Atai Isaev Week 3, Reading Response – ENG 2100: Writing 1 with Jay Thompson

Anzaldua does not believe that languages have firm lines. To prove that she mentioned Chicano Spanish, which is a border tongue that uses Spanish slang with English words thrown in here and there. She also mentioned that it is ever-changing: “Chicano Spanish is not incorrect, it is a living language”. Anzaldua also wrote that she speaks many different variations of Spanish and English with different people proving that people who speak different languages CAN share the same universe.
Anzaldua throws in a lot of Spanish words, sentences, and cultural references in her writing: “We are your linguistic nightmare, your linguistic aberration, your linguistic mestisaje, the subject of your burla”. I think she does that to create a unique style and appeal to Spanish-speaking readers. She also plays the victim card pretty often: “Chicanas feel uncomfortable talking in Spanish to Latinas, afraid of their censure. Their language was outlawed in their countries”. SHe does that to urge a sense of sympathy and make her essay more emotional.
The “change” convention seems apparent in Sedaris’s essay. He went from not completely understanding what his French teacher was saying (“Were you always this palicmkrexis?”), to *understanding her slightly better* (“It was mid-October when the teacher singled me 15 out, saying, ‘Every day spent with you is like having a cesarean section.’ And it struck me that, for the first time since arriving in France, I could understand every word that someone was saying.”).
He also uses “show and tell” because his entire literacy narrative is just a big anecdote about learning French.
However his essay doesn’t seem to have any specific message to talk away, not does it include any hidden meanings in it.
Towards the end of the essay Manson changes her mind. She accepts that silence isn’t always the answer: “While accepting silence as a means of communication was helpful, it wasn’t always enough. There were times when it was important for me to verbally com-municate even if I couldn’t fully express myself.” She learned words like “Setsunai” to convey her emotions. “I’m not sad,” I said. “I feel something, but I don’t know what it is.”

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