Loss Of Identity In Latin America

Kyler Harlow, Seth Kramer, Nichole Smith Dr. Nicholson Honors English 10, Period 1 23 February 2017 Latin America Paper An identity is a major aspect of what makes a person their own person, unfortunately, an identity is something that Americans lack. A lack of identity within the American people resulted in a lack of identity within Latin Americans as well. Latin America was colonized by Europe in the 1500’s which cause a multicultural and foreign culture to be forced upon its inhabitants. This resulted into the use of visual imagery in their literature in order to connect the reader to the loss of self experienced by the Latin Americans. The loss of identity and purpose was emphasized through kinesthetic imagery, which compared the feeling …show more content…
The progression of blindness is shown with visual imagery, shown in the quote “I live among vague whiteish shapes that are not darkness yet… to think, Democritus tore out his eyes; time has been my Democritus” (340). The process of becoming blind is slow, and fading, just as the process of losing one’s identity is slow and the identity seems to fade instead of being forgotten all at once. The fading of an identity and purpose is shown throughout the poem “In Praise of Darkness”, which uses visual imagery as a way to link the readers to the events being described in a way that they could understand. The phrase, “few vanishing decrepit houses”, connects houses, which are normally perceived in a normal viewing, as a way represent the individuality of the Latin American people, which fades as time goes on (340). There are times where one does not know that they are losing themselves until they realize that their life was wasted away. Colonialism in Latin America caused its people to feel as if they were being destroyed from the inside …show more content…
One way that the Latin American people rediscovered themselves is through recovery from the initial loss, done by resting. The story, “The Circular Ruins” describes the process of resting by stating, “He closed his pallid eyes and slept, not through weakness of flesh but through determination of will” (335). This use of kinesthetic imagery describes sleep as painful and exerting, which empathizes the character’s initial opposition to taking the first step to finding oneself. Finding one’s identity is described as a painful and arduous process because the journey to rediscovery is a daunting and fearful quest; something that most people would initial reject doing. The Latin American people demonstrated this struggle through the quote “[He] climbed up the bank without pushing aside the blades which were lacerating his flesh… nauseated and bloodstained” (335). The climbing of the bank is shown to be an excruciating process, however one will always recover, shown in the quote “He was awakened by the sun high overhead… [he found] that his wounds had healed”