when her mother began packing their belongings to run away.  Jesusita was told to keep her mouth shut.  Jesusita, her mother and baby sister escaped to Ciudad Juarez (p.1).  There, Jesusita’s mother had to work for six months in order to secure enough money for three passports.  During this time Jesusita would carry her sister in her arms, travel through the streets of Ciudad Juarez to meet her mother for lunch.

Jesusita and her baby sister had nothing to eat. Everyday they would travel to their mother’s place of employment to eat leftovers, then travel back to their residence.  At nine years old, this young child was force to grow up.  She became aware of her situation and at an early age, she understood that life was not so pleasant.  You see, Jesusita’s step-father, used to mistreat her, like he did her mother.

Jesusita had many coming of age moments beginning with her abusive step father.  Running away from home was another moment that, at that time she probably did not fully understand, but she was aware that it had to be done. Moving to Ciudad Juarez and commuting those streets with her baby sister in her arms was another moment in which she became of age.  Caring for a baby is very difficult as an adult, imagine the struggles she endured as a nine-year old girl.  The dangers she could and may have faced.

Finally crossing over the border, Jesusita worked the fields of Orange County with her mother and sister for many years.  Women in the early 20th century, like Jesusita and her family set the tone for Mexican women living in America.

Women challenged traditional domesticity values.  They organized for better working conditions, for better education and they spoke out about the gendered roles Chicano movement organizations valued. Women have demonstrated to be worriers, leaders and role models for the rest of us Mexican women.  Their coming of age moments have  helped us; our coming of age moments will help future generations.

I bought this book in the Kindle version for a book review assignment for a Chicano History course.  I loved the idea of it centering around the development of Mexican women in the United States throughout the early 19th Century. Studying about women is of interest to me, because it gives me strength and motivation for progress regardless of roadblocks.  Reading the stories of Mexican women and what they endured is only a portion of history, we, as college students, are making history as many of us are working to obtain degrees and reputable careers.  We can look forward to reading our statistics ten years from now as Mexican American Students with Bachelor degrees.  It is an awesome feeling.

Ruiz, Vicki L. From out of the Shadows: Mexican Women in Twentieth-Century America. Oxford University. 2008. Print..

Real Women Have Curves, The Play

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“Because now I wear original designs from Estela Garcia’s boutique ‘Real Women Have Curves’”(69). These are the last lines of the play Real Women Have Curves by Josefina López. Compared to the movie ending we saw of Ana walking down a street in New York City, this is quite the different ending. I think that this line in particular shows just how much the film adaptation differs from the play itself. That’s not to say the film lessens the integrity of the plot, but there are definite differences between the two.

One of the bigger differences between the movie and the play has to do with the characters. The play introduces five characters- Ana, Estela, Carmen, Pancha, and Rosali. The movie made Ana the center of the plot, but in the play she doesn’t have such a prominent role. We get a more in depth view of these women who work in Estela’s factory. The reader does get to know Ana a little better, in terms of her dreams and aspirations because we get to hear her journal entries, but the she doesn’t play such a central role as she does in the film. This aspect of the play is compromised quite a bit in the movie.

Estela is one of the characters that looses a lot of her dimensions in film. After watching the movie, I had a difficult time trying to place Estela in one single category. I felt that she was traditional, but then she deviated from norms a little bit. She wasn’t as liberated as Ana but then again she wasn’t as much of a prude as Carmen. In the play we learn that Estela is actually undocumented which we don’t get to see in the film. She also has somewhat of a love interest in the play. It doesn’t pan through because Estela realizes he “didn’t see the real [her]” (59). She wants someone that is interested in her intellect and he didn’t realize that. Estela is much more of a fascinating character in the play and the movie looses quite a bit of her back-story for the sake of making Ana the protagonist.

Carmen’s character was radically different in the play than in the movie. Her character in the movie was almost unbearable at times because she was so critical of her daughters. The scene in the movie when the women take their clothes off in the factory except Carmen is different in the play. Carmen is totally willing to show off her body and its imperfections, which she embraces.

Compared to the movie, the play seemed to be the one with the more feminist undertones. As previously mentioned, the play only had five characters. Each scene took place inside of the factory so the setting was much more intimate. That gave each character the opportunity to have more depth. This seems to be more of a feminist practice because each of the women has equal opportunity.

