Review #3 & Book Promotion: Esperanza Rising

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Full Review:

Title: Ryan, Pam Munoz. Esperanza Rising. Scholastic, 2000. Hardcover. $15.34, ISBN 978-0-439-12041-8
Genre: Fiction/Historical Fiction
Subjects: The Great Depression, Immigration, Mexican-Americans, California, Farm Laborers
Reading Level/Interest Level: 6.2/Grades 5-8
Awards: Pura Belpre Author Award 2002, ALA Notable Children’s Books 2001
Similar Titles: Breaking Through by Francisco Jiminez. Local News by Gary Soto.

Esperanza Ortega lives a life of privilege in Mexico as the daughter of a respected and wealthy land owner. Pampered, adored, and learning all the skills she will need as an upper class bride after her long anticipated quinceañera , in 2 years time, her father also teachers her how the land is part of her, how it has a heartbeat that unites all those that depend and live upon it, like her family. Little did they know that on the eve of Esperanza’s 13th birthday, their world would be turned upside down as Esperanza’s beloved father is murdered while tending to the land he so loved. The future she once thought was so certain, has changed forever.

Forced to flee the country, Esperanza and her mother travel with their former ranch hands in railroad cattle cars, penniless and afraid, to the agricultural fields of California to seek work and start a new life. Unaccustomed to cramped, drafty and poor fieldworker’s quarters, as well as the manual labor that keeps them housed and fed, Esperanza has a difficult time adjusting to the new life she refuses to accept. That is, until her mother becomes gravely ill and nothing becomes more important to Esperanza than earning enough money to retrieve her Abuelita, her grandmother, from Mexico, her mother’s sole wish. Can she conquer her feelings of inadequacy to be come the strong independent young woman she will need to be to survive the grueling labor, social and economic upheaval in her new country? Can she rise above her circumstances, save her mother and find the heartbeat of the land once more?

Besides learning the value of determination, perseverance, a strong work ethic, education and the ability to adapt to suit the challenge, tween readers may find themselves with more in common with Esperanza than initially thought. The demands of a modern world and the effects of tragedy often have consequences which force children to grow-up faster than they anticipated or may have wished, much like Esperanza. They see how she is focused on dresses and parties, friends and gifts at the beginning of the story, like many contemporaries her age , but then they can see how shallow those pursuits appear as her priorities shift as she becomes a young adult under a heavy burden. They learn the importance of family, both by blood and by bond.

Tales of hardship show readers of all ages what good character can be, of what the human animal is capable of, both good and bad, and of how people develop, grow and change in body, attitude and ethics by age and experience. Learning about stories, like Esperanza’s, which mirror many of the experiences of the immigrant agricultural workers of the 1930’s, is essential, not only to understand what issues we faced as a nation 80 years ago, but of how much that occurred back then (poverty, prejudice, fighting for a fair wage, immigration policy, English as a second language, education gaps, and unionization, to name a few) is still relevant and controversial today. We cannot come to clear and equitable solutions for these issues today until we can learn from the experiences of our predecessors and what did and did not work in the past, and how far we still have to go.


  ~”Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”~ –George Santayana

Diversity in Tween Fiction

"It is said that fiction increases/improves empathy. How can reading books from diverse cultures and lifestyles help increase our cultural competence, as well as tweens? Feel free to use examples from other reading such as Higher Power of Lucky (rural) or Are you there God? (religion)"

 

Books about diverse cultures and lifestyles increase our cultural competence, as well as tweens, because we learn through them. Through the story and the characters we learn of real hardships, realities and everything that makes us different, culturally, but we also learn about all that is similar; family dynamics, the need for the basics of survival, dreams, hopes, aspirations, disappointments, romances, ethical confrontations, seeking our places in the world at large. It’s a question of knowledge. We re-evaluate our own values and beliefs when we find a character that seems like they would have nothing in common with us, only to find that we are more similar than one might think. I am no longer a tween girl, in a new town, worried about developing, fitting in, and defining her relationship with a higher power and her contemporaries, but I can certainly empathize with Margaret and her battles to fit in and find her own inner voice in Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret. By reading of her battles I am reminded of what I went through at that age, how I felt, how it compares to Margaret, how beneficial a book like this would have been to me at that time, and reminds me that there are children out there now that are going through the exact same thing.

