Summary:

 In this reading Anzaldua’s biggest point is our identity is attached with the language we speak. When people come to the U.S they were forced to speak English all the time or they won’t get by in life. But there’s a huge problem in that, because when you try to make a person speaks a certain way it’s like stripping a person of their own speech freedom or like their identity because the languages they speak is from their mother tongue and their culture. Then she continue by explaining all the differences between the kind of Spanish that people speaks and which kind she identify herself as. After differentiating the types of Spanish she goes in depth on Chicano Spanish. Then she moves on to say Spanish speakers identify themselves differently in different environment so the people who speaks to them would understand it easier. She says that no matter what law or actions people are against them they will always remain the same and fight for their own language. They will fight til the day that all the laws would rot and will keep the language survive til then.

Response:

Her idea of language define who you are is the most interesting part I found because I feel pretty much the same as her. I feel very disconnected with my own culture after living here for 6 years. It’s hard not to speak the mother tongue everyday now when I talk to my mother in Vietnamese I have to replace many words with English instead of just speak it without thinking. Even though writing in bilingual is another very cool idea. But when a person doesn’t speak a word of Spanish try to read the material it would take a while to try to comprehend fully what the most important point she was trying to make.

Reflection:

 I think the biggest point to take away for me in this reading is to be not afraid to express myself no matter what language I was trying to speak. Fight for your self and not to abandon your own culture/identity just because someone tells you to. My connection to this text is that I’ve always try to get rid of my accent to be fit in. Because since I’ve come here some people I know would say that I have a very obvious accent while others don’t think I have one. My goal is to get rid of it completely. But now I realized that the way I speak is special and that I have my own identity, and not afraid to b identified by it.