1st draft of srp essay peer edits

8/9/2019 1st Draft of SRP Essay Peer Edits

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Manuel Sigenza

Mr. Damaso

Honors English II, Period 7

3 May 2010

I began writing when I began thinking. And thinking is a release from facts. Its

where you do something with them.

From an interview with Alberto Ros, April

5, 2010

In this world, there are people who are faced with a divide and do not belong to either

side of the split. Immigrants who enter illegally face Arizona Senate Bill 1070, a bill that denies

entry of illegal immigrants and pressures law enforcement to decide whether someone is in

Arizona illegally only if there is reason to believe so (Rau, Pitzl, and Rough). For the most part,

it seems as though this law targets immigrants who come from the Mexican border specifically

because of the large population of Hispanics in Arizona.

A third world is made in the song Icky Thump by the White Stripes when the singer

talks about going to Mexico and leaving and learning how to clean bathrooms on his own. He

continues on by saying that White Americans are immigrants like the Mexicans he refers to

when going to Mexico; he tells the Americans they should not kick anyone out (White). Arizona

Senate Bill 1070 and the White Americans in Icky Thump are the cause of destruction of a

predominant theme in Mexican-American poetry. The poet who writes about this theme is

Alberto Ros, a 58 year poet born from a British mother and Mexican father (Alberto 1). He

not only writes poetry, but also short stories and also lived in Nogales for the beginning of his


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life in the 50s (Alberto 1). Some of his work includes Day of the Refugios, Nani, and Mi

Abuelo. In these three poems, Ros incorporates a new third world after coming out of two

different cultures.

Ros fairly local life in Arizona keeps him in tune with the imagery and themes he

presents in his writing. He was born on September 18, 1952, in Nogales to Alberto and Agnes

(Alberto 1). He lived in Nogales most of his life and attended college there, but quickly went

to U of A with a full ride scholarship (Ros). He is now the Regents Professor of English at

ASU and is involved in many Hispanic and literary programs (Alberto 1). As a child at his

elementary and junior high school, he was forced to stop speaking Spanish and at the same time

forced to speak Spanish at home (Ros). As he began writing poetry, his parents were supportive

of him, but were not sure of what he was doing (Ros). He began writing in second grade, for he

was a good student and had extra time to use his imagination and expand it with images he saw

and interpreting it in his own way (Ros). As his life was inspiring to his theme of three worlds,

he was able to incorporate it into his writing.

Ros writing is as unique as it is cultural. In his works, he tends to go towards free

verse writing, but at times turns to sestinas that he modifies. What makes his writing unique is

his use the imagery that was present in his past and also his ability to create poetry that has no

rhyme scheme or meter. Some of the themes that are evident in his works include the fact that

borders create a third world, there are more ways to communicate with someone else other than

language, and isolation causes one to ponder about his or her life (Island 5). Some personal

notes that influenced his writing include the fact that his family was predominantly Hispanic and

they lived on the border and how his neighbors were of many mixed backgrounds, from Swedish

and Mexican to an assortment of different culminations (Ros). Also, his parents never came to


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his poetry readings, giving him a change to say what he needed to in his work without having

any sort of embarrassment; if his parents had gone, he would have played it safe and never would

have gotten his work out (Ros). His work is so unique due to the history he has gone through in

his lifetime.

The history that Ros has gone through is evident in his work. Maquiladora factories

that were along the Mexican-American border brought work to many people on the Mexican

border, but did not pay well (Maquiladoras 5). Immigration from the 50s to present day has

increased over the years because of the lack of jobs on the Mexican side of the border

(Maquiladoras 3). In the case of immigration, Ros saw this from his own family who lived on

the Mexican side of the border all the time (Ros). Having this present in his life made it easy for

him to create his imagery in his poetry, whether it be in regards to language or different

viewpoints. Also, coming from a family of immigrants, British and Mexican, he has the

opportunity to be able to speak specifically to an immigrant group of audience. This audience is

so large due to its large group of different people from around the world. Even though his

images only come from the border he grew up with, people can relate his vision of the border

and immigration to theirs. With the history he has gone through, Ros is able to share his theme

to the public.

