Mericans: Mexican Americans Issues - Essay Example

Analyzing a story or any other literary work is one of the core topics or units that are deeply looked into in any faculty related to literature studies. The core concept behind this focus is based on the hidden information and deep meaning of each literary work. Therefore, to comprehend the message conveyed by Merican literary work, there is a need to critically look at the story of Mericans in a comprehensive perspective manner. Mericans is a story that reflects the conflict between modernity and the traditional ways of immigrant families and their successive offspring. While the author describes the grandmother as an “awful grandmother” because of her persistent desire to maintain the traditional church doctrines, the rest of her significant others and other younger generations are embracing a new way of life that is more liberal. This conflict between traditional and modern ways puts the religious grandmother and her grandchildren in constant conflict.

In the story, the grandmother maintains the ways of the church, observing the doctrines of the Catholic Church to the letter. First, the grandmother maintains the use of light candles and use of rosaries when praying for her family, while the daughter never attends the mass as would be desired by the grandmother. The grandmother maintains the traditional church ways and uses her prayer times to pray for the entire family who are seemingly drifting away from the church and embracing the more liberal approach to life. According to the grandmother’s designated way of life, which exemplified the conservative ways, there are specific material things that are supposed to be completely shunned. First, people should shun eating fast foods such as fries, should not spend money on comic books, and should not stay anywhere else other than near the church. The desire to maintain ‘purity’, according to the traditional church doctrines, led to strict ways of life that only matched the grandmother’s standards and not any other members of the family. For instance, the son is noncommittal on matters of church, and the grandchildren are busily Americanizing their lives from language to general behaviours.

The subject family in the story is the natives of Spain. However, while only the grandmother can speak and understand Spanish, her grandchildren struggle with the native Spanish language, thereby causing some sort of barrier to communication. This exposes the fact that there is an adoption of a different culture from that of the native Spain. The successive generations struggle with the native language, a fact that the older generations understand quite well.

While the grandmother's generation lived within the church doctrines, their goals focused on the price that is of a society that is prayerful and bent on defending the outright ways of the church, the changing American society of the younger generation do not mind doing things that are outside the realm of church teachings. For example, the young boy challenges the status quo that he sees as against his good. By telling the sister he is the Flash Gordon, and that the sister is “Ming the Merciless and the Mud People”, the young boy is trying to spate his ability from that of the sister, portraying himself as the strong righteous one. The younger generations, as represented by the young boy, challenge the role of church rituals such as burning of candles, kneeling when praying, and taking holy water. To the younger generation, such rituals never changed anything as far as the reduction of human suffering is concerned. The constant church rituals did not stop people from getting sick from worms and life-threatening problems such as depression.

Society has played a role in the changes in the attitudes of the young generation. For example, the narrator’s little brother is claiming to want to be a flying feather dancer,  but in the process somehow subconsciously expresses what he has seen in the surrounding, the second world war which Germany lost. The little boy seems to have had a first-hand experience of the Second World War. The experience of such nature defines societal behaviour, as generations come and pass.

The constant exposure to a new environment with different cultures makes the younger generation inclined towards their present environment. The new generation of immigrants is ready to make their own identity, outside that of their native homes. This kind of approach puts them at loggerheads with the older generations as represented by the grandmother. The younger generations thus identify themselves as Mericans, hence speak English and behave like Americans.