Matriz , Transgressive Sexuality, and National Ambiguity in Judith Ortiz Cofer’s The Meaning of Consuelo

Chapter four demonstrates that the titular heroine of Judith Ortiz Cofer’s The Meaning of Consuelo rejects the patriarchal, conservative discourses surrounding womanhood and sexuality espoused by her family and her island, Puerto Rico. Guided by the novel’s transgressive figures, Consuelo seeks a new language and space in which to express herself: she imagines matria not as a returning to Puerto Rico’s colonial past but as an imagining of a future where Puerto Rican women and other marginalized people might live their genders and sexualities freely. The novel thus recounts the Caribbean daughter’s awakening of a gendered and sexual consciousness and her determination that if young Puerto Rican women want to attain freedom, they must do so by leaving the island and relocating to the mainland.