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The Language In Hunger Of Memory By Richard Rodriguez

763 Words4 Pages

I would love to learn Mien, the main language my family uses to communicate at family gatherings. Although I’m eager to learn now, my grandparents gave up teaching my siblings and I Mien. The difficulty of teaching three small children who already knew English took a toll on my already exhausted grandparents. Now at family gatherings, similar to Rodriguez and his teachers, when my grandparents ask me questions, I stare at them, blankly. Eventually, they give up and repeat what they previously said into broken English. Like Rodriguez and English, I felt at a disadvantage not knowing Mien. Rodriguez, the author of Hunger of Memory, believes that juggling two languages results in the loss of the culture of one, so everyone should speak English. …show more content…

Being a Puerto Rican from Brooklyn, Espada failed to learn Spanish first. Through embracing his identity and fighting for the right to speak Spanish, Espada breaks down the barriers xenophobic people put up. During a protest, Espada meets a hot-headed man threatening him for speaking Spanish. Later, with a microphone, Espada snaps back, “He can rip my tongue out if he wants. But it won’t work, porque yo hablo español con el corazón” (97-99). Espada expresses his passion for Spanish from his metaphorical sacrifice of his tongue to continue speaking Spanish. He claims Spanish as his identity when he mentions that he speaks Spanish with the heart. I feel similar emotions that Espada feels when I hear Mien. Even if I can’t produce Mien, hearing my grandparents produce my language, and trying to piece together what they’re saying warms my heart. From fighting the right to speak for the accessibility of his language, Espada embraces his …show more content…

Spanish at home had been his safe place until he left his comfort zone and went to school. Rodriguez’s difficulties of not knowing English pulled him away from society, unable to answer nun’s speaking to him at school. “Each time I’d hear them, I’d look up in surprise to see a nun’s face frowning at me. I’d mumble, not really meaning to answer” (31-33). Rodriguez not meaning to answer resurfaces the discouragement he felt from the nun’s frown. Seven years of Spanish resulted in a socially disadvantaged young child, unable to answer nuns or connect with his classmates. After his parents strengthened their English, Rodriguez lost his safe place and the necessity of communicating through Spanish. “Rare was the experience of feeling myself individualized by my family intimates” (125-127). Spanish was a part of Rodriguez for a portion of his life. Losing a part of him came with guilt, but even with that guilt, he remembers the discouragement of knowing Spanish in school and how that got him nowhere. Rodriguez finds that speaking English makes communicating painless, especially after watching his parents learn English to use in their daily

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Bilingual Analysis: Hunger Of Memory By Richard Rodriguez

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How is this purpose conveyed? The audience for this piece are people who are interested in Rodriguez’s childhood and education and seeing how scholarship children can become successful. The writer’s purpose is to explain why and how he became a scholarship and academically successful in a bilingual household with the family’s main focus on Spanish. This purpose is shown as the writer takes the reader on a journey through his childhood.

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“So many words were still unknown that when the butcher and the lady at the drugstore said something to me, exotic polysyllabic sounds would bloom in the midst of their sentences. Often, the speech of people in public seemed to be very loud, booming with confidence. The man behind the counter would literally ask, ‘What can I do for you?’ But by being firm and so clear, the sound of his voice said that he was a gringo; he belonged in the public society”(12). Rodriguez describes the way English sounds to him creating an image that the language was very complex to in his perspective.

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Anzaldua writes about her Spanish and how it is to others. She explains the major things to her, but breaks it down piece by piece. Some will understand how she tries to explain herself, but it all depends on the person. She describes that her Spanish is different compared to the other Hispanic races. Anzaldua states, “Chicano Spanish is a border tongue which developed naturally” (35).

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Analysis Of The New Bathroom Policy At English High School By Espada

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At the end of his excerpt, he speaks on the loss of family dynamic, he never “rushed home after school anymore.” Spanish was the main principal in his family, and after being forced to brush off the Spanish language, his family was troubled. Rodriguez wants his readers to know that the issue wasn’t the setbacks in learning English but the setbacks in his loving family. This is an important aspect of bilingualism for American society to understand because no brave soul decided they wanted to speak on it. Me, I can because I haven’t had to endure such pain.

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Espada shares his enthusiasm towards fighting for Spanish, “Defending the right of all Latinos to [speak Spanish]... creates in me a passion towards Spanish itself,” (18-20). Alike Espada, I believe that language is a right, and speakers of non-English languages should have the freedom to speak in a comfortable environment. I also believe that such tolerance is a stride towards making America a better, more united place. Rodriguez suffers from the lack of accommodation for him to maintain his native language while also learning English. After the public language seeps into his own home, Rodriguez tells of how he was affected.

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Richard Rodriguez apprises his experience as a bilingual child by writing a book called, The Hunger of Memory. He experiences the feeling of alienation and non acceptance because his native language isn’t English. As a bilingual, Richard is socially disadvantage. His world is separated by two distinct sounds, English and Spanish. English represent the public society while Spanish represent his private world, which is his home.

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601 Words | 3 Pages

He shows this through his many experiences with bilingual court and education. At the end of his essay, Espada concludes with a basic summary of what he has learned. Espada claims “The repression of Spanish is part of a larger attempt to silence Latinos, and, like the crazy uncle at the family dinner table yelling about independence or socialism, we must refuse to be silenced.” Through the summary the reader understands despite English being the prevalent language the in the U.S. today the Spanish culture is still being preserved through bilingualism. On the other hand Rodriguez argues that in order to gain a public identity, one must be willing to sacrifice some part of their own cultural identity.

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I find two insights very interesting in Rodriguez’s essay. Firstly, in the midst of preparing dinner, Rodriguez stated that, his mother come up and ask him to tell her some about the book that he is reading [21.] I find this interesting because the act of the author’s mother can be cited as a support. Even though his mother have a lack of education, by trying to explain and tell his mother about the book that he his reading, Rodriguez will have more understandings of the book. But the acts of Rodriguez’s mother do not seem as support for the author, because he barely answers to his mother’s question.

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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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