Learning English is the best way they can achieve that sense of belonging, for that reason it does not make sense for Americans to think that Latinos reused to learn
In this article, Author Gloria Anzaldua writes about growing up in America as a Mexican-American and the struggles that she faced due to the language barrier. Gloria claims that she grew up around a variety of different forms of both Spanish and English, “Standard English, working class/slang English, standard Spanish, Standard Mexican Spanish, and North Mexican Spanish dialect”, are just a few. The language spoken, or combinations of the languages correlate with where the Hispanic person was originally from and where in the U.S. they are now, for example, “Chicano Spanish” is spoken in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California. Another focus of this article is how Gloria would be punished in school for speaking in her native tongue and then at home by her for not speaking English properly. Gloria also felt the university she attended made the Hispanics take two speech classes, “in order to get rid of our accents”, she claims.
Written by Gloria Anzaldua, “How to Tame a Wild Tongue”, is an opinion easy , a retrospection of her past and a story about identity and recognition of a wild tongue. The following is a rhetorical analysis and personal response of this easy . My analysis will be divided into 4 separate parts including intended audience, main claim, purpose and situation. (a) Intended audience : The first thing that anyone who even skims through this easy would notice is Anzaldua’s multi-lingual language use.
Richard Rodriguez and Gloria Anzaldúa are two authors who both immigrated to America in the 1950s and received first hand experience of the assimilation process into American society. During this time, Rodriguez and Anzaldúa had struggled adjusting to the school system. Since understanding English was difficult, it made adjusting to the American school system increasingly difficult for Rodriguez. Whereas Anzaldúa, on the other hand, had trouble adjusting to America’s school system due to the fact that she didn’t wish to stop speaking Spanish even though she could speak English. Both Rodriguez and Anzaldúa had points in their growing educational lives where they had to remain silent since the people around them weren’t interested in hearing them speaking any other language than English.
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.
The Anglo or English speakers felt that if she “wanted to be American” she must speak ‘American’ (page 26). I believed that this somewhat angered her, because she was being pressured to eradicate her accent, but there is no way for her to get rid of it. This conclusion was drawn when she states, “So, if you want to really hurt me, talk badly about my language. Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity – I am my language” (page 30). The title “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” reveals about the text that it’s hard to control someone or something that has been well accustomed to a habit or way of
“How to Tame a Wild Tongue” is a chapter five from the book titled Borderlands La Frontera, written by Gloria Anzaldua. In this chapter, Gloria told us how she struggled about speaking in English and her Chicano immigration life as a Hispanic living in the United States. Firstly, she discussed how the gender and cultural impacted of the language. Next, she also discussed how the Spanish language changed and evolved. At the end, Gloria also told us how the language in terms of learning that is comes together in one.
Shaped by the journey of life, each and every human develops an everlasting identity from their perception of the world. Everyone’s identity sticks, but humans contain the capacity to change their identity throughout life; an attribute Esperanza shows greatly. Oppressed by male figures and because of her wealth, and race, Esperanza develops her sense of identity from negative aspects of her life, causing her to feel shame and develop an aspiration to form a new identity. For so long she develops her worth from what others think and say about her, but contains the power to see beyond and what her really life holds for her.
In her essay, Gloria Anzaldua claims that languages come with both personal identities and cultures. We are nothing whether we did not have our own languages. By telling the stories of her as a student such as when her teacher told her “if you want to be American, speak ‘American.’ If you do not like it, go back to Mexico where you belong.” (Anzaldua 206)
A prominent discussion in modern day politics has to do with the amount of inflowing immigrants to the United States. Citizens are split between whether or not immigrants should assimilate to American mainstream culture. The author of “Should Immigration Require Assimilation?” is weighing the necessity of political assimilation for the yearly large amounts of new U.S citizens rather than cultural assimilation. The political assimilation that he is referring to is the “embracing of the principles of American democracy, identifying with U.S. history, and communicating in English.” It was surprising to me when I learned that the songwriter that wrote the national anthem said, “ If America Changes to the point that it is no longer a Christian
According to Peter Salins, in his essay Assimilation, American Style, “Assimilation, American style has always been much more flexible and accommodating, and consequently much more affective in achieving its propose”, which is to conform to the American culture while keeping your native culture as well (Salins, 599). Some people claim that by having one culture you increase your chances of being successful they believe “Either Immigrants bring themselves “up” to the native cultural standards or they are doomed to live “out” of the charmed circle of the national culture”, but Salins states otherwise. Salins made it clear
Immigrants came to America searching for new opportunities and a new life. Together immigrants and American people brought new language and culture. In “Mother Tongue,” Amy Tan uses anecdotes to discuss how language is capable of affecting someone’s life throughout time. In “Blaxicans and other Reinvented Americans,” Richard Rodriguez motivated Americans to expand their perspective on racial identity. Both “Blaxicans and other Reinvented Americans” and “Mother Tongue” suggest that immigrants have shaped the American identity by proposing that the American experience is a blend of new ideas with languages.
Ruben Rumbaut mentions in his article “Linguistic Life Expectancies: Immigrant Lnaguage Retention in Southern California” that Mexican-Spanish has the life-expectancy of only three generations regardless of the area. A friend of mine once described it as not having a “people” because the ones of your culture expect you to speak the language, and when you do not it just becomes a disappointment. Children who fall into this category struggle to find themselves and to racially label themselves because they cannot fully embrace the culture that looks down upon them. This occures because many families feel the need to “Americanize” themselves to fit the culture of their home-country. The United states has been regarded as a “graveyard” for home lanugages because of the death of native languages in
Gloria Anzaldúa’s “La Prieta” tell her struggles with identity by talking about prejudices she dealt with while growing up. These prejudices, such as colorism, sexism, and heteronormativity, were not only held by people outside her social groups but within them as well. Anzaldúa goes on to explain the way identity is formed by intersecting factors and not only one aspect of someone’s life therefore denying one factor of identity can cause isolation and self-hatred. The fact that Anzaldúa developed faster than is deemed normal the first struggle in forming her identity.
The poem “To live in the Borderlands Means you” by Gloria Anzaldua, describes from the author’s personal experience how society can affect an individual’s identity. The mixture of different cultures and races can isolate a person because it affects his or her identity in culture, society and how politics affects them. To live in a society zone that creates isolation because of race, culture and other background creates not only political problems, but it also
