ENG 1310, Paper 3: Rhetorical Analysis of 'American Dream' Essay

This essay provides a rhetorical analysis of Karla Cornejo Villavicencio's article, "For the Child of Immigrants, the American Dream Can Be a Nightmare." The analysis explores the author's narrative approach, focusing on the struggles and experiences of immigrants in America. The essay examines Villavicencio's use of personal anecdotes, emotional appeals, and cultural references to convey the complexities of the American Dream for immigrants. It discusses the author's perspective on love, sacrifice, and the challenges faced by immigrants, including issues of identity, belonging, and the fear of deportation. The analysis also considers the effectiveness of Villavicencio's rhetorical strategies in persuading the reader to empathize with the immigrant experience and question the realities of the American Dream. The essay highlights the author's use of vivid language, her exploration of themes such as hope, and her reflections on the immigrant parents' aspirations for their children.

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The article For the Child of Immigrants, the American Dream can be a Nightmare, is a
moving piece written by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio. The author puts her heart out which
reverberates the story of about 11 million immigrants who are undocumented and fear reality. In
the article, the author tells about the experiences which she and her parents have endured in the
country like many immigrants who have made their way to American to embrace the American
dream. The readers are introduced with the article in a very fascinating and perplexed manner, as
she claims that she would create an acquaintance of a love story, to the readers.
The author exclaims that the love for America is blind as she, like several other
immigrants in the country have grown embracing this identity. They love the country in the
wildest life, which the love story is not about love solely, it is also about sacrifice, which they
have been compelled to make all their lives. An immigrant, in America faces tremendous
adversity and life is a struggle as they constantly try to keep their love live, despite being made
to live with the fear of being expelled from what they have known and loved as home. It is
moving to read, as she explains that the love for the country is even worse than a heartbreak, as
goes on to mention how ruthlessly ten year old girl, with the condition of cerebral palsy is taken
to detention shelter, rather than being taken for a surgery, that too, without her caregivers
(Cornejo Villavicencio, 2020).
The article gets intriguing to an extent of being intimidating to read further as the author
explains their harrowing experiences of being an immigrant in America. She sheds light on how
the experiences have shaped their consciousness and continuous to torments them through
everyday experiences. She questions how this love story could be true while she continues
narrating the story and various experiences which has shaped her feelings towards the nation.
She is not native to America and has come from Ecuador, during tormenting times. It is rightly

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pointed her by the author that the idea of migrating to America was the immediate necessity,
which any other parents would have done, in order to secure the future of their children rather
than seeing them die under vicious circumstances. She fondly remembers visiting places like
Times Square, Twin Towers, Empire State Building and Central Perk, which ignited the dreams
in her minds, as parents already lived with it, in their hearts, hoping to embrace the nation and its
identity (Cornejo Villavicencio, 2020). It is heartbreaking to still be immigrants in a land, in
which she has belonged and her parents are penalized in very many ways, especially mentally
and emotionally, every single day. They now live with the fear that the penalization, is also due,
legally, as she has started noting that police and administration pull out people from their homes,
at midnight, when the city is sleeping, just to be persecuted.
Her father has been at the front line of being an immigrant who worked in the restaurant
industry while teaching her to keep the dream alive to be an American, which he believed in his
heart, even though he swallowed the racial slurs which were directed at him at work alongside
wage cuts. He has been an ardent fan of soccer and baseball., so much so, that his brother is
named as Derek, after Derek Jeter, who was the captain during the World series of 1988, which
is when her brother was born (Cornejo Villavicencio, 2020). Soccer had different meanings to
him, as he identified himself as the American soccer team, of which he was the defender and the
star kicker of the team was his daughter, and ever since, she has been taught to never give up on
the game and aim to score the game, in all tournaments in life thereafter. On the other hand, the
only dream which her mother brewed in her heart, as to let her daughter become a successful
woman, which was possible in nation as great as America. She revered Hillary Clinton and her
book ‘Living History’, her favorite. Her mother often reminder her, saying “that’s why we
stayed, you know. So you could be a successful woman. I live through you” (Cornejo

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Villavicencio, 2020). The author intends to be heart by the audience, about how difficult it has
been, to hold on to love, one sidedly, while they have only received hatred and abandonment,
when they only hoped for acceptance.
The article very much focuses on the horror and struggles which the immigrants face and
dread while living the American dream, when they are not even sure of getting recognition. Their
dedication and devotion get them going, when they are continually made to correspond to
suffering and torments while being torn between two identities, one of their past and of the
present, which they strive to embrace. The form of the article is more like a narrative, and is
often perplexing as the author cherishes the memories to put across the very idea, how she fears
that the dream is but a nightmare. The situations which have been narrated are very much real
and depict the struggles of immigrants. Even to this day, her parents participate as audience by
the side of Brooklyn Bridge, while the fireworks happen which ignited the dream in their heart
too. The association with America is deeper which cannot be scrutinized or belittled just on the
basis of documents and identity. She goes on to add her mother claims her favorite book to be
the Bible, her parents still, customarily visit Chinatown in search of Dumplings, much like other
Americans and watch the Olympics while holding their breaths just to support the American
team (Cornejo Villavicencio, 2020). Even though their dreams are bit complex and she hopes
that everything, including her struggles will end with her, rather than being carried on to her
children as she ends the article stating “I will plant seeds that will bear fruit my children will eat.
This all ends with me” (Cornejo Villavicencio, 2020).
The article is a moving piece of text which rightfully voices the concerns and struggles of
the immigrants through harrowing experiences as the author dreads the outcomes, as she has
witnessed and heard immigrants being taken to detention centers and expelled. She still is

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courageous to call it a love story as she continues narrating with the intention to be heard and
understood as everything tells her, its not a dream but a nightmare. She has embraced the identity
of an Americans she has grown up acquiring and imbibing traits, ambitions and culture of the
nation. It is harrowing to realize that there is little or no hope beyond tormenting reality, as she
watches her parents hold their heart with pride and sparkling eyes, as they are the ones, who has
brought her to America and taught her to dream.

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References
Cornejo Villavicencio, K. (2020). For the Child of Immigrants, the American Dream Can Be a
Nightmare. Retrieved 29 March 2020, from https://www.vogue.com/article/child-of-
immigrants-daca-personal-essay