The language of names in Julia Alvarezs How the García girls lost their accents and "¡ Yo!"

Abstract

This work aims at providing an onomastic reading of Julia Alvarezs How the García Girls Lost Their Accents and ¡Yo!. This aspect seems worth pursuing since the author places names already at the core of the titles, which I consider an indication that they should not be taken for granted. Names may indicate some issues that seem to be of great concern to the authors and aspects to which they would like the readers to pay attention, either consciously or unconsciously. Names are also ground for the negotiation of instances of ones subjectivity, namely gender, race and nationality. Before approaching the two novels, I illustrate how much literary works in general benefit from such analysis, and then move to a discussion of some works by immigrant writers and how they approach their own names and their characters in a similar fashion, especially the issue of belonging in their two cultures. Not coincidentally, that is very alike to what can be seen in Alvarezs selected works.