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In Woman Hollering Creek we follow the character of Cleófilas. She has been given away by her father to her husband Don Serafín. A man she would dream of and believed to be the man of her dreams. They would go on to move from Mexico to the United States where she would go on to have a child with this man. Cleofilas comes from a Mexican household where they are expected to marry and have children, but she becomes disillusioned by this lifestyle. As her time in America progresses her husband abuses her and at the same time, she starts to reminisce about her childhood with her father as she remembers this is the life, she once desired for herself now that she has reached what she thought she wanted she is regretful. In Woman Hollering Creek it deals with identity as Cleofilas world is changing as she is stuck at a standstill; she searches for the origin of the river name she tries to connect with other women which she eventually does Felice a woman different from any women she had ever met before she is inspired.

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“Never Marry a Mexican” by Sandra Cisneros is about a girl, the daughter of a Mexico-born Mexican and a US-born Mexican, navigating life after her mother told her never to marry a Mexican. Obviously, her culture and identity are the basis for the plot along with her mother’s words that her up for almost an internalized hatred of sorts. Clemencia is not a very moral person, and I find her actions to be inexcusable and hard to forgive. She talked about how she couldn’t forgive her mom for cheating when married, but then has this obsession with sleeping with married men. While I cannot find any valid reason for her to do such a thing, she gives her reasoning which is, “it's always given me a bit of crazy joy to be able to kill those women like that, without their knowing it.” I think Clemencia would definitely benefit from therapy or something because she is actually a horrible person.

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The story “Never Marry a Mexican” is about a woman who was told by her mother to never marry a mexican. She herself is Mexican, yet clearly regrets marrying a Mexican man. This story deals with identity in this changing world by highlighting how people can change their mindsets once they have experienced something. Clemencia has this fixation with sleeping with married men. This is seen as an act of rebellion and a form of lashing out. The world would view these acts as immoral and wrong. Hopefully, majority of society would agree that cheating is wrong. With the story “Woman Hollering Creek” there is one instance that could be considered immoral. The main character, Cleófilas, is in an abuse relationship and finally gains the courage to leave. While I do not think this specific act is immoral, the act of taking children away from their father could be considered immoral. In this case though, I believe she did the right thing in protecting herself and her children from any further abuse.

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In the story, Woman Hollering Creek, Cleófilas Enriqueta DeLeón Hernández marries a man named Juan Pedro Martínez Sánchez. This marriage is incredibly abusive and toxic. Juan often hits Cleofilas, throws objects at her, and complains that he has to work to feed her. The story also talks about how Cleofilas is made uncomfortable about the kind of jokes men in a bar were making because violence against women is on the rise in that area.

This story deals with identity in a rapidly changing world by introducing a friend to Cleofilas, Felice. Felice helps Cleofilas get the confidence to escape her abuse and the means to by giving her a ride. This story addresses identity with women supporting each other. Cleofilas was always strong enough to leave, but being in an abusive situation can make people forget about their inner power and strength. In this rapidly changing world Felice helped Cleofilas see that inner power by taking her over the bridge that housed the only thing named after a women. Woman Hollering Creek.

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In Never Marry a Mexican we follow a Mexican woman named Clemencia as she actively struggles with the advice her mother gave her growing up: “Never marry a Mexican”. The viewer watches as she struggles with her Mexican heritage and her American lifestyle and upbrinign. She emphasizes how often her mother said this phrase, and it shows through her own internal conflict with her own race and others from her race. She describes the feuds at home from her grandparents to her mom etc. This also helped fuel her internalized hatred of her race. When it comes to her immorality, I think she is using “being the other wpman” as a form of rebellion. She emphasizes how her mother and grandmother had their roles and how she will not marry. She is sleeping with a married man to break out of the societal and her own cultural mold placed on women and especially Mexican women. Purity and abstinence and the lack of freedom to one’s own body. I also think it is very likely that her actions are just a reflction of the turmoil inside. Her relationships with married men represent her attempts at navigating her own identity as a Mexican-American.

