Nashaya Lyons-Watson
English 1100
8/31/2015
Prof. Young
Reading Response Questions to "How to Tame a Wild Tongue"
1.The dentist chair scene connects to the piece, it explains difficulties during a procedure due to a “wild tongue” and then it goes on to talk about how to tame a wild tongue. This is connected because in Anzaldua piece “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” it talks about having to control her language in a country that usual see English as the “universal language”. In this comparison the wild tongue was an allusion to her having to control what comes out of her mouth around certain people.
2. Anzaldua’s use of Spanish throughout the writing make sense because she expresses how her tongue would go wild around anyone and sometimes she would talk in Spanish and English in the same sentence. It points out that old habits died hard and you can’t really control something that is apart of you and your culture. Her purpose for it was to show how she felt when she had to conform to someone else's language even though she might have not understand it at first and to show that you can’t erase someone's culture with a few speech classes and people’s opinions on what language you should speak.
3. Standard means something considered acceptable or desirable along with something that is very good and used to make judgement on the quality of other things. You can’t really define someone’s language as standard because to talk about someone else’s language is subjective. Just because Academic English is typical used and “Standard” Spanish as well in a professional atmosphere doesn’t mean that any other way should be considered nonstandard. Someone might speak or is use to Chicano Spanish doesn’t make in nonstandard just because it’s not acceptable to this society’s standards.
4. I think it is necessary to speak/write in Academic English because in the United States just to make a decent living you need to know some form of it because you can be taken advantage of easily. By learning Academic English I’m am not saying you should lose yourself in it but in this world you’re not going to get very far without Academic English.
5. There are various of English’s in other people’s perspectives such as slang English, broken English, standard English, world English etc. Slang English is consider the English we use that might not be grammatically correct or use of shortcuts in words and sentences. Kind of a relax English. Standard English is what is acceptable for the world and what you must speak to be seen as if you have any common sense. Broken English is what people from different countries speak because they haven’t grasp the language as a whole and tend to make mistakes. And world English is all different variations of English used throughout the world. Just like Spanish there is a certain English people accept and others they look down on.
6. It’s not really a secret when I’m writing or talking in a professional atmosphere, sure I won’t use words that aren’t socially accepted. Because I know if I want to be taken seriously I must actually come across the “right” way. With my friends it’s kind of back and forth between standard English and “nonstandard English” it’s not really a secret identity it’s more like another part of me where I can relax and not be expected to follow the rules of English while talking to my friends.
7.With my friends I speak a mix of “standard and nonstandard English”, I do the same with my mother as well. Using “standard and nonstandard English” is more of a comfortable thing, i.e if I have known you for a while and know what you expect and will accept from me. With my professor it’s more standard English due to knowing it’s a professional space and society expect you to talk in standard English.
8. When she says “I am my language” is means that what she speaks relates to her it is what she is. When she speaks in nonstandard Spanish or standard Spanish it show that she has a very close relationship to her culture and she doesn’t ignore who she is. She speaks the way she does because she was raised like that and refuses to forget that. What she speaks can also speak on her experiences throughout life and what she has gone through. Language is connected to identity because like it or not it defines you in some ways, such as where you have come from, how you were raised and the culture you inhabit.
9. The end connects to the beginning because at first it talks about taming and wild tongue and through the article it shows ways of how some tongues have been tamed and look down upon by society and their own people. But in the end there tongue can not be truly tamed because what they’ve grown up with, the language their culture breathes will not totally disappear it will continue to grow throughout this country until there are standards that don’t confine them. The end is more so answering the question the beginning presents.
10. The language you speak could be part of your identity because I’ve heard others from other states say I have an New Jersey accent and that we talk faster. Such as how we think that people from the south talk slower and stretch out their words. Language can show where you come from or your culture.
11. Identity is important to me because it shows that you can’t just be molded into anyone else. You are different you are you, and nobody else. Identity helps define you but also in the same breath not put you in a box also. Identity is important to Anzaldua and she emphasizes on it multiple times. Such as when she states in the beginning of “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” “Attacks on one’s form of expression with the intent to censor are a violation of the First Amendment” When she states this I can see that she already can’t stand being put in a box and not beginning able to express her identity. If identity wasn’t important to her why would she care that she couldn’t express herself through her native tongue. Another example was when she wanted to bring her culture to a university because they didn’t emphasize it enough. “I had to “argue” with one advisor after the other, semester after semester, before I was allowed to make Chicano literature an area of focus.” She argue not just for herself but for other to have a choice in their identity and not have to cover it up due to what society deems standard. Identity has been taken from her and she fights for it because it shouldn’t happen to anyone.
