Culture is key to a society: it is what keeps it running. Without culture, society would be an endless grey blur of everything being the same. Gary Soto’s poem “Behind Grandma’s House” can be analyzed from a cultural critical perspective. Being Mexican American, Soto incorporates his culture into his work. He was born to a poor working class Mexican American family. Life was hard for Soto. Nothing ever came easy, if it came at all. In his poem “Behind Grandma’s House” he discusses the conflict his ten year old self faced: whether to fit into his new American culture or stay true to his Mexican roots. He also, at the same times, offers a comment on the hardships Mexican-Americans were facing at the time.
The poem starts with a simple statement: “At ten I wanted fame.” This phrase sets the stage for a very naïve and innocent point of view. Something so simple, and so fantastic at the same time, can only be dreamed up by a child. This phrase is found inside the first line. However the enjambment of the first line goes to show the reader that every action he takes from that point on is syntactically connected to his desire to be famous. This phrase adds to the eventual juxtaposition of Soto’s innocent childhood dreams and the real horrors that Mexican-Americans face every day. Being a realist, Soto does not like to create a view of the “perfect” society. Instead he strives to create as realistic of an image as possible. It was not uncommon for Soto’s family personally to struggle to find work. This was a sad reality for many other Mexican-Americans. This struggle can be seen in the negative diction that Soto uses. Words such as “grenades” and phrases such as “fingers of blood” have extremely negative connotations. These objects offer as symbols for the hardships and obstacles these people faced. However, such negativity is mixed in syntactically with such childish actions such as kicking trashcans and fences. This also shows that for Soto, being a child and having...