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In A Season of Madness, rather than believing that Fatin could be unfaithful and wanted a divorce, it seemed more plausible to the family that she was suffering from bouts of insanity. She only acted in this manner as she wanted to spare her husband the embarrassment of having a failed marriage. Ironic, considered she embarrassed herself for him. As for the immoral actions, it seems that all the women are trying to regain a sense of control. Either by feigning madness, sleeping around, or pretending to be in a telenovela. By acting in this manner, it allows the women to rebel from the idea of being a “perfect” wife. If they are not perfect, they believe that they will regain their freedom in some sort of way. This could be by escaping into their own world or by a divorce.

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In terms of identity in a rapidly changing world, I think the idea of marriage plays a huge role in it. It has been mentioned several times about the concept of marriage from two perspectives; the husband and mother-in-law. The husband sees the marriage as an actual in-love thing where he deeply cares for the wife. As for the mother-in-law, she sees it as a status for her son, and boldly states that she'll replace the main character with another wife since she's lost her mind. Basically, marriage is a sort of symbol or status for society that kind of makes them fit in with the rest or make them rise above, especially for the wealthy groups like the one presented here. As for the moral thing, it's clear that she feels guilt for falling in love with another man, and is poorly handling this by acting insane and likely using this as a way to escape the family to be with the one she does care about; though that's poorly failing as seen here.

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A story that weaves identity internally, intergenerationally, and within relationships, Sandra Ciserno’s Never Marry a Mexican is a think piece on interracial complexities, touching on feminism and racism. The narrator admits to being a serial homewrecker, something that would’ve been stone-worthy in prior generations. She admits feelings of desire for a relationship, but ultimately comes to terms with the notion that it’s simply easier having the men, instead of hers, as “borrowed”.

Although her mom would be the closest role model, this deviancy is likely set by the men in her family as women do not have the same authority or even space in the patriarchy. This narrator lives her life in a liminal space of lack. Being without a man is an option that is fairly new in terms of acceptability, but being this level of promiscuous and the details surrounding her relationship with Drew are simply abhorrent.

It’s an uphill battle that the narrator is fighting, the approval of the white man, not because she loves him, even though she may, but because of the lesson central to this passage: to never marry a Mexican.

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In Never Marry a Mexican Man, the narrator Clemencia’s outlook on cultural identity is heavily influenced by her mother, who tells her never to marry a Mexican man as she did. Clemencia takes this to heart, but when her mother marries a white man, a warped and twisted outlook on marriage and love begins to take shape. The outlook Clemencia develops about relationships is that they are all about power and control. When she feels most powerful, or as she puts it, “a bit of crazy joy,” is when she starts affairs with married men. Even more so when she is with them as their wives are giving birth, which she admits to doing with multiple men, it gives her great pleasure to “be able to kill those women” by stealing what they have and ruining their relationships.

Not only that, but her mother’s advice also plays a role in how she views Mexican and American culture. Her grandparents also played a role in shaping Clemencia’s outlook on culture, as their views on relationships are based on classism and a disdain for multicultural people. Clemencia describes in the beginning how this is seen in how the men she sleeps with and the women she takes pleasure in hurting are white women. However, it does not stop there; she even laughs at Drew’s wife when she calls him, and she answers before passing the phone to him. She says, “No Mexican woman would react like that.” This comment cements that her twisted views on cultural identity are the driving force behind her affairs and her thirst for power.

However, beneath this veneer that she displays of control and independence, Clemencia is a deeply troubled woman whose outlook on life, love, culture, and identity has been twisted by her upbringing and family. What finally challenges her views on life is her acknowledgment of her loneliness and how unloved she feels. She is consumed by the pain of knowing that Drew will not love her as he loves his wife. She does not know what it feels like to be loved in that way, and she likely never will.

That said, Clemencia is not a sympathetic character, nor is she a relatable character. Just because a person’s behavior can be explained does not mean it can be excused. Clemencia admits that she enjoys metaphorically killing women by destroying their marriages and will even go so far as to seduce and manipulate the son of the man she is sleeping with to fulfill her desire for control. This leaves no room for sympathy, but it makes her a complex character with multiple layers that make the story interesting.

