ENGLISH CLASS

Esmeralda Santiago

She was born on May 17, 1948, in Macún, Santurce, Puerto Rico.
Santiago moved to the United States of America due to economic reasons during the Operation Bootstrap (the 1950s – 1960s).
She received the B.A. (Bachelor of Arts) from Harvard University.
She’s been awarded honorary doctorates of letters from Trinity University, Pace University and Metropolitan College.
She began to write personal essays in 1984 that focused on her experience of growing up in Puerto Rico. Her essays were published a year later in the New York Times and Boston Circle, and magazines such as House & Garden and Metropolitan Home. Her essays talk about identity, life in the barrios of New York, island politics, violent situations, and the experience of motherhood.
She has published four novels (When I Was Puerto Rican (1993), America’s Dream (1996), Almost a Woman (1998), The Turkish Lover (2004)), and a children’s book, A Doll for Navidades (2005).
Her most famous work is When I Was Puerto Rican, her first novel-memoir.
Her second novel, America’s Dream, first appeared in 1996 and translated into six languages.
Almost a Woman, the sequel to her first novel, won 3 awards from the American Library Association and adapted into a film by PBS Masterpiece Theatre.
She currently lives in Westchester County with her husband and two children.

Photo by Robert Curtis

From what you know so far about Esmeralda Santiago, in your opinion, is she an important contributor to Puerto Rican culture? Why or why not?

Kariel Bulerín Esquilín

I definitely think Esmeralda Santiago left (and still leaves) an important mark in Puerto Rican culture. Many of her works deal with Puerto Rico’s reality, the things happening right now in our country: Puerto Rican life abroad, life in Puerto Rico, island politics, etc. In other words, she writes about the situations and struggles Puerto Ricans are going through. And thanks to her international reach, more people can enjoy her essays and memoirs, and at the same time, they can appreciate our culture, lifestyle, and identity.

Mirelys Quiñones Guadalupe

Esmeralda Santiago is a famous writer from Puerto Rico that had shown in her writing Puerto Rican culture to the world. She is an important contributor for Puerto Rico because she shows life events she had experienced in the novel When I Was Puerto Rican. There are other novels like America’s Dream and Almost a Woman (sequel to her first novel). In these novels, she involves how Puerto Ricans live in New York. She involves this so people around the world could know the struggles and problems that her people have experienced through the years.

Sebastián Hernández Díaz

Esmeralda Santiago is an important contributor to Puerto Rican culture because she wrote about her experience living in the United States. For example, in When I Was Puerto Rican, Santiago wrote about how is the culture in Puerto Rico. Also, she wrote other books that tell her horrible experience and won some awards. Finally, her experiences are important because foreign people can know about a different lifestyle and situation.

Carlos Ortiz Rodríguez

In my opinion, she contributed greatly to Puerto Rican culture. She wrote many stories about people are around here. Furthermore, she published these stories outside of Puerto Rico, meaning that people from other countries can learn about us. Having written great novels, she also acts as an important figure to represent Puerto Rico. These are the reasons why Esmeralda Santiago is important for Puerto Rico and its culture.

Paula Albaladejo Collazo

Esmeralda Santiago, in my opinion, is not that outstandingly important to the Puerto Rican culture. I think this way since sure she wrote books about her experience here but that didn’t actually do anything for Puerto Rico. She gave a voice to those who didn’t have it, so yes in that sense she is important. She’s got her accomplishments that she should be praised for and thanks to those accomplishments, people that have been there and seen everything has changed in a good way. Esmeralda Santiago is important to Puerto Rican culture but not in a sense were everyone on Puerto Rico would feel like they really owe her something.

Is Santiago conflicted about becoming more "American"?

What do you think becoming more American means to her?

Santiago feels conflicted about becoming more American because she thinks that by doing so she’ll betray her Puerto Rican culture by accepting Anglo-American habits. However, she adjusts to the city’s lifestyle. Santiago tells us in her writing that she didn’t want to change her Puerto Rican habits; nevertheless, she slowly started to adopt their culture. Furthermore, becoming more American meant a hard process for her, but which she had to accept.