So if you get the chance and if you liked the movie, you should read the play. It is a quick read and you get a more in depth understanding of the characters.

López, Josefina. Real Women Have Curves: A Comedy. Woodstock, IL: Dramatic Pub., 1996. Print.

Discussion Questions: Viramontes and Cervantes

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Readings are available on the Readings page.

Lorna Dee Cervantes’s “Beneath the Shadow of the Freeway”

Helena Maria Viramontes “The Moths”

Marta E. Sanchez “The Chicana as Scribe: Harmonizing Gender and Culture in Lorna Dee Cervantes’ “Beneath the Shadow of the Freeway””.

Reading assignment for Monday, October 8. Your reply (under Comments) is due before class. You do not need to answer these specific questions, but response should demonstrate you’ve done the reading and thought about the text.

Be sure to check and make sure your response posts.

Would you consider these to be coming of age stories? How so? What connections can you draw with The House on Mango Street? With other readings?

What do you make of the image of a freeway? What do freeways represent?

How does the narrator in “The Moths” come of age? What would she make of the quinceañera?

How do these readings deal with issues of sexuality?

—
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/michaelpatrick/

Real women have curves.

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In the movie “Real women have curves”, Ana deal with coming of age with in her family structure. Ana is the youngest of the women and is dealing with issues that deal with her desire to go to college, her body image, her self-esteem, and gender role with in her family. Ana is a young Mexican American woman that has plans to become something in her life, but her mother is very mean with comments she tells Ana in regard to her plus size and her desire to explore the world through education. Ana goes to a high school that’s outside the comfort zone of her mother. Ana attends Beverly Hills high school and is able to get a better education than her home area schools would have been able to provide her. While going to school Ana gets to see the differences in the education system and the opportunities that come with being a good student.

The reason this movie deal with the bending of gender roles is because the mother is the one that want to bring down Ana and her older sister that owns a garment shop in downtown Los Angeles. Ana’s mother believes that her daughters need to lose weight and be seen, but not heard. She thinks that a women’s place is in the home to take care and provide emotional and spiritual support for the family.  Now I feel that the reason Ana’s mother is like this because she is confined to her local surroundings of East Los Angeles. She has never gone outside her boundaries in the entire movie. She is never seen exploring Los Angeles or anything else. She is in the house or the shop helping her daughter.

While the father is out and about Los Angeles doing his routes in the gardening job he has. Ana’s father and cousins are very supportive of Ana going to school; I think this is where the gender role reverses due to the males of the family traveling outside East Los Angeles, and seeing what a good education can provide Ana. This is different than anything we read this semester because it always seemed like the fathers where the ones that want to hold back the children in order for them to help the family with able bodies to work. But Ana’s father is different because he encourages Ana to explore the world and go to school. But the grandfather in this movie is a man that wants his granddaughter to become better.

So in order to have Ana’s mother become more open minded I feel she need to get out of her safe zone or bubble and travel outside the boundaries of East Los Angeles to get a better prospective of her outside environment.

“Chica Dificil”

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Soy una chica dificil
Pero yo valgo la pena
Yo busco un santo, un gran romeo
Que por mi vaya, vaya hasta el cielo

Picame el ojo, pelame el diente,
Echame flores, hazme canciones

(Dialogo)

No creas que es facil tenerme
Titanico sera el esfuerzo
Yo busco un mago un principe azul
Que por mi derrita el polo sur

Picame el ojo, pelame el diente,
Echame flores, hazme canciones

The song “Chica Dificil” by Aterciopelados works very well in the movie “Real Women Have Curves,” and it relates to Ana’s character and her coming of age. In this film, Ana comes to a major transition in her life. She has a coming of age moment when she graduates from high school.  She has the choice to either succumb to the same cycle that other chicanas in her community will or to  rise above and become something different. There is a good portion of the movie where she is still stuck in between and has not made this decision. She is on the border of accepting not going to college and just working with her sister. Eventually she finally makes the decision that she is not going to settle and she is going to go to college.

