Gloria Anzaldua How To Tame A Wild Tongue Summary

Up to “half a year passed…” (Rodriguez, 287) until his teachers “…began to connect [his] behaviour with the difficult progress of [his] older sister and brother were making” (287). Note the fact that the teacher’s realization was because of his siblings and not because of his solitude, silent attitude. The message, as Anzaldua perfectly evokes in his short story, is that it’s our very “tongue [which] diminishes our sense of self” (298). A similar image Anzaldua depicts in ‘How to Tame a Wild Tongue’ – coincidently at the rather beginning of the text just like Rodriguez – is when the Anglo teacher said “If you want to be American, speak ‘American’. If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong” (295). On this occasion, Anzaldua’s mother also tells him off as she was “…mortified that [her son] spoke English like a Mexican” (295). Here, the pressure derives from the mom and the teacher, making Anzaldua feel out of place. He believes that “wild tongues can’t be tamed, they can only be cut” (295) emphasizing that one’s identity must be forgotten if he/she wants to learn another language (English), ultimately gaining a new identity. Another example of lack of identity recognition is when Kingston, in ‘Tongue Tied’, specifies that only the Chinese girls were left out when the class went to the auditorium. Kingston “…knew the silence had to do with being a Chinese girl” (284), hence, her self-esteem diminishes, she feels excluded from the class;

Gloria Anzaldua, author of the article " How to tame a Wild Tongue", expresses very strong views on how she feels her native Chicano Spanish language needs to be preserved in order to maintain cultural unity when used as a private form of communication. Her statement, " for a people who cannot identify with either standard (formal, Castilian) Spanish, nor standard English, what recourse is left to them but to create their own language?" suggests that despite the societal pressures of needing to learn more formal and ‘properly' accepted English and Spanish, the very nature of the Chicano language is a unique creation of acceptance, through language within the Mexican culture. She is opposed to assimilation on

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.

Gloria Anzaldua, the author of “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” expresses a very strong tie that she has to her native language. Anzaldua grew up in the United States, but spoke mostly Spanish. She did not speak the normal form of Spanish though; she spoke Chicano Spanish, a language very close to her heart. The text focuses on the idea of her losing her home accent, or tongue, to conform to the environment she is growing up in. From a very young age, Anzaldua knows that she is not treated the same as everyone else is treated. She knows that she is second to others, and her language is far from second to others as well. Anzaldua stays true to her language by identifying herself with her language and keeping

Anzaldua’s audience is everyone, ranging from immigrants to native United States citizens. In her text she uses examples that many people can relate to when English isn’t their first language or they have a unique difference from the majority. An example I chose to back up my claim is one from Anzaldua's past experiences, this takes place in her childhood dentist office where from the imagery she gives us shows she annoyed with some of the state the dentist is saying about her “strong [and] stubborn” (206) tongue. Even though the comments made by the dentist wasn’t directed towards her language and accent, the way she feels while he’s speaking to her show that she already has some insecurities with the way she speaks. She believes that her language is something that defines her, and if people have a problem with how she speaks they have made up negative assumptions about her.

In her passage, Anzaldua claims that language is an identity. She stresses the importance of how people who speak Chicano Spanish are viewed as inferior due to it not being a real language. Anzaldua reveals that “repeated attacks on [their] native tongue diminish[es] [their] sense of self” (532). Being criticized by the language one speaks causes a low self-esteem and a misconstruction of identity. It can lead a person to stop or hide the usage of their language thus suppressing one’s self. She highlights the discrimination of Chicanos, so people are aware of it therefore encouraging tolerance and social justice. Anzaldua argues that “until [she is] free to write bilingually and to switch codes without having to always translate. . .[her] tongue will be illegitimate” (533). This shows how truly she

People who are different are consequently viewed differently. It is human nature to judge others by the stereotypes that have been ingrained into our minds for however long. Stereotypes, however, may not encompass the whole story. Sometimes, you are only getting the discriminatory side of the story--a single story. Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” focuses on the discrimination towards broken English compared to Standard English and the stereotypes that evolved from such discrimination. Similarly, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s “The Danger of a Single Story” presents the idea that the “single story” is the reason for biased stereotypes that, more often than not, are untrue. Tan’s life in America was seemingly difficult due to the fact that her life and education were dependent on the language barrier between English and her “mother tongue”--the latter being seen as inferior and embarrassing. She initially felt that her mother’s fragmented English was something to be ashamed of since that was the “single story” that her peers have been spoonfed their whole lives. Adichie, however, denies these views by explaining that such stereotypes are incomplete and do not relay the person at hand’s true identity. In both “Mother Tongue” and “The Danger of a Single Story,” the speakers express how a person’s native language influences their identity through rhetorical devices such as ethos, diction, and metaphors.