Without the proper looking glass, without the proper knowledge, there is ignorance, and ignorance breeds fear and hate, mistrust and policies not necessarily beneficial or humane to anyone. By reading the story of a young African-American orphan who runs away from the foster system to find his father during the Great Depression, as in Bud, Not Buddy, you don’t have to be an orphan or an African-American to understand intrinsically Bud’s need to belong, how dangerous his journey truly was, the pain of losing his mother or being abused, the dynamic experienced with racial tensions or the desperate conditions of those who had lost everything and just wanted to provide for their families, no matter the cost. You can feel yourself in the shoes of those waiting in the meal lines of the local mission, or the bitterness of those down and out who are too proud to accept help. You can feel the relief of those who are willing to help and become family, even if only temporary. You understand, this character is not  unwholy like me.

The same can be said for Esperanza Rising. From a Hispanic migrant perspective, we can empathize, and in some cases, sympathize with a young character, Esperanza, and her contemporaries, that are forced to grow up far too soon, due to circumstances beyond her control. Her entire world is turned upside down in a very short period and she has to figure out how to “Not be afraid to start over again,” even at the tender age of 12 and 13. Starting out with a typical tween viewpoint of what is important, i.e. status, appearance, parties, friends, rites of passage, becoming an adult, we watch her learn hard lessons that rearrange her thinking and really transform her into that young adult. She learns responsibility, equality, fairness, gains an extremely determined work ethic and conquers her own prejudices while she truly learns to understand the importance of family, beyond circumstance and fortune.  She learns what the peasant woman on the train from Mexico really meant by “I am poor, but I am rich.” The readers will also learn what is truly important in life versus the standards they have come to live by through habit and social influence. One does not need to be all the things the character is in order to be influenced by them. In fact, the greatest influence, and positive change, can occur when the reader and the character are very different, but are similar where it really counts…..in mind and conscience.

I'm so glad I got to read these books now. I wish they had been presented to me when I was younger. I don't believe I was exposed to multi-cultural authors until the 12th grade during an A.P. English class where we learned about the Harlem Renaissance and the books of Zora Neale Hurston and her contemporaries. The language was difficult at first, because it was written to replicate the phonetics and speech (often influenced by geography) of the characters during the time but they were more adult oriented books. The glory was in the content. Learning about what it was really like during the Renaissance, the depression, before the civil rights movement and the struggles that African-Americans and minorities dealt with on a daily basis.... comparing how far we'd come since then and how much farther we really needed to go.

However, the books mentioned above, Bud, Not Buddy & Esperanza Rising, while also being authentic in tone, speak in a manner that is easy for tweens and adults to understand with no syallabic interpretation needed, as in the more difficult novels. They are written that way on purpose. They reach a wider audience and are easily translated to teach the meaning and to explore the characters and situations, to be easy to relate to. We don't need whitewashed covers to get us to read these books (Mondor,C.). We don't need to be tricked into believing in their value and the application of their lessons and content into our own lives. All we need is a good synopsis on the back that shows the heart of the story and cover relavent to the content and we will see, that through those differences, we can also see ourselves.

Ryan, P. M. (2007). Esperanza rising. New York: Scholastic Inc.
Curtis, C. P. (2005). Bud, not buddy. New York: Laurel Leaf.
Blume, J. (1988). Are you there god? it's me, margaret.. New York, NY: Random House, Inc.
Mondor, C. Kids of color and the new American whitewashing. Bookslut. Retrieved from http://www.bookslut.com/features/2010_02_015679.php

Why Advocate For Tween Books That Tackle Tough Issues?

