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“Yet the struggle of identities continues, the struggle of borders is our reality still. One day the inner struggle will cease and a true integration take place.” This was written by a strong, lesbian, Chicana feminist named Gloria Anzaldua. She is extremely assertive about her identity due to the miscellaneous background she came from since she was born in South Texas, because her parents were immigrants. As a result, she wrote this autobiography, “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” to express not only how diversity affects determining one’s personal identity, but also the significance of one’s language. Hence, she involves identity as the focal point of the writing to enhance the reader of the cumulative problems brought by language discrimination. …show more content…
For that reason, she makes this article bilingual rather than just in English to show her love to her language. Not only but also, she selects powerful words to emphasize the discrimination she consumed. For example, when she wanted to describe how she got “accused [of being a traitor] by various Latinos and Latinas.” She used strong words; such as “deficient”, or not having enough quality of an specified item in this case Spanish since she is speaking English. Moreover, she used the word “mutilation,” or a severe injury that causes disfigurement to accentuate what the Latinos thought of her. ““We’re going to have to control your tongue,”” Gloria starts this article with this quote as a metaphor to exemplify the acclimatization path as something tremendously vicious. Thus, the author supports this quote throughout the essay by writing about the acculturation process she experienced. Hence, she tries to show different perspectives, the Hispanic side and the Anglo side, to support her claim. On the Hispanic side, there are the Mexicans who urge to speak proper English with no accent in order to succeed, whilst the Anglo side, there is the urgency of adaption. However, the reader can interpret that Gloria’s desire was to be able to freely speak Chicano Spanish and have her own language and identity respected. As a result, the significance of this article is to urge the reader into fighting for their own identity by having their language always
In “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” Gloria Anzaldúa explains the implications of living under the influence of two cultures. She begins with a story of how she was punished by a teacher for correcting the pronunciation of her name. Anzaldúa gives the reader anecdotes about her life in a dual culture society, explaining the trials of accepting her heritage, fighting to find her place in Mexican or American society, and establishing herself as a proud Chicana.
Gloria Anzaldúa was a Chicana, lesbian feminist writer whose work exemplifies both the difficulties and beauty in living as one’s authentic self. She published her most prominent work in 1987, a book titled Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza. In Borderlands, she write of her own struggle with coming to terms with her identify as a Chicana, an identity that lies at the border between Mexican and American. For instance, she writes,“we are a synergy of two cultures with various degrees of Mexicanness or Angloness. I have so internalized the borderland conflict that sometimes I feel like one cancel out the other and we are zero” However, even as she details this struggle she asserts pride in her identity, declaring, “I will no longer be
America is a presumptuous country; its citizens don’t feel like learning any other language, so they make everyone else learn English. White Americans are the average human being and act as the standard of living, acting, and nearly all aspects of life. In her essay “White Privilege: The Invisible Knapsack,” Peggy McIntosh talks about how being white has never been discussed as a race/culture before because that identity has been pushed on everyone else, and being white subsequently carries its own set of advantages. Gloria Anzaldua is a Chicana, a person of mixed identities. In an excerpt titled “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” she discusses how the languages she speaks identify who she is in certain situations and how, throughout her life, she has been pushed to speak and act more “American” like.
Gloria Anzaldua, wrote the essay “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” communicating and describing her adolescence in a society brimming with sexism, cultural imperialism, racism, low self-esteem, and identity formation. The reason one comes to America is to finer themselves academically, and intellectually. One must learn to speak English to live among the American’s, because that is the language they speak. Though, no one has the right to deprive you of your familiar tongue. At a young age, Anzaldua was scolded, even mistreated for speaking her native “Chicano” tongue. Anzaldúa described this ignorance, cruelty, and discrimination when she states: “I remember being caught speaking Spanish at recess – that was good for three licks on the knuckles with a sharp ruler.” She overcomes this hostility throughout her life.