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This story has made me reflect time and time again on my own culture and the women around me. In Latin America, machismo, or excessive, masculine pride, is a prominent characteristic. Men carry the power in a relationship as the head of the household while women fulfill the traditional role of mother and wife. This tradition allows men to dwell in their pride and ego, excusing their aggressive and violent behavior towards women. This story is a prime example of machismo in a household. What I love about this story is how Cleofilas breaks this cycle for herself and her children. Almost always, women remain in these toxic relationships due to fear, tradition, and financial security. Despite this, Cleofilas finds it in her to break the pattern and seek better for herself. Her husband shows no sign of change or remorse, demonstrating to Cleofilas the life she had ahead of her and her children if change was not made.

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I think the most telling line of the whole story was when Fatin asks herself “Should I tell them that I had been content like any wife…” (al-Shaykh 3) because the marriage she describes is one that is built on societal expectation. She was expected to have children and raise them, to run the household, and to hide her true self behind the veneer of an identity defined by being a wife. She would never have realized she wanted more, only ever taking time for self-expression when it was convenient in between her wifely duties, if she had not met a man that fell in love with her the person, not just with her identity as mother and wife. It wasn’t moral for her to have an affair, or to fake madness in order to convince her husband to leave her, but even when she tried to tell the truth and ask for an end to the marriage, her husband and mother-in-law thought she was insane for wanting more than the life she was expected to live. As a mother and wife myself, I sometimes feel myself sinking into those identities and losing myself, even with a husband that supports me and wants me to have that time and space to be me. I can’t imagine how isolating and madness-inducing it must be to not have a partner or support system that allows you to actually be yourself.

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I really enjoyed Al-Shayks's short story. quite frankly, I feel no sympathy for any characters I the story, the mother in law wanted her son to marry for money not love, the wife has had an affair and instead of being honest, tries to force the termination of her marriage by psychological abusing her husband, and the husband fails to realize any of this... this story is a domino effect. In todays world, arranged marriages aren't so common. There are still cultures that take part in this way of life, but it is not something every man and women expect for their future. If this story were a case in todays world, I truly believe it would end more tragically.

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"Never Marry a Mexican": Tori Lynne Cofield

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"Never Marry a Mexican": Tori Lynne Cofield

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It is evident that the woman in the story has had a very tainting view of what marriage is supposed to look like. An ever-changing world is shifting her understanding of romance and love. This ideology has not only changed her identity, but she has also made immoral actions. Since she doesn't have a positive outlook on marriage, she doesn't have the moral conviction of having affairs with married men. She simply sees it as "borrowing." Like the cultural tension she witnessed in her parents' relationship, she battles the tension of wanting to be loved while not understanding or wanting to put forth commitment.

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I greatly enjoyed Al-Shaykh’s “A Season of Madness”. I can’t say I sympathize with Fatin, as I haven’t had an affair or been married, but sometimes there is an urge to break from all you know because you aren’t treated well. Fatin is stuck in a place she doesn’t want to be, in a loveless marriage, so she does what she can to get out of it. I can’t say that what she does is moral, and I think if she truly just wanted out of her marriage she wouldn’t have had an affair, but perhaps she was being selfish and wanted something that she felt was finally hers and under her control. I think this kind of situation is still common, both in terms of loveless marriages and other ways, but I wonder how many people go as far as Fatin to better their circumstances.

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In "Never Marry a Mexican," the cultural differences between not only Mexican-Americans and Mexicans are explored, but also the difference between the former and Americans. The main character internalizes her mother's opinions of Mexican men and mistrusts marriage, and she also has an affair with a man whose wife isn't Mexican and takes joy in hurting her. While these actions can be viewed as immoral, especially with the glee she gets from hurting other women, I believe these actions reflect that despite her reluctance to be in a committed relationship with a man, she still wants to be loved and be in a relationship. Also, her glee at hurting the wife shows her bitterness, as one of the reasons that the man she's with will not marry her is because she's Mexican. She points out things the wife does that a Mexican wife would never do, separating herself from the woman and justifying her actions. But, despite these justifications and attempts to hurt the wife, she is also experiencing pain as a mistress. How is she in a better position than the wife when they are both being hurt by the same man? What's the point of being a mistress instead of a wife if you secretly want what the wife has and are bitter that you'll never get it? I think this story illustrates the fact that there is no way to prevent yourself from being hurt when you want to love and be loved by someone.

