Social conflict in literature

Andre Gide's Les Caves du Vatican is a work of complex
social criticism. Using primarily the metaphor of the
labyrinth and working in satire and comic burlesque, Gide
analyzes the structure and role of the Catholic Church,
the family, and society in general. He dramatizes
multiple forms of hypocrisy and sincerity, lucidity and
blindness, freedom and entrapment. He offers no social
program, and he does not preach. Rather, he mocks
existing structures and raises disturbing questions
about social and moral choice.

The Jones Act of 1917 gave U.S. citizenship to all Puerto Ricans, who were then able to move easily between the island and the United States. A constant transfer of people ensued and the process of transculturation accelerated. Puerto Ricans zealously strive to maintain their identity and to culturally set themselves apart, most visibly through the use of the Spanish language. Thus, some find it scandalous that Puerto Rican authors, such as Rosario Ferrâe and Esmeralda Santiago, would dare publish works in English. Both authors received university-level education in the United States, but their experiences have been very different, and their works provide a worthwhile comparison. Ferrâe had not written a novel in English until she published The House on the Lagoon in 1995, and she always translates her own prose work. Santiago writes exclusively in English and does not translate her own work. The second of her three memoirs, Almost a Woman, published in 1998, relates the story of her time in New York City until she is twenty-one years old. This thesis examines the transculturation of Puerto Ricans in U.S. society and their struggle to hold onto Spanish as a way of maintaining their identity as seen in The House on the Lagoon and Almost a Woman.