Narrative Nerds and Masculinity Junot Diaz Born Dec 3 1968 in Santo Domingo Immigrated to New Jersey in 1974 Completed BA English at Rutgers in 1992 MFA from Cornell in 1995 Drown published in 1996 ID: 804265
Download The PPT/PDF document "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Diaz" is the property of its rightful owner. Permission is granted to download and print the materials on this web site for personal, non-commercial use only, and to display it on your personal computer provided you do not modify the materials and that you retain all copyright notices contained in the materials. By downloading content from our website, you accept the terms of this agreement.
Slide1
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Diaz
Narrative, Nerds and Masculinity
Slide2Junot Diaz
Born Dec 3, 1968 in Santo Domingo
Immigrated to New Jersey in 1974
Completed BA English at Rutgers in 1992MFA from Cornell in 1995Drown published in 1996Becomes professor of English at MIT in 2003Oscar Wao published in 2007wins Pullitzer in 2008
Slide3The De Leon Family
Abelard Luis Cabral
&
Socorro
Jacquelyn Astrid
Hypatia
Belicia
(
Beli)
La Inca
Jack PujolsThe GangsterDe Leon
Oscar Lola
Isis
YuniorCuban Reuben
Slide4Narrative Structure
Chapter
Title
SettingNarratorPart 1: Prologue
Yunior
1. Ghetto
Nerd at the End of the World, 1974-1987
New York
Yunior
narrating Oscar’s youth
2. Wildwood, 1982 – 1985Jersey
ShoreLola3. The 3 Heartbreaks of Belicia Cabral, 1955-1962DR
Yunior narrating Beli’s youth
4. Sentimental Education, 1988-1992
RutgersYunior narrating college with OscarPart
2DRLola
5. Poor Abelard, 1944-1946DR
Yunior narrating Abelard’s life6. Land of the Lost, 1992-1995
NY & DRYunior narrating Oscar’s adulthood
Part 3: Chs 7, 8, & Epilogue
NY & DRYunior narrating Oscar’s last days
Slide5“Of what import are brief, nameless lives… to
Galactus
?
”Who is Galactus?Whose lives are brief and nameless?Of what significance is the life of a single person in the face of chaos and destruction?
Slide6“either I’m nobody, or I’m a nation”
Second stanza of Derek Walcott’s “Schooner Flight”
Derek Walcott
poet of Santa LuciaWho is Shabine?Why must Shabine either be nobody or a nation? Could the same dichotomy apply to Oscar?Significance of epigraphs:Destructive force and legacies of colonialismThe tension between individual and community – to what extent can the story of a single individual convey the story of an entire community?
Slide7Prologue
What is
fuku
?Why are we all its children?How are Trujillo and fuku related?“What more sci-fi than Santo Domingo? What more fantasy than the Antilles?... What more fuku?” (OW 1)What is zafa? How is the story of Oscar “a zafa of sorts” (7)?
Slide8Ghetto Nerd at the
End of the World
What is Oscar’s character like?
What is the “typical/normal” Dominican male supposed to be like?Why can’t Oscar fulfill that norm?What is the the effect of “love” on Oscar and his family?How does love in OW compare/contrast with love in Sula?
Slide9Wildwood
How does Oscar’s childhood compare/contrast with Lola’s?
What are the differences between the expectations of a Dominican son versus those of a Dominican daughter?
“She was my Old World Dominican mother and I was her only daughter, the one she had raised up herself with the help of nobody, which meant it was her duty to keep me crushed under her heel” (55).Why would Lola’s mother believe this is her duty?Why does Lola believe that we can’t judge her for how she treated her mother (55)?Why can Lola only “begin” when La Inca starts the story of her grandfather and mother?