Ros developed a third world that is a culmination of the Mexico and the United

States. In order to create a third world, two worlds must exist prior to it. While he was able to

see things from the border in Nogales, he was able to take what he was given and make

something out of it. His product became a new perspective of the world. And with that

perspective came a new breed of Mexican-Americans living on the border, thinking similarly to

Ros. In his poetry, Ros explores his perspective that he shares with this generation that came


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from the 50s. And with this shared perspective, he is able to draw back from it and use it in his

poetry.

Day of the Refugios, Nani, and Mi Abuelo are poems that express the theme of

a third world in the middle of two societies. Day of the Refugios is about different holidays on

the same day in Mexico and the U.S. (See Appendix A), Nani is about the struggle with

language and how something else can be its substitute (See Appendix B), while Mi Abuelo is

about how Ros wants to be the opposite of his grandfather and tell the truth (See Appendix C).

In Day of the Refugios, Ros reflects on how anything can be put into more than one

perspective, including his own. Also, he shows that love can diminish the challenge of language

in Nani. Lastly, he expresses how ones perspective of a respected role model can change after

witnessing their acts and looking at the effect of the actions. Some of the critics of Ros work

include Jos Saldivar, a Latino who received a PhD in English from Stanford University, Chris

Semasnsky who is a writer who has been published in several literary magazines and journals,

Richard Vela, and Joseph Deters to name a few. These critics are able to interpret Ros theme

and style of writing.

The combination of different holidays on the same day brings a meshing of both the

Mexican and American cultures. Because Ros was on the border, he is able to experience the

two holidays in his own way and creates an even more special day out of it. I was born in

Nogales, Arizona/On the border between/Mexico and the United States/The places in between

places/They are like little countries/Themselves, with their own holidays/Taken a little from

everywhere (Ros Lines 1-7) is how he sets the poem up. He specifically claims that he is from

the border and that there is a creation of holidays that are taken from bits and pieces of other

countries. According to Joseph Deters, he claims there is a celebration of the unique distinction


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of this new holiday Ros has created (Deters 1). This unique creation of Ros shows that he felt

almost like he was trapped between two worlds. He was not sure of what to follow, so he

decided to mix the two cultures in front of him together. While the holidays were mixed,

languages no longer become a barrier.

Languages importance is not as nearly significant as the language of love in Rios

new dimension. The relationship between Ros and his grandmother is able to function without

language because they share love. He explains in the last three lines of Nani that,

She ask[s] [him] if [he] wants more/[He] owns no words to stop her/Even before [he] speak[s],

she serves (Ros Lines 37-39). Even though he explains earlier that he cannot understand her

and she cannot understand him, they share this loving relationship: she serves him food and he

keeps her company at home. Although language is a boundary that keeps people from

communicating together, Ros and his grandmother were capable of making a third language

(Vela 3). This diminished language barrier brings ties with Ros grandmother while looking at

the past and present reveal the truth about another relative of Ros.

By looking back at the past to his grandfather, he is able to grasp the reality of who his

grandfather was. By being able to see the lies his grandfather had said or committed after he

died gives him the image of truth about his grandfather. In the poem, Ros tells his grandfather,

An abuelo should be much more than a man/like you!, (Ros Lines 17-18) and his grandfather

responds, I am a man/who has served ants with the attitude/of a waiter, who has made each

smile as only/an ant who is fat can, and they liked me best, but there is nothing left, (Ros Lines

19-22). The attitude in which his grandfather has towards being a grandfather is that of being

indifferent but pretending to show care. It seems awkward to bury a man who in his best suit

when he does not care to be part of the family (Salidvar 1). The past and present are essentially


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borders, and Ros goes in between the two to find his grandfathers true self. Since the theme of

a third world created by two different societies is present in his poetry, there are also other forms

of art that express this same theme.