Using both English and Spanish or Spanglish the author Gloria Anzaldua explores the physical, cultural, spiritual, sexual and psychological meaning of borderlands in her book Borderlands/La Frontera: A New Mestiza. As a Chicana lesbian feminist, Anzaldua grew up in an atmosphere of oppression and confusion. Anzaldua illustrates the meaning of being a “mestiza”. In order to define this, she examines herself, her homeland and language. Anzaldúa discusses the complexity of several themes having to do with borderlands, mestizaje, cultural identity, women in the traditional Mexican family, sexual orientation, la facultad and the Coatlicue state. Through these themes, she is able to give her readers a new way of discovering themselves. Anzaldua alerts us to a new understanding of the self and the world around us by using her personal experiences.
At the beginning of the essay, Anzaldúa recounts a time when she was at the dentist. He told her, “We’re going to have to control your tongue” (33). Although he was referring to her physical tongue, Anzaldúa uses this example as a metaphor for language. The dentist, who is trying to cap her tooth, symbolizes the U.S. who is similarly seeking to restrict the rights of minority groups. Nevertheless, the tongue is preventing the dentist from doing his job. Likewise, there are several minority groups who refuse to abide to the laws of dominant cultures and are fighting back. Anzaldúa also touches on a personal story that happened at school. When she was younger, she was sent to the corner because apparently, she spoke back to her Anglo teacher. The author argues that she was unfairly scolded because she was only telling her teacher how to pronounce her name. Her teacher warned her, “If you want to be American, speak American. If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong.” This short story provides an understanding of what Anzaldúa’s life was like. It demonstrates how even at a young age, she was continually pressured because of where comes
In the essay called “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” written by Gloria Anzaldua, we can see how her diction uses code-mixing. Anzaldua uses sayings in Spanish, mostly used in Latino culture, which she translates and explains in English to help the reader to understand what she is saying. But, she wants to be clear with those who do not speak Spanish. If this were something that only Chicanos would read, then there would not need to do so. She wants to communicate her struggles about being Mexican raised in the states, who is not allowed to speak their own mother tongue.
Anzaldua grew up in the United States but spoke mostly Spanish, however, her essay discusses how the elements of language began to define her identity and culture. She was living in an English speaking environment, but was not White. She describes the difficulty of straddling the delicate changing language of Chicano Spanish. Chicano Spanish can even differ from state to state; these variations as well as and the whole Chicano language, is considered a lesser form of Spanish, which is where Anzaldua has a problem. The language a person speaks is a part...
Their purpose: to get rid of our accents.” Anzaldua also recounts how she was often ridiculed by her own people for not speaking proper Spanish, “Even our own people, other Spanish speaker nos quieren poner candados en la boca. They would hold us back with their bag of reglas academia…..Chicano Spanish is considered by the purist and by most Latinos a deficient, a mutilation of Spanish.” The author claims that instances such as these have left her people, Chicanos, with an identity crisis, even a feeling of nothingness “ Chicanos and other people of color suffer….This voluntary (yet forced) alienation makes for psychological conflict, a kind of dual identity- we don’t identify with the Anglo-American cultural values and we
According to Anzaldua, “ Chicano Spanish is considered by the purist and by most Latinos deficient, a mutilation of Spanish”(Anzaldua 32). The Chicano Spanish versus Spanish conflict that occurs in Latino society is a prime example of people considering themselves to be right in a situation where there is not a right answer. The Latino’s who speak Spanish that they believe to be normal are disturbed by the Spanish language changing. They believe that their own views are being challenged, they believe that they are correct, and they believe that anyone who challenges their views is inferior. The people who view all other views are, in reality, just trying to make themselves look more powerful. Like in Tan’s essay, people demeaned others in order to promote their own views, therefore, gaining power over the others who they demeaned. According to Tan, “ She said they would not give her any more information(...) And when the doctor finally called her daughter, me, who spoke in perfect english-- lo and behold-- we had assurances the CAT scan would be found”(Tan 2). The doctors treated Tan’s mother differently due to her use of what they considered “broken language”, leading to her being treated inadequately. People have an image of what they consider to be the right English, anyone who does not speak the right English is usually considered to be uneducated. In both Tan’s and Anzaldua’s essays, the lack of open-mindedness is one of the reasons that people want to become more powerful than others. People fail to realize that what they believe in is not always the right answer, like with stereotypes, the people are trying to gain power over others in order to make themselves seem more
In the article “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” the author, Gloria Anzaldua, explores her cultural identity, as well as, explains the struggles she has faced due to her native heritage. Anzaldua is a native Chicana who believes that “Ethnic identity is a twin skin to linguistic identity” (Anzaldua 2951). She explains that there is a distinct tie between the language a person speaks and the way he/she is treated. She also explains that language is a reflection of one’s self; if one is not confident in language, then he/she cannot be confident in life. These accounts by Anzaldua show a different side of an issue many Americans are facing, yet, like the life of the author, this article seems to have no resolve.
