ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the authors formal maneuvers because narrative discourse is frequently more difficult for students to analyze than authors thematic decisions. To specify, Alvarez, Cisneros, and Garcia utilize the formal strategies of multiple narrative voices and languages and the conceptual tools of characterization and familial/historical representations to accomplish linguistic, cultural, and historical translations in their works of fiction. Cisneros employs, among other formal strategies, crisscrossed languages to craft the novel's migratory and communal narrative voice and to engage readers with different language competencies. Herminia's narration functions as a form of lucid translation that explains and interprets; as such, it operates as a model for student analysis and interpretation. To become 'translators', then, students need to be creative, equally attentive to close reading practices as well as audiences, and capable of explanation and interpretation of complex linguistic, cultural, and historical materials.
