Have you ever stopped and wondered how language can affect you? Christine Marin in “Spanish Lessons” talks about her experience facing discrimination and how she discovers the power of her mother tongue (Kingston). Maxine Hong Kingston, a first-generation Chinese-American, in “The Language of Silence” talks about her struggles with adjusting to two different cultures and how she had to find a new voice for herself. I have gone through many of my own struggles with discrimination for speaking a different language, but I’ve learned to appreciate my mother tongue. No matter our struggles, we continue to work hard and appreciate our language. I grew up in a Spanish-speaking household, so I didn’t speak much English until I went to school. When …show more content…
When I think back to this, it reminds me of Marin’s article when she stated, “speak better English than the gringo, so that he could not ridicule [them] the way they had been ridiculed in school and work.”(Marin) I remember this is because our experiences were the same but instead the opposite. Her parents wanted her to speak better English than Spanish. In my case, it was the opposite. My parents wanted me to speak better Spanish than English. This was just one of my experiences with having to speak two languages. Although I started to speak more English, I would still speak Spanish with my friends. My friends and I would be talking in Spanish and we would catch glimpses of other kids glaring at us. At first, I didn’t really understand why they would glare at us and just ignore it. But as time went on, I started to question it even more. Although I questioned it, I never really understood why. Marin said, “I realized that the girl and her friends did not resent being outsung but resented the fact that we were singing in Spanish”(Marin). Not until I read Marin’s article was I able to fully understand that all those kids who would glare at me were simply upset they couldn’t understand what we were …show more content…
When lunchtime came, I would sit with my friends and other classmates at the lunch tables. I would open my lunch and eat it like normal. But one day my mom packed me a small burrito to eat for lunch. As I started to eat it, I heard a kid in my class complain about a “weird smell”. I ignored them not thinking much, but then I noticed them glaring at me. They just made a disgusting face at me and turned away. After I noticed that he was talking about me, I felt embarrassed and went to the trash can and threw away my food. After this experience, I told my mom to stop making me lunch and said I would just eat school lunch. This experience reminded me of the time Kingston shared her experience as a first generation. “I drank out of a toy saucer when the water spilled out of the cup, and everybody laughed, pointing at me, so I did it some more. I didn’t know that Americans don’t drink out of saucers.”(Kingston) Although our experience was different, I felt a connection to her experience. We both were judged for our cultural differences. She was judged for drinking out of a saucer while I was judged for my food. After this incident, my identity started to
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.
“Se Habla Español,” is written by a Latin author, Tanya Barrientos; and Amy Tan, a Chinese author, wrote “Mother Tongue”. In both literate narratives the authors write about their experiences with language and how it impacted their lives. In This essay we will be discussing the similarities as well as the differences in the stories and the authors of “Se Habla Español” and “Mother Tongue”. We will discuss how both authors use a play on words in their titles, how language has impacted their lives, how struggling with language has made them feel emotionally, and how both authors dealt with these issues.
Language can defined the type of person you become and it has an influence on our choices as well as lifestyle. Language itself has become a way of seeing life in a different perspectives. Tan discusses the many ways in which language has played a role in her life and the result from it. I can relate to Tan’s experience to some extent because I come from a bilingual household too. Just like Tan, I am one of my mother’s main source of communication with people who don’t speak spanish. I believe the notion of Tan’s “Mother Tongue” is stating that just because someone who cannot speak the English language perfectly, is considered less intelligent to many compared to those who can understand and speaks it fluently. But what makes us all unique is that it is rare to find two or more people who speak the same exact English. Even though both Tan and I helped our parent and come from different ethnic backgrounds; Tan came from a Chinese family while I came from a Hispanic family. We both share similar ideas about the language spoken in our household, and it was also a big challenge for both of us while we were being raised by an immigrant parent who spoke only “limited English”(Tan
In Gloria Anzaldúa’s “How to Tame a Wild Tongue”, an excerpt from her book Borderlands/La Fronter in 1987, she demonstrates that identity can be asserted through language. You can tell a lot about a person by their language. Language is your way of representing who you are as a person, and most importantly, your culture. Culture defines the most about a person. Anzaldúa shares her aggravation of not being able to speak her language, “until I can take pride in my language, I cannot take pride in myself" (Anzaldúa 378). Being seen as an individual of English as Second Language (ESL), Anzaldúa does not appreciate how she has to assist in translating to English or Spanish, where she would rather speak Spanglish. “[A]s long as I have to accommodate the English speaker rather than having them accommodate me, my tongue will be illegitimate” (Anzaldúa 378). Talking bad about her language severely impacts her identity, “I am my language” (Anzaldúa 378). A person’s identity should not be seen less because of the language they speak. Anzaldúa states that she will have her voice, though she cannot express her passion for her language with the restraint of no freedom act to embrace it, she will. Her audiences that she is reaching to are those who share the same struggle of their identities just like her, and also speaking out to people who do look down upon people like her because of where she is form and what language she speaks.
Language is an important part of who we are. It influences the way we think and behave on a great scale. However, sometimes it is forced upon us to go in different directions just so we can physically and mentally feel as if we belong to the society in which we live in. Just as we see in Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” and Richard Rodriguez’s “A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood”, both authors faced some challenges along the way by coping with two different languages, while still trying to achieve the social position which they desired.
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.
