Deconstruction of Disability Identity in Peel My Love Like an Onion

Ana Castillo’s novel Peeling My Love Like an Onion tells the story of Carmen Santos, a disabled flamenco Chicana dancer and singer, who suffers from an ethnic identity crisis and the internal and external problems of mainstream cultural marginalization during her career. The changing nature of Flamingo dance enables Carmen to overcome both mental and physical barriers, break the internal boundaries between normal and abnormal in the white-dominated American society, and realize the reconstruction of the adaptive and mobile identity of the Chicana people. This paper explores how Carmen uses disability to deconstruct the normal, uses flamenco to challenge the ideal body of traditional dancers, and uses her perseverance to challenge the normative concept of identity and gender, highlighting a mobile and independent identity that is different from the traditional disability identity.