What definitions does Anzaldúa dispute in her piece? What definitions does she introduce that are new to you? Respond to her arguments – what resonated for you, and what didn’t work?
Anzaldúa is arguing the disastrous nature of the linguistic terrorism her culture experiences by English speakers and Spanish speakers alike. I hadn't really considered any one dialect of Spanish (I have lived in Texas my whole life, so perhaps it's the only one I have been exposed to) to be inferior to the others. The only thing I can even think of comparing it to is the funny looks Texas give to the occasional aboot that sneak out a Canadian/Northerner's mouth, but I had never thought of one being superior to the other. I can see where she's coming from with this argument, but I'm not sure that war and the loss of a dialect in formal speech can necessarily be equated like she tries to. A dialect is certainly a form of expression, and it's sad that schools try to take it away, but I didn't really get that out of her argument. The way she presented the oppression in English classes almost made me take the side of the school. I don't speak Spanish in any capacity, and in the first half of the essay there's a lot of Spanish colloquialisms and phrases that I couldn't understand without Google. I was pretty frustrated with trying to get her gist when I couldn't understand everything she said, and if I was trying to teach an English class I was hired to instruct, I would be equally perturbed.
Ellen, I agree with you that the Spanish in the reading made it extremely difficult to get the "gist" of the essay. I do not know much Spanish myself, so I was also often left confused as to what she was trying to say. I couldn't agree with you more!
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