The Brief, Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao Analysis

There are various experiences linked to people in diaspora. This include the struggle to maintain their identity both politically, culturally, socially and religiously. In the recent years, global diasporas have increased because of the rapid discursive and material change. There is one commodity that all the diaspora communities share, and this is how they can survive as a whole. These groups are faced with the challenge of keeping their self-identity and also adapt to their new cultural and social environment without the loss of their identity as a group (Christian n. In this Dominican diaspora, there are different presences which play a crucial part in that they are the pillars of the culture of the Dominicans in diaspora. The presences determine the how the characters relate to each other, the notions of their home, their sense of security and to their customs (Aarbakke 13).

These issues are represented as integral parts of the diasporic experience as they are drawn between both Dominican Republic and the United States. These people are not recognized as being fully American or fully Dominican Republic. One major aspect of the diasporic experience that this clearly shows is that the communities in diaspora obtain a position that lies between the cultures of the country that hosts them and their mother country. ‖ If trauma is the ―tradition‖ of diaspora, then, we are tracking, with Freud, its transmission over generations. Diaspora is thus held up by trauma. That is, the memory of shared trauma that assures diasporic cohesion in the present” (Prabhu 10). This holds also for the generation of Dominican Diaspora present in the United States.

There are different generations of this diaspora that have different relationships with the challenges that caused them to be there. The long struggles for equality and social justice by people of color in the United States have yielded invaluable lessons from which Dominican people in the diaspora and in the Dominican Republic have drawn and may continue to draw empowerment. The diaspora will render an inestimable service to the Dominican people if it can help to rid the country of white supremacist thought and negrophobic discourse, to whatever extent those aberrations may survive in Dominican society, and allow finally a celebration of our rich African heritage” (285). The concept of diaspora has been largely addressed in literature on immigration. The major concepts have to do with the aspect of social transformation where the people in diaspora face a new social system which threatens to undermine their social system and culture because of the fact that in their new environment, they are a minority group.

This means that the culture of their host is dominant over them and therefore the threat of the extinction of their culture is a big one (Habti 150). They are people who have emigrated from their countries to come and find opportunity in this place which is considered to be the land of opportunities. Even the majority populations in the States are people who have come from other countries. The article quotes The Island at the Center of the World by Russell Shorto where it is stated that in the seventeenth century, Manhattan was a representation of the large diaspora that was to follow later in America. The author of the article states that “among the island’s then-400 inhabitants, 18 different languages were spoken.

Centuries later, this description not only fits New York, but also the U. Conclusion Diaspora is a major theme in Diaz’s The Brief, Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. Communities that live in diaspora face many challenges when it comes to preserving their group identity as a strong people although they face many challenges that come about as a result of the new cultural and social environment they find themselves in. The diasporic experience affects children more than it affects their parents who are the original immigrants form their countries of origin. The children interact more with other children in the new culture and acquire some of the cultural and social practices of their new environment. This makes it difficult for the parents to accept these changes that have taken place in their children.