My Family is a film made in 1995 by Gregory Nava about first generation Mexican-

Americans living in East Los Angeles facing everyday struggles (See Appendix F). The

characters in this film are part of the third world Ros implies in his third world, for they are

faced with a mix of culture from their parents and society they live in. Paco, like Ros, is an

author who has found conformity in his life; Jimmy, the youngest, has no care for anything but

obeys his parents; Memo, the successful lawyer, is unwilling to go towards his familys roots;

and Toni becomes a nun and returns married with an ex-priest and fights for social justice. For

the most part, Nava does work that relates to Mexican-Americans (Ebert). My Family (Mi

Familia) was made in 1995 about a Mexican family who immigrates to the U.S. and grows up in

Los Angeles (Ebert). However, conflict between the parents and children, culture, and

antagonizing characters bring despair. But in spite of the negativity, the family is able to pull

through and bring everyone together.

The characters born in the United States in My Family culturally are in a third world

because of their Mexican heritage and their residence in the United States. The film is about

family sticking together in a country with a different culture, making up for lost time, and doing

justice and finding love afterward. Toni, after going to become a nun, returns married to a man

who was a priest and works to fight social justice issues. This example of Toni shows that

although she is not a part of the religious order, she still struggles to help others and is married.

The time the film takes place is during the 1950s up to the 1980s, roughly thirty years of Ros

life. Also, the narrator, Paco, is a writer from Mexican descent living in the U.S. like Ros. Like


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Ros family, the family in the film is very large and shows their culture in the Mexican and

American fashion. As the family expresses Ros culture and background, the murals on the

Berlin Wall literally present the third world through artistic beauty.

The murals on the Berlin Wall were made during the Cold War and are currently being

restored (Moore 1). The artwork on the wall serves as a third world between East and West

Germany (See Appendix G). Most of the artwork was made by unknown artists who came from

all over the world. Most were made while the whole wall was up. Others were painted after

1989, when the majority of the wall was torn down. One of these murals was that of Soviet

leader Leonid Brezhnev kissing East German leader Erich Honecker (Gobel 1). It was made in

1990 by Dmitri Vrubel who was devastated to see his work of art covered up in graffiti after

several years (Gobel 1). Since there is no specific date of when all of the art was made, it cannot

be suggested as to how many years it took to create all the different murals. Although the murals

do not have a single artist, they all can relate to Ros poetry because of where they are and the

opinions they express.

The murals on the Berlin Wall, like Ros poetry, create a third world, art on the border

itself. The art on the wall was made by several different artists, both known and unknown. For

the most part, it consists of graffiti, but large portions of the wall are murals. Although this is

true, graffiti is still evident on top of the murals, which is reason to renew the murals that stand

to this day (Moore 1). Some of the murals show the artists personal opinions of separation of

Berlin and Germany and also express how they felt about communism. The murals show ones

personal opinion voiced through their imagination similarly to how Ros expresses his third

world in his poetry. Also, the wall itself can be seen as imagery for Ros work. As the wall and

its artwork connects and relates to Ros art, so too can the world develop new worlds.


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With Ros experience on the border, he was able to influence his future poetry and

give and receive inspiration to and from other artists to draw in a world made of a mixture. With

borders, Ros envisions a new humanity in between two countries. Arizona Senate Bill 1070

deteriorates the mixed world of people by scaring immigrants from the Mexican border away,

decreasing the number of people who can share and have this new culture. Without a border that

allows entry of people who want to work, this new culture will vanish from the face of the Earth.

Disturbances that create separations ultimately bring two viewpoints on a topic; somewhere

along the line, an idea that is a blend of the previous two comes about, bringing in a new

perspective of life


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Works Cited

"Alberto (Alvaro) Ros." Contemporary Authors Online. Detroit: Gale, 2005.Literature Resource

Center. Web. 23 Mar. 2010. .

"My Family (1995)." The Internet Movie Database. IMDb.com, Inc. Web. 26 Apr. 2010.

.

