The assignment for this blog post was to read the three pieces of reading and construct their identities from what we read. Also, how we feel they perceive themselves to be. These are only what i think and what i feel their identity is like.

"It's Hard Enough Being Me" by Anna Lisa Raya

I found her to obviously be a latina collegian. I found her to be repressed and unidentifyable especially by people in the United States and elsewhere because sometimes she looked asian and sometimes she looked white with her green eyes and pale skin. I think she was unidentifyable to both the world and herself. She seemed to doubt herself, like if she felt she was mexican she would doubt that and think she was Puerto Rican because she went to visit her grandmother. She seemed to allow things to get to her liek name calling and what people would think of her because she couldnt speak spanish. She was very defensive of herself because she thought she had to be, although she didnt physically fight or say things back, she felt the need to defend herself because she didnt know what she was and what to defend about herself. From my point of view she is Mexican American and i think it was hard for her to identify with this. She didnt know whether she was a minority or majority because she grew up thinking she was a majority and now being a college student she realized that she is a minority. Although she started off being timid i think toward the end she was satisfied with being who she was and content with being "latina".

"Two Kinds" by Amy Tan

Let me first start by saying i enjoyed Amy Tan's Joy Luck Club and i think she is a very talented writer. I was also familiar with this story as well.


First off she is an Asian American and came to the US with her mother but to me seemed to be more "americanized" than her parents. She was very respectful of her mother because that's what she had inhibited from living in China. She seemed very ambitious but not goal driven ambition, she seemed to want the time to come to make her mother angry and not do what she says. She wanted to impress her mother and allowed her mother to use her as sort of an experiment that she could test on. Her mother wanted her to be a pianist, Shirley Temple, and even remember things quickly and in depth. Her mother pushed her to be a genius(something she was not) and she felt like she could not please her mother. I think this was true, her mother had very high hopes for her and she did not seem to impress her mother one bit. She was very easily adapted to the things her mother would do, sort of a chameleon. She did what she was told and nothing more and nothing less. They also seemed to be poor because it seemed as though they couldnt afford alot(hints: second hand piano). I found her to be a disappointment and lazy because like with the pianist she manuevered around his ailments so she didnt have to work hard. If she messed up a key, she didn't even try to fix it. She looks at herself as ugly and sad, but i found her to be strong after her "prodigy" in the mirror. She had longed to be loved by her mom and to make her mom proud but after realizing she couldnt, she began to be herself and make herself happy and became a stronger person.

"Everyday Use" by Alice Walker

In the beginning the author seemed to state some of the obvious identity traits. She was obviously overweight or atleast "chubby". Also with the slang and the way she spoke, she is African American as well. I think she is a bit masculine because she killed the bull calf and things like this just dont seem to be too feminine. From this same scenario, i found her to be very country because a city person would not have to kill anything themselves to eat. She is very independent and doesnt depend on a man to do things for her in her household. Also, the very obvious she is a mother, the mother of Dee and Maggie. I think she is middle aged and doesnt seem too appealing to her daughters because they dont really introduce her to their friends or anybody else. She seemed very passive and allowed them to do pretty much whatever they wanted (like Dee changing her name or getting married). Her personality seemed to be very observant and soft, she didnt say much except when spoken to, she did not bicker or fight with them. She did not seem very confident nor did it seem that she felt pretty.

David Sedaris:Identity Construction..

The assignment was to read Go Carolina and The Learning Curve by David Sedaris and construct his identity from what we read.



Although this seemed to be an easy assignment, I found that it was not. It is hard to read something that somebody wrote and find key identity traits. Most people like me need to know the person or at least have one face to face interaction to tell what a person's identity is or may be. I will make an attempt to do this and this is only what I infer from reading this.


First off, in reading "Go Carolina", this is where I made most of my notes on his identity. I think it was easier to find what his identity was like while he was a child and interacted more amongst others. From this story I found that he is obviously a child with a very distinguished lisp. I also find him being intelligent at a young age because even though he had a lisp, he also used quite intelligent words and words that "normal" children probably wouldn't use because they don't know the words yet. I also found him to be kind of troubled because of his lisp, he was very insecure and sensitive about his speech impediment and about his "speech therapy". He was also sensitive to what people in class or other kids would think or say. He seemed to me like a chameleon; he wanted to blend in and be like everybody else. He wanted to be very conspicuous and did not want to be made fun of and did not want people to know of his impending speech therapies at 2:30. He seemed very confidential about a lot of things like his baking, or fantasies, and about his speech sessions. In other words, he was the "odd ball", he seemed to stand out greatly in class and even in North Carolina because he wasn't a sports fanatic like the others. He just seemed to tell people what they wanted to hear, like a pushover. Mr. Sedaris also did not seem so "well off", I mean not poor just not so well off especially when explaining how his Christmas would go.

In "The Learning Curve", I found him to be very feminine. While he was a homosexual, he was the feminine one's with the girl voice and feminine qualities. He is very timid and seems to avoid the arising confrontations with students and anybody else who came along. I think he really died for acceptance among everybody;young or old. He was very analytical, he analyzing everything and everybody. He did not take chances or go beyond what was expected. The characteristics he lacked as a teacher he covered up. The things he lacked as a man he also covered up. He stayed the same from child to adult.


In conclusion, his identity from my point of view is:

>white, caucasian male
>insecure, sensitive and troubled
>homosexual and feminine
>need for validation
>dry humored
>intelligent, confidential
>odd
>maybe a geek