What was your role in the discussion ?
I contributed to the conversation by giving my points of view in a passive way and respecting everyone else's opinion.

What can you take from the discussion?
This discussion allowed me to have a better understanding of the book itself and the characters. It also helped me to link the book with real life aspects and how we can se themes of the book in our daily lifes.
Did the discussion open any new interpretations about the text?

This discussion helped me to see other points of view in the story, for example it allowed me to see Oscar's mother as a feminist character and it also made me realise how most women in the story are strong and powerful characters.

What can you take from the discussion?
We had a lot of similar opinions about the hypermasculinity in the book and how Oscar's identity was affected by all the expectations and stereotypes his family had.
In addition, the discussion made me think about the similarities and differences of our society nowadays and the society of the book; although the gender inequality and discrimination against women in the book shows an exaggerated version of what and how our society works nowadays, it still has aspects that portray the current state in which we live in. Also, xenophobia has decreased.
Did the discussion open any new interpretations about the text?
The fifth question about gender equality and women made me think about the women's perspective and their role in the book; how they normalised inequality and accepted it. For example, Maritza was abused in most of her relationships and Oscar's mother encouraged violence against women as it if was the normal behavior. 

In the discussion we had, several important ideas such as the concept of hypermasculinity being presented in the text, xenophobia being a problem in Oscar's society and still sometimes in ours nowadays, and the objectification of women were discussed. From the discussion, I learned how similar our team ideas were and that we have similar ways of perceiving the text. We got to the conclusion that probably the reason why this author wrote this book was to spread awareness about the discrimination and social inequality at that time, and how surprised we were on the way women at that time normalized gender inequality and accepted it without feeling the need for the situation to change. Talking to the other team members and listening to the answers they gave to the questions I wrote also made me think about things I haven't considered before like for example the way Spanish language could also represent hypermasculinity in the text. During the discussion, I was the Discussion Director. I had a more passive role as I tried to listen to the ideas and answers the other team members had in reference to my questions. 

What can you take from the discussion? Did it open any new interpretations about the text? 

 

We all participated actively and in general terms had the same ideas and opinion about sexism, discrimination and hypermasculinity. We thought that although this was present in the text in order to convey what Dominican society and community represents, it does not show what society is today as everything has changed and we live in a world where these themes are less prevalent in our daily lives and are less common as time passes. It only portrays an exaggerated version of today's society. Moreover, we talked about how women saw this sexist society as something normal and okay. They were actually in favour of it and wanted Oscar to take part in it by having the role of a stereotypical Dominican man who hits and treats women as objects. And it was his mother who wanted him to become this person who he was not which made Oscar feel more pressure on him as it was now not only society which rejected him for not fitting the stereotype of a overly aggressive Dominican man, but it was also his family and especially his mother who put the same pressure on him which caused him feel insecure and have a low self esteem.