Ebert, Roger. "My Family."RogerEbert.com. RogerEbert.com, 3 May 1995. Web. 24 Apr. 2010.

.

Gbel, Malte. "Kiss of Death: Officials Erase Historic Berlin Wall Mural." Spiegel Online International.

SPIEGELnet. Web. 22 Apr. 2010. .

Moore, Tristan. "Berlin Wall Gets Fresh Lick of Paint."BBC News. BBC, 21 Apr. 2009. Web. 22 Apr.

2010. .

Rau, Alia B., Mary Jo Pitzl, and Ginger Rough. "Angst Rises as Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer Mulls

Immigration Bill."Arizona Central. The Arizona Republic, 21 Apr. 2010. Web. 26 Apr. 2010.

.

Ros, Alberto. Telephone Interview. 5 April 2010.

Saldivar, Jos David. Denver Quarterly. Denver Quarterly 17.2 (Summer 1982): 141-144. Rpt. In

Poetry Criticism . Ed. Lawrence J. Trudeau. Vol 57. Detroit: Gale, 2004.Literature Resource

Center. Web. 13 Apr. 2010. .

White, John A. "Icky Thumb." Metro Lyrics. Metro Lyrics, 5 Feb. 2010. Web. 20 Apr. 2010.

.


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Island of the Three Marias.Poetry for Students. Ed. Elizabeth Thomason. Vol. 11. Detroit:

Gale Group, 2001. 78-98.Poetry for Students. Web. 9 Apr. 2010. .


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Appendix A

Day of the Refugios

I was born in Nogales, Arizona,

On the border between

Mexico and the United States.

The places in between places

They are like little countries 5

Themselves, with their own holidays

Taken a little from everywhere.My Fourth of July is from childhood,Childhood itself a kind of country, too.

It's a place that's far from me now, 10

A place I'd like to visit again.The Fourth of July takes me there.

In that childhood place and border placeThe Fourth of July, like everything else,

It meant more than just one thing. 15

In the United States the Fourth of July

It was the United States.

In Mexico it was the da de los Refugios,

The saint's day of people named Refugio.

I come from a family of people with names, 20

Real names, not-afraid names, with colors

Like the fireworks: Refugio,

Margarito, Matilde, Alvaro, Consuelo,

Humberto, Olga, Celina, Gilberto.

Names that take a moment to say, 25Names you have to practice.

These were the names of saints, serious ones,

And it was right to take a moment with them.I guess that's what my family thought.


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The connection to saints was strong: 30

Mu grandmother's name--here it comes--Her name was Refugio,

And my great-grandmother's name was Refugio,

And my mother-in-law's name now,

It's another Refugio, Refugios everywhere, 35

Refugios and shrimp cocktails and sodas.

Fourth of July was a birthday party

For all the women in my family

Going way back, a party

For everything Mexico, where they came from, 40

For the other words and the green

Tinted glasses my great-grandmother wore.

These women were me,What I was before me,

So that birthday fireworks in the evening, 45

All for them,This seemed right.

In that way the fireworks were for me, too.

Still, we were in the United States now,

And the Fourth of July, 50

Well, it was the Fourth of July.

But just what that meant,

In this border place and time,it was a matter of opinion in my family.

Appendix B

Nani

Sitting at her table, she serves

the sopa de arroz to me

instinctively, and I watch her,


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the absolute mam, and eat words

I might have had to say more 5

out of embarrassment. To speak,

now-foreign words I used to speak,

too, dribble down her mouth as she serves

me albndigas. No more

than a third are easy to me. 10

By the stove she does something with words

and looks at me only with her

back. I am full. I tell her

I taste the mint, and watch her speak

smiles at the stove. All my words 15

make her smile. Nani never serves

herself, she only watches me

with her skin, her hair. I ask for more.

I watch the mam warming more

tortillas for me. I watch her 20

fingers in the flame for me.

