The first time I watched the video, I can’t stop thinking about how she keep echoing the word “language” to “anguish.” I thought that the poem was very different from other poems that I have read and listened to. I come to realize that the poem that Philip wrote is about oppression and displacement of the slaves. When she said, “English is my father tongue,a father tongue is a foreign language, therefore English is a foreign language,” (Philip) this line can be connected to Frederick Douglass’ narrative. He was forced to speak english because his masters were english speakers but it is illegal to read. The way Philip read her poem makes me feel like she is unaware of her “mother tongue” because she is forced to speak her “father tongue” that she mentioned as a foreign language.  Philip tried to make us understand how its like to be born a slave, not knowing your origin, not being able to have the privileges that others have because you are a slave.

Language is a form of communication that we use everyday, it is the most common one to express ourselves. Just knowing how to speak a language is not enough; being able to read and to speak it is the privilege that the slaves back then could not have. Douglass desired to read had opened a lot of new doors for him, he managed to escape and because of that he became a free man; not only that he is a free man he also left us a great work which is his narrative.