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In the story, "Season of Madness" the speaker pretends to be insane in order to coerce her husband to divorce her or send her away. This stems from the decision she made to have relations with another whom she fell in love with while they were married, because her marriage was arranged and she did not love her husband. This story confronts the standard and idea of arranged marriage as a staple in the speaker's society and the feelings of isolation it brings. The wife only finds reprieve in her time alone by the beach painting, and there she finds new love. It asks the question if an act that is considered a betrayal of a partner could be considered such, if the partnership was unequal and forced from the start? The choice by the wife to commit her "infidelity", is not an act of betrayal but an act of self-determination as she grapples with her feelings and then decides what she wants to be free. She then plays the part of madness in order to liberate herself, but her husband defiantly holds on to her until the end.

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Throughout "Woman Hollering Creek," readers see Cleófilas navigate her identity through the lenses of personal culture, gender roles, communication, and self-discovery. She navigates life as a Mexican-American, which can be considered two cultures in one. She also deals with hardships regarding her husband and ends up finding her true identity through self-discovery and independence. Some characters may make choices that can be considered immoral. In "Never Marry a Mexican," Clemencia makes choices based on her long-lasting irritations about her family as a way to rebel.

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Cleófilas is an outsider, to both her old and new neighborhoods. She loves the idea of romance and tries to force its ideals upon her abusive marriage. Throughout, she tries to find a reason why La Gritona screamed at the river. Cleófilas ends up finding her identity in the legend. At the end of the story, she realizes the woman screams for the desire for individuality and a feeling of freedom. While she was constantly forced to shove her identity into the expectations of others, at the end of the story Cleófilas is free to discover it herself.

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Al-Shaykh and Cisneros Short Story Padlet

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Al-Shaykh and Cisneros Short Story Padlet

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Parents are like potters. Like a potter with clay, parents hold the power to mold and shape children's identity, for better or worse.

In the story, "Never Marry a Mexican," two instances illustrate the influence of a parent on a child's identity. The first example is in the first sentence, "Never marry a Mexican, my ma said once and always. She said this because of my father. She said this though she was Mexican too." Identity was determined by experience for Clemencia's mother. Her subjective experience shaped her objective opinion. Just because one person had a bad experience, doesn't mean everyone will. Not only does Clemencia adopt her mother's ill feelings towards Mexican men, but because she witnessed her mother's marriage, Clemencia says, "I'll never marry. Not any man."

The second example of a parents identity-shaping ability is seen in Clemencia's actions that replicate her mother's.  Clemencia says, "That man she met at work, Owen Lambert, the foreman at the photo-finishing plant, who she was seeing even while my father was sick. Even then. That's what I can't forgive." Although Clemencia sees the wrongdoing of her mother, she does the same thing as her mother, "Did you tell him, while his mother lay on her back laboring his birth, I lay in his mother's bed making love to you...And it's not the last time I've slept with a man the night his wife is birthing a baby." Children may not like what they see in their parents, but children will inevitably see their parents in themselves.

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In Cisneros' story "Never Marry a Mexican," I believe Clemencia struggles with her identity, especially as her parents were from split world as her mother was born in the US and her father was born in Mexico. From here, her mother advises her to never marry a Mexican, as it could spell trouble, and throughout the story, while Clemencia does mention her other affairs, we are focused on the relationship she has with a white man named Drew. Ironically, as her mother tells her to never marry a Mexican, she finds herself constantly engaging in affairs with taken men, therefore confirming the title as the men would never pick Clemencia over their wives. Clemencia is aware of the men's relationships, yet she finds pleasure in taking them from their wives, which is an extremely immoral action to take. I believe she aids these men due to her lack of self-worth and stability. We see this when Clemencia explains how Drew would speak to her in Spanish during their affairs and Cisneros writes, "I liked when you spoke to me in my language. I could love myself and think myself worth loving." Going back to Clemencia's struggles with her identity, I believe it could be the result of the residual pain from her mother turning away from their cultural heritage by cheating on her father with a white man and erasing Clemencia and Ximena from her life.