Cherríe Moraga Criticism
Cherríe Moraga stands as a pivotal figure in American literature, celebrated for her influential contributions to Chicano and Chicana narratives. Her body of work spans multiple genres, including drama, poetry, and essays, revealing the nuanced intricacies of Chicano life. Moraga's upbringing in a bicultural household in Whittier, California, profoundly shaped her literary voice, which is characterized by an exploration of female subjectivity and the intersections of race, class, and sexuality. This cultural duality is a recurring theme in her interviews, such as the one with Karin Rosa Ikas, where she delves into these complex identities.
Moraga's dramatic works, including the groundbreaking play Giving Up the Ghost, are celebrated for their exploration of female and lesbian identity, highlighting the marginalization and repression of Hispanic women. This is a central theme in Jorge Huerta's essay. Her plays such as Shadow of a Man critique patriarchal structures within Chicano culture, a point of analysis for critics like Yvonne Yarbro-Bejarano. Furthermore, Heroes and Saints addresses the social injustices faced by California's migrant laborers, a subject that has garnered the attention of critics including Ed Morales.
In addition to her drama, Moraga's literary oeuvre includes powerful prose such as Cuentos: Stories by Latinas and Loving in the War Years, which explore Latina identity and sexuality. These works have been praised by critics like Judith Ortiz Cofer. Her plays have been heralded for their radical depictions of Chicana life, a point discussed by Raymund Paredes and Julia de Foor Jay. In particular, Heroes and Saints has been noted by Hal Gelb for its compassionate portrayal and insightful commentary on social change.
Moraga's unique literary style often incorporates a blend of Spanish and English, a reflection of her cultural identity and the broader Chicano experience. This stylistic choice is evident in works like The Last Generation, which Marie-Elise Wheatwind and Jan Clausen have praised for its forward-looking insights into social dynamics.
Through her pioneering work, Moraga has created a space for Latina writers to develop their own narrative traditions, while her dramatic writings continue the legacy of Chicano theatro. This legacy and its developments are often explored in critical essays such as Catherine Wiley's essay on Chicano drama.
Contents
- Principal Works
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Moraga, Cherríe (Contemporary Literary Criticism)
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Mujeres en Lucha
(summary)
In the following review, Cofer praises the stories in Cuentos—of which Moraga is an editor and contributor—and the poems and prose in Loving in the War Years for their focus on the Latina's search for identity and individuality.
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Luz María Umpierre with Cherríe Moraga
(summary)
In the following interview, Moraga explores her identity and challenges as a Chicana lesbian writer, discussing her works such as Loving in the War Years and the influential anthology This Bridge Called My Back, and reflecting on themes of family, cultural identity, and the intersectionality of race and gender in her literary endeavors.
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Giving Up the Ghost
(summary)
In the following review, Paredes notes that Giving Up the Ghost represents the most radical element of contemporary Chicana writing because of Moraga's portrayal of sexual relationships and Roman Catholic culture in the Mexican-American community.
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'A Deep Racial Memory of Love': The Chicana Feminism of Cherrie Moraga
(summary)
In the following essay, Sternbach examines Moraga's attempts to return to the pre-Malinche Latino notion of womanhood in her feminism.
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Heroes and Saints
(summary)
In the following review, Gelb notes that in Heroes and Saints Moraga "has written with compassion and intelligence about the difficulties of change," although she fails to fully explore some of her principal characters.
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Coming Home: Interview with Cherríe Moraga
(summary)
In the following interview, Moraga, along with Brady and Heredia, discusses her literary career and the influence of her multicultural identity, emphasizing the impact of This Bridge Called My Back on feminist discourse and highlighting the importance of specificity and authenticity in representing marginalized voices.
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All in the Familia
(summary)
In the following review, Wheatwind praises Moraga's commitment to Chicano culture and feminist ideals as reflected in The Last Generation. The Last Generation, a comprehensive new collection of prose and poetry by Cherríe Moraga, embraces a myriad forms and audiences. It includes personal narratives, insightful dreams, poetic forays into the author's past, political visions of her community's future, and prose transliterations of talks and presentations given at various conferences and symposia.
