Free Custom «Jimmy Santiago Baca‘Meditations on the South Valley’ » Essay Paper

In his literary work ‘meditations on the south valley’, Jimmy Santiago Baca aims at developing goals aimed at affirming personal struggles of the Mexican community in integrating into the American frontier. The book therefore strives to enliven the trail of events based on a preview of personal life experiences, and other key events. “…he tells stories of its people, stories at once typical and unique…” (Baca xvi). As plot develops, the story line borders on bringing to life key aspects on struggles aimed at attaining key self actualization goals in tandem with personal development initiatives.

Personal development has essentially been developed through the use of personal reflections based on individual life circumstances. For instance, the individual life reflections serve to emulate key aspects of personal life by rebuilding previous experiences and encounters. This can be seen in:

“in his own fantasie,

To share his bread with invisible companions,

To speak back to voices

That brim over from his childhood memories” (Jimmy Baca Santiago)

This serves to portray a struggle with an aim of reconnecting with previous life circumstances with regard to previous personal associations and individual relations.

In line with personal development, it is evident that the task of developing personal hope primarily relies upon persistency. Individuals primarily need to persist upon the influence of repetitive tasks and push forth for their life goals. This can be seen in:

“They’ve survived kill-dem meskin days,

Retained their humor for a good joke,

And slowly wean themselves

From this life,

And prepare for the next” (Jimmy Santiago Baca)

Furthermore, persistency can be seen as an aspect that would lead to strengthening future individual prospects.

The prospect of attaining self actualization depends upon developing fundamental aspects of endurance on the present circumstances. Jimmy Santiago Baca essentially achieves this through portraying conditions in the South Valley and its relative effects on the people. This can be seen in:

“These are the viejos

Who endured poverty,

and learned to do

with what they had

and made a rich dream land

out of a small garden plot” (Jimmy Santiago Baca).

The use of ‘rich dream land’ serves to emulate the actual attainment of self actualization goals, while ‘small garden plot’ shows the existing life circumstances with regard to resource availability

Jimmy Santiago Baca in his meditations on the South Valley’ succeeds in influencing the reader with his reflections based on life realities. In essence, everyone is on a pursuit for self actualization and the attainment of personal development. The poems therefore achieves in portraying the aforementioned aspects.