Tanya Barrientos’s article “Se Habla Español” and Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” are two insightful narratives which examine cultural and social aspects of language through the childhood experiences which Barrientos and Tan had as second generation Americans. Both experiences explore the value of language and how it has played a unique role in Tanya and Amy’s lives.
In Barrientos’s article she recounts her quick assimilation to the American culture and language as a child, which led her astray from her Guatemalan heritage. She highlights her parents’ drive to only teach her English upon immigrating into America. This had a profound effect on how she has perceived her Guatemalan heritage and her identity. On a separate note, Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” tells the story of how Tan’s mother’s unorthodox English made an impact on her upbringing. In both Tan and Barrientos’s lives language played a unique role in the development of their identity. Although each narrative tells a different story, both writers express the significance of language through their stories. Barrientos examines how language separated her from her heritage while Tan exemplifies how language can sway perception or evoke an emotion.
The experiences Tanya Barrientos narrates in “Se Habla Español” convey her belief that language has created a barrier between herself and her heritage. Barrientos opens her article as she is enrolling into a Spanish course, with the question, “Should I go into it again? Should I explain, the way I have to half a dozen others, that I am Guatemalan by birth but pura gringa by circumstance?” (Barrientos, 629). She references being a “gringa” which is a slightly derogatory Spanish term for describing somebody who is completely American. Barrientos continues by remarking how her dark complexion and appearance have oftentimes given others the impression that she is already a fluent Spanish speaker. As she begins to backtrack into her childhood, Barrientos observes her ignorance towards the Spanish language at an early age and her, “though [that] if (she] stayed away from Spanish, stereotypes would stay away from [her)” (Barrientos, 630).
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Barrientos’s separation from the Latinos in her neighborhood and during her career as a student skewed her views of the Spanish language. In addition, her “cruel vision of a child” gave her the idea that speaking Spanish translated into being poor. Barrientos took pride in not being associated with these stereotypes which she had bought into. This superiority which Barrientos felt from her disassociation to Latinos was a result of the environment she grew up in as well as her inability to speak the Spanish language. The separation Barrientos experienced from her roots was common among immigrants during her childhood. The “notion of the American melting pot,” which Barrientos’s parents embraced and instilled into her had changed over time in America, as society shifted its views on ethnic identity. This deviation from the “melting pot” ideology to America being a “multicolored quilt” left Barrientos void of her own unique identity.
This alienation which she experienced as an adult was a result of her realization that her upbringing had led her astray from her culture. In turn, Barrientos explains how she has been missing a part of her identity because she never learned to appreciate her origin. The simple truth which Barrientos expresses in “Se Habla Español” about language is the vital role it plays in shaping a culture or an individual’s identity. On the other hand, Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” focuses on the role language played in her mother’s life and how it affected Tan both as a child, but also as a writer. Tan’s claim as a writer is that, “Language is the tool of [her] trade. And [she] use[s] them all- all of the Englishes [she] grew up with” (Tan, 633). The “Englishes” which Tan grew up with is a reference about her mother’s unconventional manner of speaking English, as opposed to the standard English Tan communicated with in school.
This “language of intimacy” which Tan used only with her mother became the language which she grew up with. To Tan, “[her] mother’s English is perfectly clear, as [she] hear[s] it, is vivid, direct, full of observation and imagery. That was the language that helped the way [she] saw things, expressed things, made sense of the world” (Tan,635). Tan mentions numerous occasions in “Mother Tongue” when she had to speak on the phone on her mother’s behalf. Tan recalls that she was “forced to ask for information or even to complain and yell at people who had been rude to her” (Tan, 635). Although Tan could comprehend her mother intuitively, she examines how language alters peoples’ perception of one another. Tan describes how the English her mother spoke changed the perception Tan had of her mother growing up; “I was ashamed of her English. I believed that her English reflected the quality of what she had to say.
That is, because she expressed them imperfectly her thoughts were imperfect” (Tan, 635). Tan’s mother, whose English was often described as “broken,” was oftentimes not taken seriously in public because of the limitations of her English. Tan states that her mother’s English, “almost had an effect on limiting (Tan’s] possibilities in life as well,” because [while] development of language skills [is] heavily influenced by peers, she feels that “the language spoken in the family, especially in immigrant families which are more insular, plays a large role in shaping the language of the child” (Tan, 636). The capability language has to shape individuals and cultures, yet still evoke an emotion or sway a perception, has played a tremendous role in both Amy Tan and Tanya Barrientos’s lives. Not only have both authors contemplated the significance which language bears, but both stories exemplify how language has made an impact on each writer’s identities as well as their childhoods.
While Amy Tan’s story “Mother Tongue” demonstrates how limited language has the potential to hinder the perception of an individual in society, Barrientos’s divergence from her native culture’s tongue exposes how language can create a barrier between cultures or societies. Both narratives examine the power of language and the manner in which it can affect people in very distinctive ways. Tan and Barrientos have had different experiences with language in their lives, but each of their stories demonstrate the potential of the power language has on the individual, culture, or society.