We think that Santiago’s definition of becoming more American means to be accepted and get used to their lifestyle. When she moved to Brooklyn, she feared that she would not be accepted by American society by the fact she was Puerto Rican. She thought that by the way she acted, spoke, or thought, people would treat her differently. This drove her to try her best in order to get accepted, for example, in Performing Arts School by sounding and acting as American as possible.

What evidence can you see in Puerto Rican culture that is of Anglo-American origin? Name at least three examples and explain them.

Carlos Ortiz Rodríguez

I feel that the Anglo-American culture influences us in various ways. I think our style of clothing is strongly derived from the United States, with the addition of jeans and t-shirts. I also suppose architecture is something we got from the United States, as the designs of major buildings like hospitals are a lot like the ones from the mainland. Yet another thing we have thanks to the United States are additional holidays, such as Halloween, Valentine's Day, and Independence Day. These are some of the things I believe we get from the United States.

Sebastián Hernández Díaz

The evidence I see in Puerto Rican culture that is from Anglo-American origin is the music, food, and architecture. Nowadays, Puerto Ricans are listening to American songs like Don't Wanna Know from Maroon 5, Whatever It Takes from Imagine Dragons, and Stone Cold from Demi Lovato. In terms of food, Puerto Rico is full of American fast food chains like McDonald's, Burger King, and Pizza Hut, that are already art of our diet. Finally, architecture greatly influences because many Puerto Rican structures look like the ones from America.

Mirelys Quiñones Guadalupe

Anglo-American culture has influenced in Puerto Rican’s culture during years. The most common examples are the music, language, and food. According to the music, the most influential ones are pop, rock, and hip hop. The language has influenced by the english class in school, books, novels, and movies. In the food it has influenced on our daily meals like hot dogs, hamburgers, etc. All this three examples keep influencing Puerto Rican culture more every day.

Kariel Bulerín Esquilín

Every day we can see Anglo-American culture in Puerto Rico. America has implanted many things through the decades, like its music, food, and entertainment. In terms of food, we have incorporated to our diet meals like hamburgers, hotdogs, and French fries, in addition to their fast food chains many of us love and support. We also listen to a lot of American music genres like Pop, Jazz, Electronic, Hip Hop, and Country, and we fill the concerts of singers like Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, Madonna, Katy Perry, Metallica, Panic! At The Disco and many others. As for entertainment, almost everything we see in TV comes from the United States; series like The 100, The Office, The Flash, Arrow, and movies like Stars Wars and The Avengers are some of the entertainment that reflects their culture. Furthermore, Puerto Ricans are highly influenced by Anglo-American culture.

Paula Albaladejo Collazo

Anglo-American culture has affected Puerto Rican culture in many ways. It has affected in the language, in our festivities and music. It has affected our language in the sense that most of the people in Puerto Rico talk English or at least this generation. In our festivities since some of our holidays are from the U.S. history, therefore they are from the U.S. culture. In the music, because some genres of music come from there, for example blues, rock, ect.

How much do you feel influenced by American culture? Give and explain at least one example that illustrates Anglo-American influence in your daily life.

Kariel Bulerín Esquilín

I feel greatly influenced by American culture in many aspects, but mostly, it is very noticeable in the way I speak. In a daily basis, I usually use English words in my Spanish vocabulary; in other words, I use Spanglish. Parking instead of estacionamiento, party instead of fiesta, and hamburger instead of hamburguesa are some of the words words I use when speaking with other Puerto Ricans. For decades, and by some sort of reason, we have created a new way of speaking mixing our Spanish vocabulary with words from other languages. This, however, has been criticized by many people, like José Luis González, for example. In my opinion, I think that anglicisms are an example of acceptance for language bonding. However, we have to perfect our native language so that it is not affected by them.

