The Hidden Costs of Success: Identity, Community, and Social Suffering in the Autobiographies of Dan-el Peralta and Sonia Sotomayor

Abstract

Embedded in the appraisals by mainstream US media outlets of Dan-el Peralta and Sonia Sotomayor’s personal narratives are gross distortions. They displayed very early glimpses of exceptional intellectual capabilities in spite of trying circumstances in low-income neighborhoods of East Harlem and the Bronx, which made their journeys to the Ivy League and beyond seem particularly striking at first glance. However, they each were faced with tremendous emotional, interpersonal, and academic obstacles as a result of their socioeconomic standings in conjunction with their identities as Latinos within affluent English-speaking environments, which induced much social suffering along the way—suffering that must not go unnoticed whilst assessing the arcs of their lives and their arduous paths to success.