How to Tame a Wild Tongue
“My Perspective of a Wild Tongue” “How to Tame a Wild Tongue”, by Gloria Anzaldua, is a very expressive story about a Mexican American women’s struggle to preserve her culture. Her main fight revolves around a struggle to keep a form of Spanish, called “Chicano Spanish”, a live. In the short story she says, " for a people who cannot entirely identify with either standard (formal, Castilian) Spanish, or standard English, what recourse is left to them but to create their own language?"(page 55). She is stating that despite what the societies both Mexican and American want her to do she will not concede defeat. The American Society would like her to speak proper English, while the Mexican Society wishes she would speak proper Castillian. With both pressures bearing down upon her and her counterparts their only solution, in their eyes is to form their own language. That language becomes known as Chicano Mexican, which is basically a mix of everything she has been taught by both societies. It is not easy for any immigrant to assimilate to a new home. Most would say that Gloria is not an immigrant because she was born is the south of Texas. My interpretation of an immigrant is not geographical but cultural. She may have been born in the United States but she was raised in a classic Mexican culture, and was forced into a strict American society. Neither of the cultures were and still aren’t willing to change. There are many difficulties to overcome, the weather, food, sports, recognized religions, clothing, and most difficult of all language. Any immigrant who comes to America whose native tongue is not English will appear to Americans as if they are an outsider. Even though Gloria was technically born in America she is still an immigrant. She is an immigrant to American culture. She was born into a Mexican family in America. Gloria had to immigrate into American society. The American Society wanted her to speak proper English without a Mexican accent. Gloria