Carlos Ortiz Rodríguez

I feel that one way Anglo-American plays a part in our daily life is our language. Original English words and derivations of other words are the additions we have made. Words like sandwich and carro have been heard generally in our speech. Although Spanish remains our main language, it has a few words from the English language. Our version of Spanglish, however, uses far fewer words than the Spanglish spoken by those who move to the United States, due to mainland citizens being less common in Puerto Rico. Although we are affected by the Anglo-American culture, their effect on us is very minor.

Sebastián Hernández Díaz

I feel very influenced by American culture in terms of economy. Since America took possesion on Puerto Rico, they have taught us to spend a lot of money in their products, which has caused that a lot of money is sent to America. Also, I feel very influenced by their TV commercials, because they try to convince us to buy the things they are promoting. Finally, their stores influence me a lot; in every corner, we can see American stores like Walgreens and Walmart that have taken great part of our economy.

Mirelys Quiñones Guadalupe

I feel very influenced by Anglo-American culture by their TV shows and language. Nowadays Puerto Ricans, and mostly the teenagers, see many American TV shows, and most of the time they are aware of what is happening in the United States. Thanks to the language I express myself with it when I'm speaking to my friends, and during classes.

Paula Albaladejo Collazo

I feel really influenced by this culture. This is because at least in my opinion I am better at speaking and writing in English. At first I hated the language, but now I prefer this language since I find it easier. I still love the Spanish language but I grew more used to English for some weird reason. I end up falling asleep if I read a book in Spanish but if I read it in English I will be able to stay awake. So yes, the culture has influenced me in a big way.

What is typical Puerto Rican for you? Name three examples and explain.

Carlos Ortiz Rodríguez

There are various aspects about us that differentiate us from other nations. For starters, we are very informal, always using hand gestures and ignoring certain letters when we speak. Another thing that distinguishes us from others is that we talk a lot; it's hard to see a moment when we are quiet. It should also be noted that we like to show foreigners our great food; we are proud of the way we cook our food and want to show others about it. These are the things I feel are typical for Puerto Ricans.

Mirelys Quñones Guadalupe

Typical Puerto Rican for me is a person who dances bomba and plena, eats rice and beans, and speaks with the Spanish accent from Puerto Rico. Traditional bomba and plena dances come from African culture that came to Puerto Rico by the slaves, and later then became part of Puerto Rican culture as well. As for food, rice and beans are our cuisine as a culture, and our Spanish accent distinguishes us from other countries that share our same language.

Paula Albaladejo Collazo

Typical Puerto Rican for me… for me a Puerto Rican is a person that puts family before anything else, a person that never backs down, and a person that stays strong. For me at least a Puerto Rican is someone who smiles when it’s needed to. For me it’s someone warm that will always receive you with open arms. Someone that is proud to be who they are and where they came from for me that’s a Puerto Rican.

Kariel Bulerín Esquilín

For me, a Puerto Rican is someone who never backs down in every situation. What I'm sure of is that Puerto Ricans have a strong heart and never give up. Also, we Puerto Ricans treat one another as a family; although we don't know each other very well and have to take care of our own problems, we care about others and always help each other. Finally, we always try to have a smile even in the worst moments; Puerto Rico has passed through a lot of bad things, but we always have our heads held high and face adversity with the best of us.

Sebastián Hernández Díaz

Typical Puerto Rican for me is to eat with the family, always be happy, and help other people. Puerto Ricans like to eat rice with beans and chicken while being with their families. In Christmas, we Puerto Ricans like to eat rice with gandules and cooked piglet while talking and celebrating with our loved ones. Puerto Ricans are always happy despite the circumstances; when hurricane María passed through our island and destroyed a lot of homes and our electrical system, we were not complaining; instead, we stayed positive. Finally, we like to help other people. When María came, we got out of our homes and started taking away trees from the streets, rebuild houses, and giving provisions to who needed it most.