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Biography & Autobiography. Multi-Cultural. Sociology. Nonfiction. HTML:In her father�??s Peruvian family, Marie Arana was taught to be a proper lady, yet in her mother�??s American family she learned to shoot a gun, break a horse, and snap a chicken�??s neck for dinner. Arana shuttled easily between these deeply separate cultures for years. But only when she immigrated with her family to the United States did she come to understand that she was a hybrid American whose cultural identity was split in half. Coming to terms with this split is at the heart of this graceful, beautifully realized portrait of a child who �??was a north-south collision, a New World fusion. An American Chica.�?� Here are two vastly different landscapes: Peru�??earthquake-prone, charged with ghosts of history and mythology�??and the sprawling prairie lands of Wyoming. In these rich terrains resides a colorful cast of family members who bring Arana�??s historia to life...her proud grandfather who one day simply st… (more)
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The very first sentence of American Chica sets the entire tone of Arana's memoir, "The corridors of my skull are haunted" (p 5). Indeed, Arana's family history hides ghosts and her story prods proverbial skeletons out of closets. I won't give away the details but there was one moment in Arana's story that had me holding my breath. She has a brush with impropriety that is tinged with the guilty question of did I bring this on myself? Is it somehow my fault? I could relate.The most poignant pieces of Arana's writing was when she was remembering her innocence; the times when prejudice didn't darken her childhood.