Take a photo of a barcode or cover
4 reviews for:
Someday Mija, You'll Learn the Difference Between a Whore and a Working Woman: A Memoir
Yvonne Martinez, Yvonne Martinez
3.38 AVERAGE
4 reviews for:
Someday Mija, You'll Learn the Difference Between a Whore and a Working Woman: A Memoir
Yvonne Martinez, Yvonne Martinez
3.38 AVERAGE
dark
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
This was a very powerful memoir, and certainly one that was at times difficult to read.
The book was written in the form of mini essays and was split into two parts; the first half discussing the author’s life as a child taken in by her grandmother, and the second discussing the author’s life as an adult after her childhood experiences.
It was not only sad, but also disturbing to read of the trauma the author faced growing up. While this section was at times hard to read and get through, it was important to understanding how the author was able to leverage this trauma into her adult years, and advocate for members of her community experiencing oppression and abuse.
Overall, this was a very inspiring memoir and I would recommend it to anyone who wants to read something moving.
The book was written in the form of mini essays and was split into two parts; the first half discussing the author’s life as a child taken in by her grandmother, and the second discussing the author’s life as an adult after her childhood experiences.
It was not only sad, but also disturbing to read of the trauma the author faced growing up. While this section was at times hard to read and get through, it was important to understanding how the author was able to leverage this trauma into her adult years, and advocate for members of her community experiencing oppression and abuse.
Overall, this was a very inspiring memoir and I would recommend it to anyone who wants to read something moving.
dark
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
This is an intensely powerful memoir; Martinez’s life is a scar tissue of intergenerational wounds. Someday Mija, You’ll Learn the Difference Between a Whore and a Working Woman is a serious treatment of what the traumas of racial violence, poverty, and sexual exploitation can do to a child and a family, and how Yvonne was able to weave these histories — her own, her mother’s, her grandmother’s, her family’s and her community’s — into a lifetime of “doing better.” This is not a memoir to be undertaken lightly.
Someday Mija, You’ll Learn the Difference Between a Whore and a Working Woman is divided into two halves, the first reads like a novel and documents Martinez’s experiences as a child and growing up in a dysfunctional family. The second half addresses Yvonne’s life afterward, as an adult and specifically as an activist in the service of her community, as an organizer, and educator.
The two halves are intertwined: it is Martinez’s experiences growing up in an abusive and violent home that shapes her ability to understand the traumas that envelop her community. This shared experience is one not easily addressed by public health programs or the simple piling on of more and more education. Oppressive systems stemming from cultures steeped in patriarchy, sexual violence, and colonization cannot be wiped away, even replaced that easily. These cultures exist within even larger systems of oppression.
In Martinez’s case, however, these experiences also spurred them to take on systemic racism, sexism, violence, and poverty as institutions to be dismantled. This is a case of an individual working from within, for one’s own community (and for all communities). Change must be internal as well as external for it to sustain; Martinez’s life is proof of that.
A profound and consuming memoir that is in equal parts disturbing, sad, and inspiring.
Someday Mija, You’ll Learn the Difference Between a Whore and a Working Woman is divided into two halves, the first reads like a novel and documents Martinez’s experiences as a child and growing up in a dysfunctional family. The second half addresses Yvonne’s life afterward, as an adult and specifically as an activist in the service of her community, as an organizer, and educator.
The two halves are intertwined: it is Martinez’s experiences growing up in an abusive and violent home that shapes her ability to understand the traumas that envelop her community. This shared experience is one not easily addressed by public health programs or the simple piling on of more and more education. Oppressive systems stemming from cultures steeped in patriarchy, sexual violence, and colonization cannot be wiped away, even replaced that easily. These cultures exist within even larger systems of oppression.
In Martinez’s case, however, these experiences also spurred them to take on systemic racism, sexism, violence, and poverty as institutions to be dismantled. This is a case of an individual working from within, for one’s own community (and for all communities). Change must be internal as well as external for it to sustain; Martinez’s life is proof of that.
A profound and consuming memoir that is in equal parts disturbing, sad, and inspiring.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Xenophobia, Trafficking, Death of parent, Pregnancy, Gaslighting, Abandonment, Sexual harassment, Colonisation, Classism