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Essay On How To Tame A Wild Tongue

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Language is a human system of communication with everyone and it values in our culture. We all have some kind of language barriers within us, no matter what background we are from. "Mother Tongue" by Amy Tan and "How to Tame a Wild Tongue" by Gloria Anzaldua shares similar themes as they both deal with how different forms of the same language are recognized in the society. Anzaldua and Tan are facing many barriers because of their difficulties with the language that they learned, in order to overcome these challenges, they needed to incorporate with their families so that these changes would not affect themselves but also their families. When living in a family with parents that speak "broken English", it is always common to find hardships and challenges. In "How to Tame a Wild Tongue" by Gloria Anzaldua, her mother states that, " Pa' hallar buen trabajo tienes que saber hablar el ingles bien. Que vale toda......ingles con un 'accen" (34). This means that to get a good job we need to speak English well. Her mother was embarrassed that Anzaldua spoke English like Mexican. Anzaldua's mother only wanted the …show more content…

Anzaldua explains that how she felt unaccepted by all groups, Americans, Mexicans, and other Spanish speakers. Along with her peers, her teachers give her a hard time as well. Anzaldua states that, "If you want to be American speak 'America'. If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong" (34). This means that Anzaldua not only get teased about her Spanish, but also with her English as well. Similarly, Amy Tan had also problems with her language as well. During her young age, she was expected to speak with very important people due to her mother's inability to speak English. Due to these experience, such as her mother's translator, Tan realize the importance of being able to express her thoughts well in order to have a smoother

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Rhetorical Analysis on Anzaldua’s How to Tame a Wild Tongue The passage How to Tame a Wild Tongue is a very defensive and straightforward argumentative essay which defends her language and the people who speak it against the discrimination that the author herself has experienced first hand (Ethos). From this text we can infer that the author is most likely from hispanic descent as she is speaking spanish a lot of the time throughout the text. This text mainly speaks about the discrimination many Mexican-Americans suffer because they are spanish speaking.

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Rodriguez’s English was not the best, and because of that he would either be silent or quietly mumble when asked to participate by one of the nuns (73). Since his lack of participation was noticeable and showed little progress, some of his teachers visited Rodriguez’s home to ask his parents to “encourage your children to practice their English when they are home?” (73). Rodriguez one day walks in on his parents speaking Spanish, but when they see him they switch to English, which offends and over the days that follows angers him enough to decide to seriously learn English. Rodriguez even willingly decides to participate in class (74).

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That expanded her horizon to here feminine nature. Her Chicano Spanish was considered a ‘bastard’ language to Spanish speaker. Anzaldua thought that women in her culture should take pride in their selves and their language. Her language is not the same as the known Spanish and she will not change her speech patterns. Anzaldua says “I am my

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The power of language We all have some form of language limitations, no matter where we come from and what our background is. “Mother tongue” by Amy Tan and “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” by Gloria Anzaldua both share similar themes in their stories that demonstrate how they both deal with how different forms of the same language are portrayed in society. In both stories they speak about what society declares the right way of speech and having to face prejudgment, the two authors share their personal experiences of how they’ve dealt with it.

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Although Selena was becoming one of the most popular people in Tejano music, she still struggled with speaking Spanish. As it was her goal to take her music across all barriers, she knew she had to master the language if she wanted to make a difference (Marvis 12). She could sing in Spanish with the help of her father, but when it came to talking in press conferences and with others, she had difficulty with the language. She did not let her mistakes discourage her from trying to speak the language. Instead, she often laughed off her mistakes in Spanish interviews and never gave up trying to master the language (López 13).

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Anzaldúa, on the other hand, struggles with the discrimination against her Chicano culture and language. Throughout her essay, “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” she talks about how the languages she speaks are all variant forms of a combination of multiple languages; however, they form the foundation of her culture and her identity. It is

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“It’s the whole environment,” she replied. “All kinds of services are available in Spanish or Spanglish. Sports and after-school activities are conducted in Spanglish. That’s what the kids hear on the radio and in the street.” Until recently, immigrants made learning English a priority.

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A tongue is one of the most important body parts, if that’s what we shall call it, that a human being has. If it was not for the tongue, it would be a very quiet world. Gloria Anzaldúa, born in 1942, near the large Rio Grande Valley of South Texas, was bound to make a difference in lives before she ever knew it. When Gloria turned eleven she started to work in the fields as a migrant worker and then started on her family’s land after the passing of her father. In Gloria Anzaldúa’s the short story, How to Tame a Wild Tongue, she describes her upbringing and growing up in a dual culture society split in two.

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On the other hand, in Richard Rodriguez “ Public and Private Language”, he talks about how people who are out in public they tend to speak in English and when they are at home they will speak in a language that makes them more comfortable. Both authors struggle in English but in different ways. Tan’s mother has hard time speaking English since it was not her first language.

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In her writing, Tan often describes her experiences as the child of Chinese immigrants, growing up in northern California and living in American culture. Tan explains how she has learned to embrace the many Englishes her mother speaks and how her background has also caused her to have different Englishes. While others classify her mother's English as "broken" she finds no fault in it. In Tan's view, just because something is broken does not necessarily mean that it is in need of fixing. In her essay, author Amy Tan addresses the connections between languages and cultures in describing the different Englishes her mother uses.

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Contrary to Baca, Marin knew how to write well and excelled in it. As a Mexican-American, Marin struggled with her identity as she wasn’t fluent in Spanish and desired to know more about and fully embrace her culture. Through out her life, she encountered many instances of discrimination toward her knowledge of language. During college, which was an accomplishment in itself, phrases like “Mexicans don’t write that well.” and “You people don’t even speak the language correctly.”

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She talks about how her friends could not understand her mother 's talking but Amy thought her mother was good at speaking English. Amy states, "Some say they understand none of it, as if she were speaking pure Chinese. But to me, my mother 's English is

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Our identity is a place upon many attributes of a human being. Whether the person is someone who goes on promoting themselves to the world or not, and it shows how people communicate to others around them. Language is one of the main components that unveils the person’s identity in their everyday life, and they are many different ways to approach a person’s language. Relating to the article of Yiyun Li, “To Speak is to Blunder,” she knows two languages that has its positive and negative outcomes in her life. I to relate to her understanding of language, but a different view of what language means to me.

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Another point is Amy says that her mother is not hard to understand, it 's that other people find it hard to comprehend her talking. People who do not know her mother well probably won 't give themselves time to connect with her mother 's English. As described by Amy from her personal view that her mother 's English was "perfectly clear, perfectly natural" (Tan, 2006, p. 21). Specific evidence that supports was the author stating, "Her language, as I hear it, is vivid, direct, full of observation and imagery." (Tan, 2006, p. 20).

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After reading Mother Tongue by Amy Tan, my perspective changed about the struggles for people who are not as good at English. All throughout this article Tan uses personal experience from her mom to show the readers the struggle while also using primary sources to back up her claim. All the evidence backs up her initial claim and as the reader your perspective changes after reading about how she personally was effected. The author 's main claim of Mother Tongue is to persuade people so respect people who struggle with English because she has serval personal connections, she has fact based proof, and she is an experienced writer on this topic and in general. All throughout the reading she uses many personal stories and personal experiences on how difficult it was for her mother to go through her everyday life.

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