So today's question is "How did the tween book you read represent a developmental or age appropriate approach to dealing with the topic of loss, abuse, homlessness, alcoholism, etc. This discussion should help clarifiy a position of advocacy to those who might challenge these titles.

For this question, I re-read Bridge to Terabithia. I can remember reading this book in the 4th or 5th grade and bawling my eyes out. I think the themes of loss, growing up faster than one would have liked and feeling so isolated really hit home, because at the time, I was in what is now known as the "tween" category. I didn't feel like I fit in anywhere, physically, emotionally, at school or at home. I didn't have many friends, just like Jess and Leslie, there were some big issues going on in my life that I needed to make sense of and I didn't feel like I had anyone to confide in or that anyone knew what I was going through. But, when I read this book, I instantly felt like Jess and Leslie understood what I was going through. They weren't alone because their adventures and their trials and tribulations, their issues, were my issues and I wasn't alone because I was on those journeys with them. I akin the feeling to the movie The Neverending Story. You don't just read the book, you become part of it and it becomes part of you.

Now, that's just a sentimental way to say that the book deals with some serious, very difficult issues that may seem uncommon for a child of that age to experience, but it does happen, and probably more often than we think, and books like Bridge to Terabithia are vital to those going through these issues because it helps them cope in a healthy manner. They get to see that expressing emotion and validating what you are feeling is absolutely appropriate. The sadness, the anger, the frustration and the isolation are normal, but there are solutions. These types of books are able to say yes, you may have lost someone close to you, your parents may not understand you, you may not fit in with your peers, you may feel lost, confused and hopeless but there IS hope. There is a future. There are ways to express the way you feel and work through those problems to come back to your life in a fuller and hopefully, happier manner. 

This is why we need to advocate for these books. Really, what we are doing is advocating for tweens. These kids are building their self-worth, their community ties, their identities and carving out their places in the world. They are bridging the gap between childhood and young adult hood and the transition is rarely smooth and painless. Changing bodies and changing emotions are hard enough to deal with but add to that mix a serious life altering issues, like homelessness, drug abuse or death and it feels like the rug has been pulled out from under you and you can't tell where reality is anymore.

Kids aren't born with coping strategies. They have to learn them and at a time like this, when they are the most impressionable, if they learn poor coping strategies and destructive tendancies that will affect their entire life in a negative way. Whereas, with tools like books exploring these issues in a healthy manner or even in a book showing what could happen, or has happened, when poor choices were made in coping, it shows these impressionable kids that #1 they have choices (and therefore some sense of control over their own lives) and #2 what the positive choices are and what the ramifications are of choosing poorly. Jess ran and he drew. When he met Leslie, together they built an entire imaginary kingdom where they could control the good and conquer the bad. They finally had a place to feel safe and valued, talk out their problems, often using role playing and storytelling, and I think they really showed that in a worst case scenario, that can be in your mind only, as long as you have that something to hold on to, to comfort you, to analyze from afar, through the lens of imagination if necessary.

On the other hand, in fiction, when these issues are dealt with, it creates enough distance between the reader and the situation for them to be able to analyze the entire situation and perspectives they may not have understood previously without causing an overwhelming emotional reaction. Most importantly, it provides this information in an age appropriate manner, or at least it should if it is recommended for this age group. As I said before, this is an age of half-child/half-adult. They need to be treated like they can handle these issue but they need to be presented in a non-threatening manner that is relatable, compelling, and if nothing else, entertaining. It's like finding the morale in the story. I was entertained and invested in the characters when I read this book as a child, but it wasn't until I was done reading the story, sobbing with the book in the hands that I realized I wasn't really sobbing for them, I was sobbing for me, and that was ok.

I like to credit books like this with teaching me that it is ok to cry. It's ok to verbalize your emotions. It's ok to be upset, or angry at the hand you've been dealt. But, it is what you do with the lessons that situation has taught you that matters the most and will have the greatest impact on your character as an adult, and subsequently, what you teach to the next generation.