Character Case Study: Angel Guzman

Character Case Study: Angel Guzman

Character Case Study- Angel Guzman
The movie, Stand and Deliver, presents a class of senior high school students that come from an economically depressed area of East Las Angeles, California.  
The character I have chosen to perform a case study on is Angel Guzman.   Angel is a single Hispanic male that lives with his grandmother. He is a student at an East Las Angeles high school named Garfield High School. Due to the fact that Angel is a senior I have speculated that he is 17 years old.
Angel is uninsured. In the movie his grandmother gets ill. Angel takes her to the hospital for care.   He asks the nurse how much longer his grandmother must wait in order to receive medical care.   The nurse responds by asking, “Does she have insurance? Does she have medical?” In which Angel responds, “No.”   The nurse continues to ask, “Then how are you going to pay for this?”   In which Angel responds, “If we could pay for it, we would go to a real hospital.” (Menendez & Musca, 1988).
Angel’s culture is very prominent in his life. He surrounds himself with friends of Mexican decent. In the movie, he only speaks in Spanish to his elderly grandmother but speaks mainly English at school. Watching the movie, I found it obvious that family is of exceptional importance to Angel as he takes care of his grandmother.
I believe Angel goes above and beyond the stereotype for his culture, race, and economic status. Throughout the movie he tries to have a tough attitude and likes to cause problems. In the end of this movie he proves that he can step out of the bounds of a stereotype by working hard, taking, and passing an advanced placement test in Calculus.


Chart 1: The cultural Identity for Angel Guzman. From this chart you can see the importance of this characters cultural identity.



















Bibliography

Menendez, Ramon., & Musca, Tom. (Producer). (1988). Stand and deliver. [Television series]. Las Angeles, California:...