Thursday, March 5, 2015

Ideas for the Caramelo Response Paper


As always, you can write your Caramelo response paper on whatever topic you want, but here are a few ideas to help you get started if you're having trouble coming up with a focus.
  • In what ways might this novel be considered a “rebozo”? In what way is Celaya contining the lost family tradition in telling this particular story as she tells it?
  • Evaluate Caramelo as a coming-of-age story. Does Celaya come of age? In what sense? 
  • Look at Caramelo through the lens of gender and/or race? What does this novel illuminate about gender roles in different cultures and eras, and/or about the racial/cultural realities and complexities?
  • There are a number of names in Caramelo that might be considered significant. How do the names of various characters affect how we see or understand them? Are there any ways that Celaya's name and/or her various nicknames seem important to you?
  • Given what we’ve seen in the book, imagine Candelaria’s life at the time of the anniversary party. How old is she, where is she, what is she doing, and what is she like?
  • After her father disappoints Celaya by telling her the wrong "secret" in the anniversary party chapter, she muses that "maybe it's okay" that there are so many apologies unspoken in her family, and so many conflicts unresolved (p. 428). In what sense is it "okay," and/or are there ways in which it's not?