ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the novel reflects the transnational character of the relationship between the Dominican Republic (DR) and its American diaspora, presenting the three generations of de Leon y Cabral family as transnational subjects. Junot Diaz achieved wider recognition and acknowledgement with his first novel, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, which won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize. Diaz takes the most fundamental (micro)social structure, the family, and through its story illuminates the realities of the Dominican community through the simultaneous interpellation of the individual, particularly the diaspora-born Oscar and Lola. The fuku is such an intimate part of Dominican cultural identity that everyone has a fuku story "knocking around in their family". The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao is an act of exorcism, or as Yunior puts it, "a zafa of sorts". The novel also captures the characters' attempts to "bear witness to themselves", which involves filling the patinas en blanco and fighting disremembrance.
