This separation of the Hispanic community on a large scale reflects the feeling of alienation that the protagonists feel on a personal level. These sentiments are captured through the characters’ constant struggle with their cultural identity as Dominican Americans. “Oscar Wao” is prefaced by a Derek Walcott poem in which he speaks of his mixed heritage which ends in the line “either I’m nobody or I’m a nation.” Similarly to the poems of Derek Walcott, Diaz questions what it means to belong to a cultural group through his characters’ search for acceptance.
In a similar manner Diaz prefaces the stories in “Drown” with the poem “Bilingual Blues” by Gustavo Pérez Firmat: “The fact I am writing to you in English already falsifies what I wanted to tell you. My subject: how to explain to you that I don't belong English though I belong nowhere else” Again, Diaz has chosen a poet whose work focuses on the question of cultural identity. Firmat's words capture perfectly the sense of being an outsider trapped between two worlds felt not only the characters in 'Drown' but also 'Oscar Wao'.
In “Oscar Wao”, Diaz uses Oscar de Leon’s rejections from different social groups as a showcase of archetypal attitudes towards cultural identity in America. The “white kids” in Oscar’s university look only at his “black skin and afro”, and decide immediately that he is too different in appearance alone for them to have anything in common. Moreover, they subsequently treat him with “inhuman cheeriness”: although they are pleasant to Oscar, they do not accept him as an equal, the apt use of “inhuman” reinforcing the feeling of Oscar’s alienation.
Furthermore, Oscar is rejected by the “kids of colour” ironically not being different enough from the white kids: “upon hearing him speak and seeing him move his body, [they] shook their heads. You are not Dominican.” Oscar does not fit into the stereotype of the “fly bachatero” Dominican male, so much so, that they cannot believe that he is Dominican. This rejection particularly evokes a sense of pathos in the reader because Oscar is rejected by the social group he belongs to by birth. This is made all the more poignant by Oscar's reply of “Soy Dominicano. Dominicano Soy”; he is trying to establish the most basic of connections with the other characters by communicating in their native language. The short stories in “Drown” also raise the dilemma of cultural identity in immigrants, but rather than the characters being rejected outright by society, it is the subtle nagging feeling of being different that alienates the characters of Drown. The progression of this feeling of otherness can be tracked through the stories of “Drown”.
The stories set in the Dominican Republic and Yunior's first years as an immigrant in the US, such as “Ysrael” and “Fiesta 1980”, have a strong sense of identity because the character is sure of himself as a Dominican, and this is reflected through the frequent use of Spanish words and phrases within the text. However, as Yunior progresses into his adolescent years within the stories of “Drown' his sense of identity as Dominican wanes; Spanish is used less and less and he often expresses annoyance at his Dominican looks: “ run your hand through your hair like the white boys do even though the only thing that runs through your hair easily is Africa.” This humorous and seemingly flippant remark about his looks shows Yunior's desire to look more Caucasian and consequently seem more American.
However, Diaz also presents a conflicting distaste of all things overtly American. This distaste is often expressed in Spanish colloquialisms such as in “Boyfriend” in which Yunior describes the American boyfriend of a Dominican girl as “painfully gringo”; the use of Spanish allowing Yunior to distance himself from the American traits he dislikes. This conflict of identity, the wish to be more American, while still wanting to distance himself from other Americans shows how out of place Yunior feels within American society. Moreover, this conflict of identity is one of the stronger instances of authorial intervention felt within both novels. It seems that through Yunior, Diaz is writing about the conflicting feelings he had about his cultural identity as a young man and even struggles with today. These feelings of otherness Diaz creates in both “Drown and “Oscar Wao”, are reflected in the use of the dual settings of the Dominican Republic and the United States, leaving both the characters and the reader straddling two worlds; feeling alienated and out of place in both.
In addition to this, Diaz's liberal use of Spanish throughout both texts serves as the primary method of alienation between both society and the protagonists, as well as between the reader and the characters. In “Oscar Wao” this is compounded by the use of “nerd speak”- constant references to comics and science fiction. Even the title of the book: “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” is taken from a line in an issue of the comic “Fantastic Four”: “Of what import are brief, nameless lives...to Galactus.” The reader who is not familiar with the marvel universe would not know that Galactus is the devourer of worlds, and that they, in a sense as readers act as Galactus; consuming Oscar's small world, then moving onto the next book. These again serve to alienate both the characters within the book and readers who are not familiar with the obscure references, solidifying his image as an isolated “loser with a capital L” in the minds of the characters and readers.
