Aria

Reading Aria by Richard Rodriguez, was really interesting. I liked that it was a story and he shared his emotions and feelings through story telling, rather than stating the facts like the other pieces we have read. I decided to do an extended comment for my blog and I'm connected it with Josh! (Who did a really nice job on his work and I really liked it)

For Josh's first quote he chose, I completely thought of the same thing. I could not believe that the nuns would come in and tell Richard's parents that. I felt that they thought they had more power over the family to tell them what to do. Also, Christy mentioned this in her blog as well, but that he should feel comfortable in his home and speaking Spanish is what they do to feel comfortable. Now its like his in a whole new and different place. I took spanish in High School and my teacher moved to the US when she was 20 and learned English and decided to be a Spanish teacher. She gets stuck sometimes and still has a thick Spanish accent and it was difficult to understand her. All I can think about is going into HER home or HER classroom and saying "you need to learn better English". (Which I would never do, she was an amazing teacher) Awful, just sad to think about?

The second quote Josh chose was something I picked out immediately as well and it stood out to me. I knew it was a powerful sentence, but I didn't look that deep into it until I read Josh's explanation. He said that Richard didn't feel like he belonged or wasn't apart of the country he was born in, just because he didn't speak English. I just thought the sentence was saying once he spoke english for the first time he was proud and felt like he made an achievement. But he wasn't proud of himself, because it was something that he was forced to do. It wasn't so much as a goal or something to accomplish, he HAD to do it. Up until that point, he was just Richard Rodriguez, not Richard the American citizen. And like Josh said, I feel bad for him as well. Reading Josh's explanation reminded me of Grinner's SCWAAMP. One of the components of being a true american is Whiteness and American-ness, both of which were not Richard. Sure he was born in America, but he wasn't an American to society because he wasn't white, he Had a spanish last name, english wasn't his first language, and so on? Then I started to feel even more sad for him because I couldn't imagine ever feeling that way too.

The last quote Josh picked out broke my heart even more than his second quote. Just Richard explaining how much has life had changed, when he didn't even ask for it too. He was uncomfortable when the nuns came in and forced them to speak English more, now his whole world was changed upside down. His home life was different, but now everything is different. Josh makes a great point that he learned English in an awful, forceful way. I wonder if he had learned it in an easier and more caring way, things might have been different. In the other reading, Teaching multilingual students, the author speaks of different ways that they can work to teach those students. Some of those should have been used to help Richard. Josh also put up a nice picture of a face with spanish near the brain and english in the mouth. I thought it was really powerful because thats exactly what it really is. The brain is telling you to speak what you know, but your mouth forces you to say what you have to say. Really compelling.

The two videos were exactly what Josh said: eye opening. I can't even describe them in a way that moves you because there are so any thoughts running through my mind! The facts were just so powerful and things that you couldn't believe. It was a mixture of laughs and facts to get everyone to realize the strength of what is going on. Our world has focused on simply english, and all the other languages are nothing compared to. There should be all these languages in the school systems, other than spanish, and french (those were the only ones at my high school). Josh made a good point in his blog that education in schools should be teaching English, not at the homes. I found a short article about language barriers in schools, really interesting I think. Home is for homework, so you work on school work at home but if you're having trouble, school is where they help you fix you're difficulties! I would love to learn another language! Without different languages, the world is just boring I believe. Why wouldn't you Want a group of diverse humans coming together and being united? I feel that is just wonderful.

Josh, you did a great job!! I loved everything you spoke about and your thoughts were really strong and eye opening as well. :)

Topic: Did anyone else take a language in high school and college? How was your experience?