Reading With & Against the Grain

Reading against the grain -

In the section entitled “Linguistic Terrorism,” Anzaldua argues that Chicanos have “internalized the belief that [they] speak poor Spanish” and “feel uncomfortable talking in Spanish to Latinas, afraid of their censure.” However it must be noted that this is a fallacy of hasty generalization and coming to conclusion about a group as a whole from the small sample size (perhaps friends, family, or acquaintances) must be disregarded as an ineffective argument.

Furthermore, Anzaldua only leaves a paragraph to talk about how the Chicano movement of the late 60’s was effective in increasing their political power tremendously. From the activism came about the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund as well as The Equal Opportunity Act of 1974, leading to major educational and political reform for Chicanos.

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Reading with the grain:

One of the very first experiences that Anzaldua describes in How to Tame a Wild Tongue is when she spoke Spanish at school during recess, was punished physically, and told “If you want to be American, speak American.” She then realizes how that was an attack on her right to express herself, violating the First Amendment; a concept that is explicitly protected in the U.S. Constitution making expressing yourself freely the most American thing you can do. Many Americans fail to realize that what makes America different and better than other countries is that it’s people are diverse and multifaceted. In the section “Overcoming the tradition of silence” the author mentions how she speaks different languages, or dialects, depending on who she’s around. I found this to be super relatable for those who speak more than one language because most of us have a different way of speaking when we’re in a specific environment. Personally, I am bilingual and I speak English and Spanish. In my experience as a Cuban-American living in Miami I find myself speaking broken Spanish at home, English at school, Spanglish/slang with friends, and formal Spanish in Cuba when I visit. Similarly to Anzaldua, when I was younger I had no pride for Spanish and and refused to speak it. It wasn’t until my grandma immigrated to the U.S. from Cuba when I started to learn because I wanted to be able to communicate with her and now I couldn’t be more proud of being Latina and speaking Spanish. Reading How to Tame a Wild Tongue has reinforced my thoughts on not only being Latina but also being an American and a woman.

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Citation: Anzaldúa, Gloria. “How to Tame a Wild Tongue.” Borderlands: the New Mestiza = La Frontera, Aunt Lute Books, San Francisco, 1987, p. 2947-2955.