While reading this article one of the most shocking sections were when the students were talking to Monzó and sharing their outlook on their place and their language’s place in society. These students even at this early age are feeling how devalued their first language has been. They feel like they have to speak the right* English, only use English in public places, never their first language, and that they must assimilate to the American culture as much as possible. This reminded me of a chapter in Lippi-Green (2012)’s text. Within this chapter Lippi-Green (2012) discusses how in the United States Spanish speakers are not only expected to learn English but they are expected to learn and utilize the right* English determined by the majority and assimilate entirely to American culture. Throughout Monzó and Rueda (2009)’s text the children in conversations expressed their observation of the social order in relation to language and race. This was surprising to me since they are only in 5th grade. During a conversation with one of the children Monzó and Rueda (2009) recorded an alarming statement, “He said that his mother could not be considered American because she did not...
From the moment that we are born, we are exposed to means of language and communication. Though technically we can not speak as babies; we give our parents small signals to let them know what we need such as, being hungry or needing a diaper change. Language is proven to be essential and an important part of life. In the essays, Homemade Education, by Malcolm X and Spanish Lessons, by Christine Marin both essays give a strong example of why language is important. In Malcolm’s essay, he explains how when he was prison the power of language completely changed his life. In Marin’s essay she talks about her experience with the English and Spanish language and how both languages opened up new doors for her in her life and
In the essay, “How To Tame A Wild Tongue”, by Gloria Anzaldua and the essay, Mother Tongue, by Amy Tan, the ignorance shown by many people is highlighted. Amy Tan’s essay focuses on how some people look down on others who do not speak English without an accent. Anzaldua’s essay focuses on how people do not have a broad view of language and often look down upon others who do not speak the language that they speak. Both of the essays address language, but the broader topic that they acknowledge is more important. The essays both acknowledge how humans feel uncomfortable around people that are different from them, and often demean others. People demean others due to people wanting to look more powerful by giving their views correctness while discrediting
In the essay “Mother Tongue” Amy Tan, the author, gives a different, a more upbeat outlook on the various forms of English that immigrants speak as they adapt to the American culture. Using simple language to develop her argument, she casually communicates to the audience rather than informing which helps the audience understand what is being presented at ease. Her mother plays an important role in her outlook of language, because she helps her realize that language not only allows one to be a part of a culture but create one’s identity in society. Amy Tan shares her real life stories about cultural racism and the struggle to survive in America as an immigrant without showing any emotions, which is a wonderful epiphany for the audience in realizing
The purpose of Amy Tan’s essay, “Mother Tongue,” is to show how challenging it can be if an individual is raised by a parent who speaks “limited English” (36) as Tan’s mother does, partially because it can result in people being judged poorly by others. As Tan’s primary care giver, her mother was a significant part of her childhood, and she has a strong influence over Tan’s writing style. Being raised by her mother taught her that one’s perception of the world is heavily based upon the language spoken at home. Alternately, people’s perceptions of one another are based largely on the language used.
The author’s view augurs well with philosophical views expressed on foreign languages indicating that adoption of a foreign language should be as a means of communication on a cross-cultural platform, but it should not define a people’s personality (García 118). Anzaldua and these philosophical views could be interpolated and extrapolated into other minority groups in the US such as the black community, Chinese and Japanese among others. The author’s assertion that a “monolingual Chicana whose first language is English or Spanish is the same person as a Chicana who speaks variants of Spanish”(80) underlines the significance of one’s native language in relation to the social and cultural practices. Indeed, she presents a number of languages that she has to use in under different circumstances as a means of communication. However, while Anzaldua questions lack of pride and loyalty among minority groups, she also addresses the structural system in the dominant American culture which subverts the native languages probably because they are not cultured. She says that students even at University level are advised to “take French classes because French is considered more cultured” (Anzaldua 81). It could be viewed from the development of her argument that perception of an uncultured language of the minority groups, and the
In “Mother Tongue”, Tan writes about the awareness and discrimination about her broken English compared to Standard English. In Tan's essay she quotes her mother’s speech to demonstrate her mother's “Broken English”. Amy tan said “You should know that my mother’s expressive command of English belies how much she actually understands”(467). In other words, her mother had better command in English, and this was not shown in her story. The use of anecdotes and pathos, in Amy Tan’s story, Mother Tongue Narrates the discrimination of the Chinese immigrants, this prejudice takes place in the northern part of America caused by the immigrants accent. Tan figures out one must remain true to oneself in order to break the cultural barriers.
Minority groups have faced inequality from the majority. This is due to their means of communication, mainly stemming from the language they use. As a call to action, many authors have shared their experiences to help raise awareness. For example, Chinese Americans have been represented by Amy Tan ’s essay, “Mother Tongue;” she shares the discrimination she and her family have faced throughout her life by white Americans.
...xpressing her Chinese culture. Mastering a second language allows her to articulate her and her mother’s thoughts; it is a foundation for her pride and a foundation to express herself. For Gloria Anzaldua, instead of choosing one language over the other, she chose a mix of the two and fights for it. She realized the value of her language when she lost it and now treasures it. The kind of Spanish she speaks is neither English nor Spanish, but both. It is overflowing with culture from Medieval Spain, France, Germany, etc., just from the origins of the words. It is her pride and a representation of herself, fighting and living. In conclusion, in addition to Lera Boroditsky’s article proving that the structure of language affects how we think, the articles by Eric Liu, Amy Tan, and Gloria Anzaldua show how language is a foundation for a person’s culture, pride, and self.