My Hips My Caderas

In the excerpt, “My Hips, My Caderas” by Alisa Valdes, gives distinctive examples of her life story to develop a meaning for how society perceives women. America strives to fit the perception of beauty because it is the single physical characteristic that makes us matter. Her anecdotes show us how the world shapes our thoughts to brainwash us. Alisa Valdes personal experiences are a service to provide a better explanation of how we perpetrate in order to be welcomed in society. “Beauty is in the eye of the culture.” This is an essential quote that summarizes the moral of Valdes story. Being a biracial woman, she received perspectives from two cultures about the way she looks. Valdes is white and Cuban. She is a girl with hips and curves. She is seen as voluptuous. White Americans and Cubans have different viewpoints on how women should look and what beauty is considered to be. Valdes body type isn’t accepted in by all of her family because of the type of the different type of society they live in. As a child it confused her as to what herself image should be. Her mother’s side of the family is white Americans who believed being skinny was the key to beauty. In America, we have several reminders of what we should look like. Our models are size zeros. All our foods are low fat or reduced in calories producing dieting. We also promote surgery to stay skinny. Hips or la caderas are seen as fat which is ugly, ugly being the antonym for beauty. On the contrary her father’s side believed that the thicker you were or the more curves that complimented one’s body made you more of a woman. That notion highlighted a woman’s beauty. Caderas, often referred to in her explanation, simply translated is hips. In Latin cultures caderas are the stomach, waist, and thighs. It’s all that makes a “real woman”. La caderas are the essence of a woman. Those who don’t posses these caderas are seen as sick. It’s unattractive to the eye. The different cultures that she exemplifies