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La Vida (V-421) Paperback – February 12, 1968

by Oscar Lewis (Author)
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Product Details

  • Paperback: 669 pages
  • Publisher: Vintage (February 12, 1968)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0394704215
  • ISBN-13: 978-0394704210
  • Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 1.7 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
  • Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #953,990 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Puertorican family"s struggle to survive
By A Customer on December 11, 2002
Format: Paperback
Lewis was able to go inside a family that trusted him enough to show just how difficult life can be. This book makes you think and shows you just how grinding poverty can eat away at ones soul. It also manages to show the vibrancy this family has. you are able to see the world from different members attempts at making a better life. It tells vividly how the streets of New York which hold so much promise ultimately cause most members of this family so much pain. This is a must read not only for latinos but for everyone. This book is more about the endurance of a soul as it is about ethnicity.
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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Worthy Study
By Juliet M. Grigsby on August 28, 2001
Format: Paperback
La Vida is an anthropological study that tells the story, in their own words, of an extended Puerto Rican family in San Juan and in New York. What a lively and colorful culture! If you want to get a sense of life among Puerto Ricans in the 1960s who exist low on the economic scale, this book will tell you everything you could possibly want to know about their individual lives from their perspective. The perspective is important because it can change the way the reader views a person until she hears that character's own voice. Every day I looked forward to "living" with this family.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
A Study in the Culture of Poverty
By ernest schusky on December 5, 2012
Format: Paperback
A popular field of study in the l960s was the 'culture of poverty.' Anthropology had the advantage of being familiar with such culture in most parts of the world. Lewis first wrote about it in Mexico. Five Families When he turned his attention to Puerto Rico, he had a significant reputation behind him, and La Vida attracted much critical attention. It did not meet the high standard he set in Five Families, but the work is important because of Puerto Rico's centrality in New York as well as it being a part of the United States.
Lewis' obvious empathy for his subjects while maintaining objectivity as well as his clear writing make the book well worth reading.
ernestschusky.com
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Emotionally intense.
By M. J Pronio on March 30, 2008
Format: Hardcover
I recently returned from Puerto Rico and on my walk up the coast to old San Juan saw a jagged hillside on the beautiful ocean filled with cardboard homes built on slopes and stilts. It struck me as very odd; the gorgeous Ocean with this somewhat small enclave of slum housing... surrounded by the beautiful streets and history of old San Juan. I then saw two little girls in Catholic School uniforms, giggling and running down to the steps into the Slum. I asked a travel partner who explained that the place the little girls were running to with the windows that were open holes, the trash and bums in the alley, was one of the most notorious slums around; La Perla.

I left Puerto Rico with the thoughts of my wonderful hotel and gorgeous dinners but I could not get the picture of La Perla out of my mind. It was such a strange sight; again a slum of all slums on one of the most goregeous pieces of world I've seen. I became enthralled and interested in what made this small piece of the earth they way it was. In my research, I came across Oscar Lewis' study of this place. Interestingly enough, he wrote it in 1964.... and it seems this small slum hasn't changed at all since then.

I am about a quarter through the book and am absolutely enthralled. The tragedy of poverty and how it repeats itself is evident very early on in this study.

The main character, Fernanda, (Nanda) a child of poverty of which this story begins, goes on in interviews about her life. From her childhood, being at first abandoned by her Mother then to reuniting with her Mother, all the while being abused physically and emotionally by all in her life. She becomes a "bride" at 14 having a child thereafter by a man her mother 'adores' and yet her beats her. This is normal life.Read more ›
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