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The Axis of Herstory
(summary)
In the following review, Clausen finds The Last Generation prophetic of racial, class, and gender clashes to come in the twenty-first century.
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Review of Shadow of a Man
(summary)
In the following review: Wiley finds Denver's Su Teatro production of Shadow of a Man "triumphant" for women, particularly Latinas.
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Cherríe Moraga: Mapping Aztlan
(summary)
In the following essay, DeRose discusses Moraga's involvement with the Brava Theater Center in San Francisco's Mission District.
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(Re)Claiming the Race of the Mother: Cherríe Moraga's Shadow of a Man, Giving Up the Ghost, and Heroes and Saints
(summary)
In the following essay, de Foor Jay examines mother-daughter relationships in Shadow of a Man, Giving Up the Ghost, and Heroes and Saints. Moraga explores the process of socialization and its effects on mothers and daughters in the Chicano/Chicana community, rendering a vision of revolution, led by courageous vendidas, as the only recourse to (re)claim the race.
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Waiting in the Wings: Portrait of a Queer Motherhood
(summary)
In the following review, the critic praises the evocative immediacy of Moraga's motherhood experiences in Waiting in the Wings: Portrait of a Queer Motherhood. Waiting in the Wings: Portrait of a Queer Motherhood is an honest, introspective memoir of evolving lesbian motherhood.
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Teatro Chicano and the Seduction of Nostalgia
(summary)
In the following essay, Wiley discusses how the notion of nostalgia relates to Moraga's and other Chicano artists drama.
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Mujeres en Lucha
(summary)
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Moraga, Cherríe (Drama Criticism)
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Cherríe Moraga: Poet, Playwright, Essayist, and Educator
(summary)
In the following essay, Moraga and Ikas explore Cherríe Moraga's journey as a Chicana writer and activist, discussing how her works address intersections of feminism, race, class, and sexuality, while highlighting her contributions to Chicana literature and the ongoing dialogue about cultural nationalism and political activism.
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Criticism: Giving Up The Ghost
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Making Familia from Scratch: Split Subjectivities in the Work of Helena María Víramontes and Cherríe Moraga
(summary)
In the following essay, Alarcón contrasts the views on female subjectivity presented by the lead characters—one repressed, the other more spiritually free—in two Chicana works: Helena Viramontes' story “Snapshots” and Cherríe Moraga's play Giving Up the Ghost.
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The House of Difference: Gender, Culture, and the Subject-in-Process on the American Stage
(summary)
In the following essay, Rosenberg examines how Moraga's position as “subject-in-process” allows her to confront the problems that have contributed to her status as outsider.
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Cherríe Moraga's Lesbian Representations: Revealing Lesbian Desire: Giving Up the Ghost
(summary)
In the following essay, Huerta debates how Giving Up the Ghost has evolved from its first staged reading in 1984 and how it deconstructs female subjectivity.
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Making Familia from Scratch: Split Subjectivities in the Work of Helena María Víramontes and Cherríe Moraga
(summary)
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Criticism: Shadow Of A Man
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Cherríe Moraga's ‘Shadow of a Man’: Touching the Wound in Order to Heal
(summary)
In the following essay, Yarbro-Bejarano reviews how Moraga's Shadow of a Man challenges the problems created by the machismo nature of Chicano culture through the play's frank dialogues about sexuality and desire.
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Cherríe Moraga's Radical Revision of Death of a Salesman.
(summary)
In the following essay, Wiley argues that Moraga, in a “radical revision” of Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman, has advanced its central themes of betrayal and subjugation through the use of Chicana leads, while adding a textual layer of sexuality that was only touched upon in Miller's piece.
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Cherríe Moraga's ‘Shadow of a Man’: Touching the Wound in Order to Heal
(summary)
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Heroes And Saints
(summary)
In the following essay, Morales analyzes California's Hispanic theatre in the early 1990s, including Cherríe Moraga's Heroes and Saints, relating Jorge Huerta’s assertion that “Moraga seems to be the one star [among Hispanic playwrights] on the horizon of any significance.”
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Cherríe Moraga: Poet, Playwright, Essayist, and Educator
(summary)
- Further Reading