Code Switching Vs. Home Literacy

In the article, “Learning How to Code Switch: Humbling, but Necessary,” I learned that I can relate to Eric Deggans to my own experience. When growing up I had to code switch, an example when I was in elementary and I was in Bilingual classes from Kindergarten to Third Grade. Then when fourth Grade hit my school wanted to switch me to an English class not a Bilingual classes anymore. My mom that day had a lot of thought about it and she said it was fine that the school suggested that, so I switched. The change was different because I couldn’t speak Spanish in my 4th grade English class anymore and I had to code switch to just speaking English to the rest of my classmates. And when I saw my Last 3rd grade bilingual class moving to 4th grade

The two writings Mother Tongue, by Amy Tan, and The Memoirs of a Rebel Princess, by Abida Sultaan, were able to reach me and affect me as an audience through their tone and purpose (Jack and Pryal 2016). Both of these stories are literacy narratives, thus the authors are writing about their own experiences of learning to read and to write. Each of these stories depicts the difficulties these authors endured before they were able to successfully accomplish their education.

Purpose: To highlight the difficulties students have at school and at home when it comes down to learning a language which they aren’t acquainted to and the consequences of such, depending on their social background.

He does not believe as Anzaluda does that you have to create your own language if you cannot identify with more formal forms of acceptance. Although he admits it is heartbreaking to have shared fewer words with his parents because of the language barrier, he thinks his choice in learning and practicing English was necessary. In fact, the more he learned

Scholar, Gloria Anzaldúa, in her narrative essay, “How To Tame A Wild Tongue’, speaks her many experiences on being pressured on what language to use. She then expresses how the discrimination made her to realize the ugly truth--that people reject languages that aren’t their own. She adopts logos, ethos and pathos in order to appeal toward her audience who is anyone who is not bilingual. One of the perspectives she takes on in her piece clearly expresses the relationship between language and identity and how it creates a conflict between her and the world.

in Nguyen’s essay the two girls go to school and are automatically placed in a bilingual education system based on their physical features. This leads people around these characters to make assumptions of them not being able to understand english; when in reality, that is not the case because in Tan’s essay the mother understood and read a variety of newspapers. In Nguyen’s the girls also understand the materials in class and excelled in academics.

Throughout Anzaldúa’s nonfiction/ autobiography, she chooses to incorporate the use of code switching, personification, and synecdoche in order to escalate and show her audience how she found her identity from her language and connect it to show others the same as she found

Having to live a life of two languages leads to an insecure identity. Rodriguez argues that learning both languages and using them rather than avoiding one, leads to a better sense of identity and freedom. Thus, his intended audience are people who are of higher education, scholars, and educators. Both himself, and the audience have shared values which entail: “independent thinking, self-knowledge”, education, “commitment to the affairs of the world”, and scholarship and intellect. Rodriguez convinces the audience to seriously consider his claim through effective appeals to ethos and pathos. Ethos is developed in the area of authority by personal anecdotes and in the area of credibility by shared values. Pathos is effectively evoked via experiences he had that make the audience more likely to pause and consider his claim.

In Richard Rodriguez's essay , “ Aria: A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood ” he writes about how he struggled as a child who only spoke Spanish language but lives in a society where the “public” language is English . He believes that speaking proper English will somehow help him fit into society and find his “true” identity. Throughout the essay he contrast the Spanish language identity and English language identity. As a young boy, Rodriguez finds consolation and safety in his home where they only speak Spanish. He feels that he only has a true identity when he is at home surrounded by those who speak the same language as him . On the contrary , he becomes trapped and disoriented when not being able to speak / understand the English language . He feels as if he is not part of “their world” and has no identity in society. By comparing and contrasting Spanish language identity and English language identity . Rodriguez's essay is an example that speaking different languages should not make anyone choose an identity . In fact being able to speak and understand multiple languages in his case Spanish and English makes the language a part of his identity, but with two different sides .

Learning a new language seems to have only positive effects. However, for a Mexican American, accomplishing this goal brought him drawbacks in the interaction with his family. In his essay, ‘’Public and Private language,’’ Richard Rodriguez describes the difficulty in learning a new language and the sacrifice he makes to accomplish his goal. Richard Rodriguez shares the difficulty for older people, as they learn a new language; however, for younger generations is easier to learn a new language. Also, the new language creates a lack of communication for Richard Rodriguez.

In the essay about Aria: A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood, Richard Rodriguez reflects his childhood memory and challenges the idea of bilingual education. As a young child, Rodriguez finds comfort and safety in his noisy home full of Spanish sounds. Spanish is his family's' intimate language that comforts Rodriguez by surrounding him in a web built by the family love and security which is conveyed using the Spanish language. Throughout his essay he represents the power of the individual to defeat the language barrier and how he overcame this particular problem as a child. Rodriguez uses this essay to show how he fights through his childhood to understand English. Speaking English clearly will help him to adapt to the modern society.

Second language develops new friendships and new relationships. Last year, a new boy joined my son’s class. Later we found out that he was adapted from Russia. My son was able to communicate with him in Russian and right now they are friends. There was an important connection between boys – language that built the new friendship.

“One of the greatest and most influential filmmakers of all time”, Federico Fellini once stated that “A different language is a different vision of life” and I, in my turn tend to say that he was perfectly right. A person who speaks more than one language can experience multiple personalities, visions and reflections consisting which language is he speaking. High School students should comprehend the real benefit of speaking a foreign language. Being a multilingual myself and speaking fluently four languages and studying another two, I consider that I am qualified enough to persuade that my argument is strong, plausible and not ultimately-right. In the following paragraphs I am going to address the following three reasons why should other High School students learn at least one foreign language? Firstly, learning a new language enhances performances in the academic domain and makes you smarter. Secondly, knowing a new language is a high estimated and a very valuable characteristic in your professional CV. Thirdly, international travel is more pleasant through knowing a foreign language.

Tan clearly mentions in her story that she had to speak two different languages to her Asian mom who had her own made up English. Tan relates to both her Asian descent and American belongings by using her mom’s made up English to speak with her mom, and uses the proper English to give lectures and speak to most Americans. On the same grounds, Anzaldua learned through her life experiences to frequently use multiple types of English, and many other Dialects of proper Spanish and Mexican Spanish. She uses each language to communicate, connect and affiliate to specific people according to their background. This proves that the assumption that language defines culture and identity fails. What happens to the people who speak many languages, do they not get the benefit and pride of belonging to a certain community? Rather the contrary, they belong to multiple communities and they choose which group they want to communicate with and with which language. People have the ability to switch from a language to another to be part of a group and this supports the idea that identity defines and shapes language, and not the opposite.

Why should people nowadays see languages as a big prize? A person speaks more languages have more opportunities are skewed to him because he benefits the profit comparing to a person who speaks only one standard language. It is time for globalization and its effects on children for speaking other languages as a must. In two articles “Aria: A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood” by Richard Rodriguez and “Whose Voice Is It Anyway?” by Victor Villanueva, the two authors both expressed their opinions on native language and how the assimilation impacts a child. However, Rodriguez believed that the assimilation was beneficial for him as he had grown up in the English-speaking world and he disliked bilingual education which created many controversy.