The song begins saying, “ I am not an easy girl but I am worth the pain.” In the film, Ana definitely is not an easy girl. She is constantly challenging her parents about many roles they see for her, especially Ana’s mom. The song continues, “I am looking for a saint, a Romeo that would go all the way to the sky for me. Wink and smile at me, give me flowers and make songs for me.” For Ana it is about literally the opposite sex as well as metaphorical. She is realizing her value. She tells her mom that there is more to her than her looks. She is also beginning to explore her sexuality as a woman. In the film she meets a young guy, who she has a relationship with, that sees and encourages her potential. The song continues, “it is not easy to have me, it will require a titanic effort. I am looking for a mage, a prince that will melt the south pole for me.”

When Ana makes the decision that she is going to be different and better, she realizes her worth. Ana realizes that she is worth the “titanic effort,” from herself and others. She is not going to settle and she is looking for the best.

Translation: http://planetandepoch.com/?p=622

Age, Sex and Race in Real Women Have Curves

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Coming of age is difficult for any person regardless of age, sex, race etc. In this film, Ana is dealing with all three of these matrices. As compared to her sister and her mother she is obviously the youngest woman in the house. She is the most agile and able to help the family. Her mother’s first line in the film is asking Ana to make breakfast for the family. Carmen, her mother, later makes her work for Estela so that she can help financially. Carmen began working when she was thirteen so she figured Ana was over due for that responsibility. Ana eventually defies her mother’s wishes to work straight out of high school by defining her own coming of age moment in attending Columbia.

Race is the context for which the entire film is based upon. Being Mexican American or Chicana is difficult for Ana. She must reconcile her two cultures in herself without becoming the outcast in either. At school she attempts to fit in by lying about a post graduation adventure to Europe. At home she must suppress who she is in order to make her mother happy. Carmen is the embodiment of traditional Mexican womanhood. She enforces female stereotypes on her daughters when she calls them fat or tells them that no one cares about their thoughts. The Mexican machismo culture which Carman associates with is a form of oppression which Ana refuses to subscribe to.
Though Ana is 18, a very fertile age, her mother neglects her sexual maturity. She is either to stay a virgin or find a man and get pregnant. Ana develops her own sexual identity which she shapes in direat contrast to her mother. Ana believes that a woman is more than her body. This is also evident in her choosing to attend university. Ana’s sexual coming of age is made very obvious to us in the film. She loses her virginity to her boyfriend whom she seems to only have dated for a short time. Before they have sex Ana turns the light on so he can see her as she really is. The next day we see Ana admiring her own body in the mirror finally accepting her curves and coming in to herself as the woman she wants to be.

#CHST302 Real Women Have Curves

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She does have many coming of age choices in this film. Choosing to apply to as well as go to college against her parents’ will. Working in the clothing factory was a big coming of age experience or her. She got to witness the hard work and little pay her family received. She also had a coming of a moment when she had to ask her father if she could borrow money for her sister’s business. Ana’s situation definitely resembles “House On Mango St.” because she is growing up in an environment with other low-income individuals all sharing a specific mindset about life. Ana also relates to Moraga in the sense that they both go against the excepted sexual norms. Ana has been told she has to save her virginity for marriage and look good just to get a man, but she believes there is more to her than that like her personality and mind. The experiences in this movie caused ana to have new eye opening experiences and see the possibilities of her life in a whole new light.

In the film, Ana’s mother both embodies and enforces “traditional” Chicana gender roles. She emphasizes the importance of women to take care of their husband and children, and to devote themselves to family alone. There is no room for individual identity or making your own path, which she refers to as “selfishness.” She does the “traditional” Chicana motherly duties of cooking, cleaning, criticizing, gossiping and fussing over superstitions. She wants nothing more than for her daughters to lose weight, catch a husband, and get married so they can follow in her role.

Throughout the film we are reminded that they are in the heart of Los Angeles. The Mexican music and people, the culture, and the diversity are all very present. Ana lives in the East side where she is the odd one out for seeming “white”, thinking too much, and not accepting the traditional ways of life. However, she attends Beverly Hills High School where she lies to her classmates about traveling to Europe after graduation just to fit in with their middle upper class ideals. Los Angeles is so diverse that it really helped capture the moments conveyed in the film.
Ana struggles between her two cultures: the American and the traditional Mexican.