Alvarez is quoted as admitting, "I am a Dominican, hyphen, American. ... It is the separation from her native country, the Dominican Republic, which serves as a backdrop for the holistically autobiographical novel, How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent. ... For the majority of her life, it has been the love of her native Spanish that has created a divide deep within her disillusioned self. ... However, Alvarez herself believes strongly in a "mandate of silence" associated with minority women's literature and its impact. ... Throughout the book, there are numerous degrading references ma...

• Word Count: 2799
• Approx Pages: 11
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: High School

This led to the rapid expansion of a largely unsophisticated literary public, the rise of the popular press, and the mass production of 'popular' literature for a semi-literate 'lowbrow' readership. ... A tension in writing between the popular and the esoteric, and the popular and specialized, the commercial and the avant-garde, became a feature of twentieth-century literature. ... Before 1914, English literature and ideas were in many ways still harking back to the nineteenth century: after 1918, Modern begins to define the twentieth century. ... There is also the fact t...

• Word Count: 10566
• Approx Pages: 42