Anzaldúa identifies her cultures struggle into adapting to the community she lives in. She begins her challenges with the incident of the dentist in order to emphasize her concern, as in not her own mouth, but more specifically their language. If you want to be American, speak ‘American’ (Anzaldúa 471). She is

Anzaldua begins her fight in “how to tame a wild tongue” by sharing her experience with language. She goes on to shares times where she was discriminated for the language she spoke and how others would try to silence not just her voice but her culture. She goes into depth of this topic by using visionary writing along with her emotion capturing the audience’s feelings and attention. She uses metaphor of someone trying to take her culture away by stating, “We’re going to have to control your tongue,” the dentist says, pulling out all the metal from my mouth. Silver bits plop and tinkle into the basin. My mouth is a motherlode. The dentist is cleaning out my roots,”(206). The dentist being a person who is not a minority is trying to get her to confine in a culture that is not hers, by forcing her to speak a different language that would erase her roots.

In Gloria Anzaldua’s letter “Speaking in Tongues: A Letter to 3rd World Women Writers” she delivers her message of being a third world woman writer and how there is a constant struggle between conforming to gain a voice in the world of writing and staying true to your culture. She pulls pieces from her own life experiences and works from other looked over women writers of color to make her point and connect to her audience letting them know she is part of their plight to be heard. In my rewrite of the essay “A Letter in “tongues”” I changed the delivery from a letter to a free verse poem condense Anzaldua 's message from Writing Women of color to just discriminated women writers just in general. They both focused use of pathos and ethos but mine leans more towards ethos pointing out that the dominant ideology of english writing being the only way to be heard as a writer that it is denying the voice of writing women of color and that is ethically wrong not what has happened to herself to invoke feeling.

The main argument that both Anzaldua and Baldwin makes are very similar, and in these aspects, both are as equally strong. Both authors have experienced cultural and language discrimination throughout their lives, and wish to make a change. Anzaldua argues that Chicano English should not be considered an inferior language, while Baldwin claims that Black English should not be considered an inferior form of English. Anzaldua and Baldwin address the oppressors of their language and condemns them for marginalizing Chicano English and Black English, respectively. They also empower those who can relate to their situation, and encourage them to step up to be equal to that of speakers of other languages. While the main message and purpose of each author is clear, their delivery differs vastly.

When Anzaldua says “So, if you want to really hurt me, talk badly about my language” she wants you to feel every aspect of what she is saying. In “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” she persuades her readers to believe the way she feels and that she has went through hell to fight for what she believes in.

Language is an essential part of a person; through language, you will find a person’s culture and nationality. In “How to Tame a Wild Tongue”, Gloria Anzaldua, demonstrates her stance of language and how she proudly admits that language, to her, is an identity that makes her feel whole . She also expresses hardship growing up because some people are not willing to accept her for who she is and forcefully attempts to make her change.

“How to Tame a Wild Tongue”, by Gloria Anzaldua, is a very expressive story about a Mexican American women’s struggle to preserve her culture. Her main fight revolves around a struggle to keep a form of Spanish, called “Chicano Spanish”, a live. In the short story she says, " for a people who cannot entirely identify with either standard (formal, Castilian) Spanish, or standard English, what recourse is left to them but to create their own language?"(page 55). She is stating that despite what the societies both Mexican and American want her to do she will not concede defeat. The American Society would like her to speak proper English, while the Mexican Society wishes she would speak proper

Anzaldua takes great pride in her language, “So if you want to really hurt me, talk badly about my language. Ethnic diversity is twin skin to linguistic identity – I am my language” (p89). She states that her language is a part of herself so when you insult Chicano it’s like a strike to the heart of Anzaldua. Anzaldua goes on to explains that although Chicanos all over the US speak different dialects of Chicano Spanish, they are still all Chicanos. Just because the language varies a little does not diminish its authenticity. People who speak a variation on a language should not be ashamed because they speak a little differently. “There is the quiet of the Indian about us. We know how to survive. When other races have given up their tongue we’ve kept ours. We know what it is to live under the hammer blow of the dominant norteamericano culture. but more we count the blows, we count the days the weeks the years the centuries the aeons until the white laws and commerce and customs will rot in the deserts they’ve created” (p93). She strongly urges Los Chicanos to not give up their culture and endure. She believes that the will of their culture will outlast any obstacle they encounter and demands that they not give in to the temptation to conform.