For more than 300 years, immigrants from every corner of the globe have settled in America, creating the most diverse and heterogeneous nation on Earth. Though immigrants have given much to the country, their process of changing from their homeland to the new land has never been easy. To immigrate does not only mean to come and live in a country after leaving your own country, but it also means to deal with many new and unfamiliar situations, social backgrounds, cultures, and mainly with the acquisition and master of a new language. This often causes mixed emotions, frustration, awkward feelings, and other conflicts. In Richard Rodriguez’s essay “Aria: Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood”, the author describes the social, cultural and linguistic difficulties encountered in America as he attempts to assimilate to the American culture. Richard Rodriguez by committing himself to speaking English, he lost his cultural ties, family background and ethnic heritage.
The essay “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” by Gloria Anzaldua is relevant to today’s society, because it brings to discussion important social issues such acculturation, racism, and sexism. A major social event that she lived through and was an advocate of was the Chicano movement, which influenced her in her writing. This essay is not only written solely using her intelligence and research, it also comes from personal experience. Furthermore, she says that she will not be silenced anymore, that all people deserve the right to freedom of speech and the freedom to their culture. Not to have to submit to the dominant cultures found here in the United States. This essay is directed towards two groups
The eternal endeavor of obtaining a realistic sense of selfhood is depicted for all struggling women of color in Gloria Anzaldua’s “Borderlands/La Frontera” (1987). Anzaldua illustrates the oppressing realities of her world – one that sets limitations for the minority. Albeit the obvious restraints against the white majority (the physical borderland between the U.S. and Mexico), there is a constant and overwhelming emotional battle against the psychological “borderlands” instilled in Anzaldua as she desperately seeks recognition as an openly queer Mestiza woman. With being a Mestiza comes a lot of cultural stereotypes that more than often try to define ones’ role in the world – especially if you are those whom have privilege above the “others”.
Julia Alvarez writes a personal story about her life changing experience adapting to a different culture. Julia Alvarez was born in the Dominican republic and her family moved to the states to provide a secure future for the family. Parents tend to move to America to provide an education for their children or to escape their national threats from their born country. Julia Alvarez begins to compare and contrasts her experience adapting to a different culture. As she lives in America Julia Alvarez is inspired by many writers and political figures that she grew up with in America. Also Julia Alvarez describes how difficult it was for her to adapt to a different culture and learn a new language in this foreign land she now resides in. Julia Alvarez states ‘’My sister and I being young, soon rallied to the challenge. We learned the new language, the new mind, the new music, the ways to dress and behave ourselves. But our our success on these fronts soon created a another kind of problem in our family. My parent wanted desperately to keep us to the old standards, and yet they also wanted us to succeed in this culture”. Julia Alvarez’s cultural narrative shows that she went through an hardship because of her new identity and her conflicted old cultural identity. Julia alvarez shows this by mention