Junot Diaz's decision to switch the narrator perspective gives the reader a glimpse of what it is like to experience traditional gender role issues from the female perspective. A main issue in this novel is the gender roles of traditional Dominican society, and Oscar represents a male who struggles with masculinity through self pity, and Lola represents a female who wrestles with feminine norms through defiance. It is interesting to see the other half of this major topic and how different characters react to conflict.
The mom of Oscar and Lola, Belicia is a multidimensional character. Through her often toxic relationship with Lola, a main issue that comes to focus is the expression of love and what actual love looks like. Often times Lola feels unloved by her mother, and like she is being "crushed under her heel" (Diaz 55). On page 70, when Lola runs away but turns back for her crying mother, she finds out her mother was only faking it to be able to reclaim her daughter. This scene makes the reader question whether Lola's mom really loves her or if she just wants to treat her as a possession and slave that she has full control over. However, later on Belicia says to Lola on the phone, "Just know I would die for you" (Diaz 72). Belicia's willingness to sacrifice her life for Lola is the ultimate act of motherly love, which presents another conflicting side of Belicia.
When it comes down to it, despite the volatile dynamic between them, Lola and her mother do love each other. It is society's cultural norms that cause them to express themselves in conflicting ways. As a Dominican woman, Belicia has probably had very little control over anything in her life, but having a daughter gave her the opportunity to be able to claim something as entirely hers, especially because she raised her children as a single mom. Because of this, Belicia's tyranny over Lola can be somewhat justified, because her behavior as a mom is just a result of society.
Personally, I can relate to Lola's relationship with her mother because my mom and I used to fight frequently and there is still often tension between us. We love each other, but our different ways of expressing it often lead to conflict. In the end, my mother wants what is best for me, but she does not always handle situations the way I would want to handle them. If I go about achieving my goals in a different way from how she would do it, she often worries and then expels that stress onto me. A similar dynamic is seen between Lola and her mom: they both want the same end result (for Lola to be happy), but they want to go about achieving this goal differently. Belicia wants Lola to conform to society and be like her, but Lola wants to make her own path.
