Judith Ortiz Cofers Poetry Touches a Chord essays

Judith Ortiz Cofer's Poetry Touches a Chord essays Judith Ortiz Cofer is a Latina poet and prolific writer, born in Puerto Rico in 1952 and now residing in Athens, Georgia. She married Charles John Cofer in 1971, and has one daughter, Tanya. She immigrated to the United States with her parents in 1956, and they settled in New Jersey, where she had most of her early schooling. Cofer learned English to "help her Spanish speaking mother run the household and make important decisions" ("Hispanic Writers" 165), and came to love the language and its power ("Hispanic Writers" 165). In 1974, she received her B.A. in English from Augusta College, and in 1977 went on to receive her M.A. in English from Florida Atlantic University, then complete some graduate work at Oxford University (Editors). Cofer's background is in teaching, and that is where she began her career, and where she continues it today. She wrote poetry at first, and wrote extensively about the problems and paradoxes facing Latina women. She notes that her own world is firmly rooted in two distinct cultures. "I write in English," she muses, "yet I write obsessively about my Puerto Rican experience . . . . That is how my psyche works. I am a composite of two worlds" ("Hispanic Writers"). While Cofer grew up in the United States, she often returned to her grandmother's house in Puerto Rico with her mother, and so, she balances the Latina customs and culture of her youth with the culture of America, thus her feeling she is a composite. Cofer has taught at a variety of schools and universities, and she frequently travels to discuss her work and her culture. She also frequently teaches at writers' workshops. One biographer notes, "Her lectures frequently focus on diversity in American art and culture," (Abbe) a topic that emerges repeatedly in her poetry such as "Common Ground." Currently, she is a Franklin Professor of English and Creative Writing in the Dep...