Dreamer's Struggles In Occupied America

A Dreamer’s Struggles In Victor Villasenor novel, Rain of Gold is an accurate view in how he portrays what his family experienced in migrating into the Southwest of the United States, in attempt to live a safe prosperous life. Lupe, Victoriano, and Juan are three characters from the novel that best illustrates the struggles that many immigrants face in crossing over in search for work and safety. In Occupied America, by Rodolfo Acuna supports the experiences of the characters in the novel, making it clear that the events that took place in Rain of Gold are in fact what people experience in the real life. For instance, Lupe struggled with the threat of being rapped as well as any other young lady in the novel; she also struggled with education
It was a privilege for any child to go to school, none less a girl. The novel puts emphasis through the story how Lupe struggled to get an education. For example, when Don Manuel declares, “He’s under no written obligation to supply a school for the village.” He was arguing with the mothers of the students whom attended school when they discontinued paying Senora Munoz, though she continued to teach which was leading her to secretly starve. But the village united and helped maintain education by paying the teacher what they could as long as they could and took turn having her over for dinner and feeding her in the meantime she was there. Another occasion was when Lupe was older and by then she had migrated to the United States, she had returned to school and although she was making great progress and maintain good discipline and determination she went through a hurdle that scared her from ever returning she explained to her mother stating, “Mr. Horn my new teacher, was real nice to me, too, helping me after school; but then one day he, he, he grabbed me from behind while I was writing on the blackboard.”(pg267) This frightened Lupe especially when he called her a dirty Mexican prick-tease that she was too old to be in school. In her time women Mexican women were taught to be respected and not allow a man to ever mistreat them, their customs were solid in marrying a
He came of a line of heroes and embraced his ancestry; he was a boy who grew up to be proud of his past. When I first began to read into Juan’s story I had the impression he was a grown man based on is actions and attitude, little did I know he was just a thirteen year old boy who know more about life than the average 20 year old today. Juan went through a lot of discrimination throughout the novel, at one point when he is talking to two of his nephews he informs the two that, “Hell he treated the dogs better than me. He only had eyes for my brother Domingo, who was blue-eyed like himself.”(pg228) and goes on and tells the boys that prejudice exist in Mexico too, meaning that it’s not just in the United States that narrow-mindedness is present but in their native country as well. In the article, “The True Significance of the Word White” maintains how assimilation came to birth and how the mindset of the Euro American affected the culture and lifestyle of the Latin people. One piece of the article it’s obvious what they thought of the Mexican people and therefore look down on then and discriminated against them, “European Americans believed Mexicans were an “indolent” people, whose backwardness reflected their having poor personal habits and collective deficiencies such as laziness or a penchant for extravagances.” In them succeeding in passing along this “opinion” of Mexican people it was just as easy for Mexican people to accept this