Near her mouth, I see a wrinkle speak

of a man whose body serves

the ants like she serves me, then more words

from more wrinkles about children, words 25

about this and that, flowing more


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easily from these other mouths. Each serves

as a tremendous string around her,

holding her together. They speak

Nani was this and that to me 30

and I wonder just how much of me

will die with her, what were the words

I could have been, was. Her insides speak

through a hundred wrinkles, now, more

than she can bear, steel around her, 35

shouting, then, What is this thing she serves?

She asks me if I want more.

I own no words to stop her.

Even before I speak, she serves

Appendix C

Mi Abuelo

Where my grandfather is is in the ground

where you can hear the future

like an Indian with his ear at the tracks.

A pipe leads down to him so that sometimes

he whispers what will happen to a man 5

in town or how he will meet the best

dressed woman tomorrow and how the best


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man at her wedding will chew the ground

next to her. Mi abuelo is the man

who speaks through all the mouths in my house, 10

An echo of me hitting the pipe sometimes

to stop him from saying my hair is a

sieve is the only other sound. It is a phrase

he says, and my hair is a sieve is sometimes

repeated for hours out of the ground 15

when I let him, which is not often.

An abuelo should be much more than a man

like you! He stops then, and speaks:I am a man

who has served ants with the attitude

of a waiter, who has made each smile as only 20

an ant who is fat can, and they liked me best,

but there is nothing left. Yet I know he ground

green coffee beans as a child, and sometimes

he will talk about his wife, and sometimes

about when he was deaf and a man 25

cured him by mail and he heard groundhogs

talking, or about how he walked with a cane

he chewed on when he got hungry.

At best, mi abuelo is a liar.

I see an old picture of him at nanis with an 30


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off-white yellow center mustache and sometimes

thats all I know for sure. He talks best

about these hills,slowest waves, and where this man

is going, and Im convinced his hair is a sieve,

that his fever is cooled now underground. 35

Mi abuelo is an ordinary man.

I look down the pipe, sometimes, and see a

ripple-topped stream in its best suit, in the ground.

Appendix D


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Appendix E


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Appendix F

My Family, Gregory Nava, 1995


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Appendix G

Berlin Wall

Appendix H

A Small Motor by Alberto Ros

The easiest sadness is a boyWatching another boy

Walk with a barefooted girl, clean

Perfect feet, that kind of nose,

Eyes like those hes dreamed

In the dream that comes back.

A boy watching another boy lucky

Gets an acheThat is a small motor.

In me there is an animal,

And in that animalThere is a hunger.

I remember the boy

Watching a boy.It was me.

Watching, I was a little bit

The boy walking.

I was both of us.

Thats how it felt. What I could not have,


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Thats what I was

Inside, an acheComing as I stood

Too many places.

A Tiny Engine

After Alberto lvaro Ros

The sorest anguish is a manWatching a grown boy

Stroll with a gorgeous woman, nice

Beautiful feet, special cheeksAnd eyes that one would travel to see

But can only find in distant dreams unimaginable.

A man awkwardly watching a lucky boy

Gives him heartburn

That is a tiny engine.

Inside of me is a beast,

And in that beast,A thirst is present.

I can recall the manWatching the boy.

He was me.

Staring, I essentially was the

The boy strolling.

I was two in one.

Or at least I felt that.

What I couldn't have was

Who I was

Deep inside, a pain

Entering as I lieToo few place

PEER RESPONSE


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After you read and annotate a student paper for CONTENT, write a long (10-

15 sentence) paragraph in which you mention three positive aspects of

the paper (and why?) and three places for improvement(and why?). Be

abnormallyspecific. Also, be sure to cover the areas below (including a

rating of each section of the paper).

a. Weak arguments, paragraphs, transitions?b. The writer lacks citations and evidence from reliable sources

c. The writers paper is of varying quality? Rate each section 1 (low) to 5

(high)i. Introduction _____

ii. Biographical and Historical Context _____

iii. Literary Thread in Three Poems _____iv. Art Connections _____

v. Conclusion _____

d. Paste this paragraph and rating at the end of the paper for your writing

partner


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