Published in 1972

Themes:

The Influence of Culture on Identity Bless Me, Ultima explores the difficulty of reconciling conflicting cultural traditions. In the end, Anaya suggests that a person can draw from several cultural traditions to forge a more complex and adaptable identity. Antonio is so eager to find a single, definitive answer to the questions that haunt him because he has been influenced by many conflicting cultures. The first major conflict involves his parents. His Luna mother wishes for him to become a priest, while his vaquero father wishes for him to ride the llano. Each parent has deeply rooted cultural convictions. Next is the conflict within his town between its Spanish and indigenous cultures. We see evidence of this conflict in the pronounced tension between Ultima’s mystical folklore and the Catholic church. Another conflict takes place at Antonio’s school between Spanish and English speakers.

Anaya uses these conflicts to explore the influence of culture on identity. Many characters in the book are limited by their cultural prejudices and never learn to look beyond their own assumptions. For example, the townspeople condemn Narciso for being a drunk and refuse to acknowledge that his traumatic experience in the war might play a part in his psychological state. Ultima teaches Antonio to avoid the limitations inherent in abiding by one culture, one religion, or one creed. Instead, Ultima encourages Antonio to embrace all of the cultural influences in his life to become a better person.

The Importance of Moral Independence An emphasis on thinking independently about moral decisions pervades Bless Me, Ultima. Antonio’s progress toward moral independence is the main marker of his maturity and development throughout the novel. Antonio’s struggle to reconcile the complexities of his experience with his religion leads him to conclude that he must make his own decisions. He becomes increasingly frustrated by the failure of the church to explain the most pressing questions about morality and human experience.

Motifs:
Family The recurring presence of various family relationships—uncles, siblings, and parents, especially—provides a subtle commentary on the nature of identity and ultimately underscores the book’s main theme of moral independence. Many of Antonio’s family members seek to define his future, especially his uncles, who argue about whether he will become a priest or a vaquero. Antonio looks to other members of his family to help define his identity, especially when he tries to model himself after Andrew, his older brother. In the end, Antonio must learn to make his own choices, drawing from the wisdom and experience of his family, but not being limited by their wishes and perspectives.

Learning and Education Ultima once predicts vaguely that Antonio will be a “man of learning.” Many scenes in the book explore Antonio’s education, both religious (his Communion classes) and academic (his school classes). Antonio’s growth and development serve as examples of education. Ultima believes that every experience helps inform one’s identity and perspective on life. Bless Me, Ultima is the story of Antonio’s growth from childhood to maturity. His progress is represented by his gradually expanding education, both in the classroom and in his own introspective interpretation of his experience.

22. In Sandra Cisneros's " Barbie-Q", a sudden abundance of flawed Barbie dolls makes the child narrator accepts her own identity and discards society's ideals of women.

The initial storyworld is that of materialism and perfection. What the narrator values in her dolls and what she plays with them could be seen as a reflection of her own self image, of what she thinks she should look like and what kind of life she should live. From the first few lines of the story it becomes clear that the narrator of the story is a little girl. She describes the outfits of her barbies, as if reading from the package, to her friend. " Yours is the one with mean eyes and a ponytail. Striped swimsuit, stilettos, sunglasses, and gold hoop earrings." The doll's mean eyes reveals the author's critical attitude towards the ideal it represents. This attitude also shows in the title of the story. The Narrator uses second person, as if directly adressing the reader. Who she is talking to is never defined in the story, but it is clear that she is talking to a fellow child. The narration mainly uses only first and second person, which realistically recreates the world of a little girl, where the narrator and her friend are the only people and Barbie dolls the only things that matter.

In the second paragraph, the girls repeat society's gender roles in their play: " Every time the same story. Your Barbie is roommates with my Barbie, my Barbie's boyfriend comes over and your Barbie steals him, okay? " The invisible Ken doll could be seen as the author's way of emphasising her point about society's assuptions of young women's interests. The author makes the scene strange enough to catch the reader's attention.

The flea market scene describes the mundane reality of the narrator's neighbourhood which is contrasted with the girl's aspirations that are projected tobarbie dolls that represent a different social background and lifestyle. The narrator lists the items in the flea markets just like she did with her dolls. This emphasises the contrast. The initial story world is disrupted in the flea market scene as the narrator finds flawed Barbies for sale. This scene develops in the next paragraph as the narrator gets all the Barbies she dreamed of, only all of them damaged by a fire.

In the last paragraph, the narrator seems to accept her own social background as she understands that it doesn't matter that they can't afford all the new Barbie dolls. The narrator describes her flawed Barbie: " And if the prettiest doll, Barbie's MOD'ern cousin Francie with real eyelashes, eyelash brush included, has a left foot that's melted a little-so? " This statement could be seen as having a wider meaning, that the child also accepts her own flaws and ends her quest for perfection defined by society.

The short story Barbie-Q written by Sandra Cisneros is about two young girls that do not have a lot of money to afford everything they want. The only thing the girls care about is having a Barbie to play with; it does not have to have the perfect hair and the perfect body. These two girls want any Barbie no matter what it looks like because the doll is still Barbie on the inside. The flea market the girls were walking through that morning was selling melted toys from the warehouse fire. One quote that shows the girls do not care what the Barbie looks like is, “And if the prettiest doll, Barbie’s MOD’ern cousin Francie with real eyelashes, eyelash brush included, has a left foot that’s melted a little—so? ”(162). This quote resembles the beauty that the girls see past the melted foot and how dirty the Barbie looked.

This short story shows that beauty is not what is on the outside, but what is on the inside. When the two girls look at the Barbie, they think of what they can do to cover up the flaws it has. In the quote when the girl says “so? ” she means why does it matter that these Barbie’s are different. The fact that the Barbie’s are melted and the girls are finding ways to make them look better, shows how they view beauty. It shows that the only beauty the two girls see is the Barbie. They do not care if she has a melted foot or that the hair on the doll is burnt. All the girls see if the beauty within the Barbie.