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Essay On How To Tame A Wild Tongue

632 Words3 Pages

Language is a human system of communication with everyone and it values in our culture. We all have some kind of language barriers within us, no matter what background we are from. "Mother Tongue" by Amy Tan and "How to Tame a Wild Tongue" by Gloria Anzaldua shares similar themes as they both deal with how different forms of the same language are recognized in the society. Anzaldua and Tan are facing many barriers because of their difficulties with the language that they learned, in order to overcome these challenges, they needed to incorporate with their families so that these changes would not affect themselves but also their families.
When living in a family with parents that speak "broken English", it is always common to find hardships and challenges. In "How to Tame a Wild Tongue" by Gloria Anzaldua, her mother states that, " Pa' hallar buen trabajo tienes que saber hablar el ingles bien. Que vale toda......ingles con un 'accen" (34). This means that to get a good job we need to speak English well. Her mother was embarrassed that Anzaldua spoke English like Mexican. Anzaldua's mother only wanted the …show more content…

Anzaldua explains that how she felt unaccepted by all groups, Americans, Mexicans, and other Spanish speakers. Along with her peers, her teachers give her a hard time as well. Anzaldua states that, "If you want to be American speak 'America'. If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong" (34). This means that Anzaldua not only get teased about her Spanish, but also with her English as well. Similarly, Amy Tan had also problems with her language as well. During her young age, she was expected to speak with very important people due to her mother's inability to speak English. Due to these experience, such as her mother's translator, Tan realize the importance of being able to express her thoughts well in order to have a smoother

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After reading Mother Tongue by Amy Tan, my perspective changed about the struggles for people who are not as good at English. All throughout this article Tan uses personal experience from her mom to show the readers the struggle while also using primary sources to back up her claim. All the evidence backs up her initial claim and as the reader your perspective changes after reading about how she personally was effected. The author 's main claim of Mother Tongue is to persuade people so respect people who struggle with English because she has serval personal connections, she has fact based proof, and she is an experienced writer on this topic and in general. All throughout the reading she uses many personal stories and personal experiences on how difficult it was for her mother to go through her everyday life.

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She talks about how her friends could not understand her mother 's talking but Amy thought her mother was good at speaking English. Amy states, "Some say they understand none of it, as if she were speaking pure Chinese. But to me, my mother 's English is

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