Judith Ortiz Cofer Analysis

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Judith Ortiz Cofer is a poet, novelist, and teacher from Hormigueros, Puerto Rico born on February 24, 1952. Her father was in the U.S. Navy so her family was constantly moving, going and returning between her hometown and Paterson, New Jersey. Therefore she attended school in both countries and also gained insight to two very different cultures. When Ortiz Cofer was fifteen years old her family moved again, but this time to Augusta, Georgia. Here she attended Augusta State University earning a bachelor or arts degree in english. After a couple of years Ortiz Cofer moved to Florida and then attended Florida Atlantic University gaining a Master of Arts degree in the same field. It was then that she began her work in literature and eventually teaching. Through her writings Ortiz Cofer depicted the divisions between the two cultures that she grew with. Most of her work actually represents her life in some way. Many of her stories are Puerto Rican culture, showing that her heritage has a strong influence on what she does. The challenging childhood that she had to experience have influenced many of the things that she’s written. Even though Ortiz Cofer has two major cultures she believed that she didn’t have to choose one or …show more content…
Their American experience exposed them to events that gave them the knowledge necessary to write the things that they did. They both used their experiences as a structure for their writings. Ortiz Cofer and Reed wrote in a way that put their characters in the situations in which they once found themselves. They exposed the American experience that many others who shared ethnicity with them had. Even though they both came from two different cultures, there are similarities in the things that they wrote about that can be distinguished. Their lives enabled Ortiz Cofer and Reed to compose works which represented their experiences in some