"Richard Rodriguez "Aria"
After reading “Aria” by Richard Rodriguez, I really had to think. I had no idea that when people learn English and leave their other language, that a person could feel this way. I’ve never spoke any language other than English, and everyone in my family always spoke English at home and everywhere we went so I have never had to experience a loss of who I was. Someone’s identity covers a lot, and one part is their language that they speak. Their first language is what they identify with first. It comforted them; it helped them feel at home. That’s how Richard was when he had to learn English. He felt he was losing a part of his and his family’s identity. The way Richard said that, “I considered Spanish to be a private language”. You could see that he connected with it and nobody ever knew what he was saying to he felt safe in a way, to say what he wanted and only his sister and brother and his parents would understand.
Back when Richard was in school, the schools would just ignore the kids and have them figure it out on their own. They wanted them to just get what’s going on and what’s expected of them and nobody ever cared about the emotional stuff that goes on in the process of that. Richard didn’t know what to do, or how to feel confident in himself so that’s why he went quiet for about a year. I found a YouTube video that talks about bilingual education in the schools and what’s going on, and why it was started and when it was started. "
I completely agree and understood what Sarah says. I can't iimagine having somebody tell me one day that I could no longer speak English and I had to conform to what they want. To give up everything that I have known just to fit into someone else's standards seems crazy. I felt so much sadness that when the nuns went to his home and asked the parents to speak English to the children. From what I had gathered about Richard, it would be a very hard thing for him to lose at home. The more I read on I saw then pain and frustration he felt by losing the comfort of the Spanish language at home. I really like how Sarah pointed out how people overlook the emotional aspect. Emotions play such a large part in the way a person is. The changes of losing his language effected him emotionally because it was such a big change in his life. I agree that this article was an eye opener to what happens when someone must change their main language. I know a little bit of Spanish, and have no idea what I would do if someone all of sudden said that was what I had to use all of the time. I honestly am not sure I would be able to do it. To suddenly become fluent in another language. I think that this is something that needs to be worked on. Yes, learning English is needed for this country, but not at the expense of losing who your are. If fact I found an article(click here) that says being bilingual is beneficial, in the very first sentence. It goes on, however, to talk about people againist it. Lastly thank you Sarah for your help and the use of your response!