Spanish is the native language of the protagonists and consequently appears constantly in both texts. Spanish is used by Diaz to express anything from the extremities of emotion, to everyday colloquialisms. Furthermore, Spanish is essential to how the characters relate to one another, for example in both texts; the protagonists address their parents as “mami” and “papi”. This is not only a mark of respect for their parents, but also symbolic of how Spanish ties the characters to each other and their roots in the Dominican Republic.
However, this use of Spanish creates a divide between the characters and their American surroundings; in “Negocios”, the story of Ramon de las Casas', Yunior's father's, immigration to the US, while describing the airport, the narrator points out that “everyone was speaking English”, an irrelevant detail to the English speaking reader, but by pointing this out the narrator is subtly showing the reader that this is a significant to the character: by being unable to speak English he is immediately alienated. Moreover, the use of Spanish creates a language barrier between the reader and the characters, stopping the audience from being able to relate completely to the characters. In this sense, the reader is treated as an outsider, unable to understand all the inside jokes, which reflects the isolation of the characters.
The most noteworthy aspect of Diaz's use of Spanish, however, lies in his choice not to italicise the Spanish used in both books, despite the italicisation of foreign words being one of the standard rules of English grammar. However, by italicising the foreign words, this highlights their difference from the rest of the text and implies that because they are foreign, they do not belong. Diaz conversely strives to integrate the Spanish words into the English text as a means of validating not only the language itself, the experiences of Spanish speakers as equally important to those lived in English.
Furthermore, the use of Spanish in both books raises the question of the veracity of the narrative voice: can a book detailing the lives and experiences of Spanish speaking immigrants be honestly and accurately narrated in English? This idea is raised in the aforementioned preface to drown “The fact I am writing to you in English already falsifies what I wanted to tell you,” Through this simple quotation, Diaz communicates to the reader that they will never be able to fully understand or relate completely to his stories or characters; there will always be sentiments lost in translation. This is compounded by Diaz's use of reported speech for all of the dialogue in both texts. Although the texts are in English, most, if not all of the characters' conversations would have taken place in Spanish. Consequently the narrator in both texts becomes a translator for the reader, filtering the speech of the characters and ultimately acting as yet another barrier between the characters and the reader.
Throughout both texts, Diaz's use of different narrative techniques continue to build up this wall between character and reader, feeding the overhanging atmosphere of alienation that envelops both novels. In “Oscar Wao”, the use of third person narration creates the semblance of an omniscient narrator, who is later introduced as a supporting character, calling into question the reliability of the narrator in the mind of the reader, as the narrator was not present for most of the events recounted in the book. Moreover, this use of the third person also makes it more difficult for the reader to relate to Oscar, as the narrator acts as a constant barrier between Oscar and the reader; only the narrator's voice is heard; and thus the reader never offered insight into Oscar's true emotions. This reflects and intensifies the sense of Oscar's alienation; even the audience cannot get close to him. In “Drown” most of the stories are narrated in the first person by the protagonist Yunior de las Casas, yet the dispassionate tone in which Yunior recounts each story makes it seem as though the events are happening to a different person. Despite the detachment of Yunior as a narrator, unlike the narration in “Oscar Wao”, the use of the first person allows the reader greater opportunity to see the true emotions of the characters.
Another way in which Diaz adds to the sense of alienation in both texts is through narrative structure. At several points in “Oscar Wao”, the narrative shifts to the past to tell the stories of Belicia, Oscar's mother, and Albeard, Oscar's maternal grandfather. These flashbacks and forwards break apart the narrative and distance the reader from the main characters. The order in which the stories in “Drown” are presented is used to similar effect; all of the stories except two are in chronological order. The fourth story of the book, “Aguantando” [“Waiting”], tells of Yunior's life as a child in the Dominican Republic, but rather being a complete narrative shift, the story reads much like an afterthought, as if the character was reminiscing about a previous life, showing the character's emotional detachment. In a similar manner, the last story in “Drown”, “Negocios”, Yunior recounts the tale of his father's arrival the USA, ironically enough, making the beginning of the story the end again, forcefully pulling the reader out of the main story line as another means of alienating the reader.
Diaz's exploration of alienation through the experiences of his characters in “Drown” and “Oscar Wao” raises deep questions within both the characters and readers. Like many others before him such as Walcott and Firmat, Diaz uses his own experiences in his writing to question the idea of cultural identity for those who often find themselves split between two contrasting cultures. This appeals to readers who can identify with this internal cultural conflict or who are questioning their place in the world, as well as allowing insight into a very introspective theme.
