Myths About Maria Judith Ortiz Cofer\'s \"The

¶ … Myths About Maria

Judith Ortiz Cofer's "The Myth of the Latin Woman: I Just Met a Girl Named Maria reveals how an educated Puerto Rican woman has to endure stereotypical labels from a variety of different people - mainly influenced by WASP culture. The three stereotypes that she has to withstand include: fashion, sexuality, and the notion that Latin women are thought to be little more than "domestics." Cofer explains how each of these myths unsettled her thinking, and at times, how her identity went through a bit of a crisis because she was raised in a Puerto Rican/Spanish-speaking, Catholic home, yet she had to tolerate slights from a largely white populace in Jersey who didn't recognize her cultural forms of expression, nor her sense of pride. Although each of these stereotypes myths represents a myth that Cofer has to debunk, perhaps the first noticeable one, fashion, occurred when she was still in high school.

Essentially, Cofer recognizes how her loud and ostentatious attire at a career day celebration led many of the pedagogues to treat her and her Latin contemporaries like second-class citizens. Cofer recalls how many of the Latin student contingent were greeted with scowls and turned-up noses from non-Latin nuns and teachers. She writes,

But it was painfully obvious to me that to the others, in their tailored skirts and silk blouses, we must have seemed 'hopeless' and 'vulgar'" (Cofer 226). Despite her ornate jewelry and tightly worn form-fitting clothes, teachers and administrators never informed her about proper business-wear. Despite the uninviting looks and stares that she received in regards to her attire, the myth of about a Latin women's sexuality was more insulting, and perhaps more dangerous.

She alludes to conversations in her home about Latin women who had to cope with sexual advances from non-Latin colleagues and bosses in factories where they worked because the common myth at the time was that Latin women were supposed to be very hot-blooded and "sexual." In effect, non-Latin men thought that Latin girls were supposed to be more readily willing to exchange sexual favors because they were believed that their curvy shapes at a perceived young age was an invitation for a "good time." She writes of how she responded negatively to a mainstream boy's come-ons negatively and his reply, "I thought you Latin girls were supposed to mature early"

Cofer 227) suggesting that physical maturity in Latin culture somehow translated into sexual and emotional maturity.

Lastly, Cofer tells of the most burdensome myth of all: the notion that because she is Latin, she is therefore an uneducated housewife and/or maid. This seems to be the most hurtful of all of the aforementioned stereotypes because some of them actually came from educated people that Cofer assumed would be better informed. She is an educated woman attending Oxford University (one of the most prestigious schools in the world), and still white people from all over the world may think of her as an uneducated handmaiden and/or domestic. During her first public poetry reading she writes, "An older woman motioned me over to her table, and thinking (foolish me) that she wanted me to autograph a copy of my newly published verse, I went over. She ordered a cup of coffee from me assuming I was the waitress" (Cofer 228). This is perhaps the most humiliating to Cofer because such a woman, with all of her supposed education should have recognized that Cofer was an author in her class, not a marginalized person because of her look, name, or attire.

Perhaps the saddest part of Cofer's revelations about the myths of Latin women is that many of them are still alive and well in a 21st century America. This essay/story was not merely a recollection of the past, but a reminder to young people, Latin and non-