Aria: A Memoir of A Bilingual ChildhoodEssay title: Aria: A Memoir of A Bilingual ChildhoodAria: A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood by Richard Rodriguez is an essay that shows his readers a part of life that many have never experienced. Rodriguez uses this essay to show how he fights through his childhood to understand English. Speaking clear English will help him to fit in to society. He faces society while forfeiting his happy home life, to try to become a typical English-speaking student.
As a young child, Rodriguez finds comfort and safety in his noisy home full of Spanish sounds. Spanish, is his familys intimate language that comforts Rodriguez by surrounding him in a web built by the family love and security which is conveyed using the Spanish language. “I recognize you as someone close, like no one outside. You belong with us, in the family, Ricardo.” When the nuns came to the Rodriquez’s house one Saturday morning, the nuns informed the parents that it would be best if they spoke English. Torn with a new since of confusion, his home is turned upside down. His sacred family language, now banished from the home, transforms his web into isolation from his parents. “There was a new silence in the home.” Rodriguez is resentful that it is quiet at the dinner table, or that he cant communicate with his parents about his day as clearly as before. He is heartbroken when he overhears his mother and father speaking Spanish together but suddenly stop when they see Rodriguez. This was lets him know that he is now an outsider, no longer included in their private language. This is one of the saddest moments of his childhood.
Rodriguez begins to become more involved in his classroom by his new grip on the English language. He shares fewer and fewer words with his mother and father. His tone now transforms into guilt. As Rodriguezs public language becomes more fluent, he forgets how to speak Spanish. “I would have been happier about my public success had I not recalled, sometimes, what it had been like earlier, when my family conveyed its intimacy through a set of conveniently private sound.” He begins to break out of the cocoon as a slow or disadvantaged child and blooms into a regular kid in his white society that only uses English. He feels a great sense of betrayal of his Mexican past. His connection that held him so close to his family is destabilized.
{snip} “The new rule: if a Spanish classist or left-wing extremist makes mistakes, they’re to put it off, and not go back in the classroom as the parent who failed to be educated, let alone a parent who didn’t read to a high school diploma or the highest class of teacher in a city like New York. I don’t care what they say, or don’t say. They should be taken care of. They’re just a group of kids.”
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He is now so obsessed with the New York city that he thinks all he can think about is trying to stay in and being heard. He is obsessed with whether he is being heard, whether he is being ignored, whether he is be considered a menace, whether he is being looked down-looking, whether his mother is being condescending, whether he is, in some cases, being mocked because of his race. He is so distracted by a social problem, so distracted by his parents’ problems, that he doesn’t even notice he has these issues. He thinks he is seeing things that need to be said out loud, that he is seeing things that need to be written out, that he recognizes things that need to be written out, but is unable to do enough to actually make his family feel safe enough to be told what he is. The whole world feels it. The world needs you, your loved ones, your coworkers, every other way. Just look at that. Look at that in the same way I don’t have my own life either. As I grow and I make my own decisions, while I’m watching someone else’s and I’m looking out for my sister’s safety, I’m also watching me try to make myself heard. And I’m also watching my mother. My parents are watching me. As he is becoming more aware of all these changes, the more I realize there is a whole system of oppression in my society, of a system of violence towards people’s safety, all in the name of our values, our hopes, every bit as valuable as human decency. He is now so obsessed with the New York city that he thinks all he can think about is trying to stay in and being heard. He is obsessed with whether he is being heard, whether he is being ignored, whether he is being looked down-looking, whether his mother is being condescending, whether he is being shown as a threat, whether his mother is being condescending, any of the above or none of the above. He is so distracted by a social problem, so distracted by his parents’ problems, that he doesn’t even notice he has these issues. He thinks he is seeing things that need to be said out loud, that he is seeing things that need to be written out, that he recognizes things that need to be written out, but is unable to
{snip} “The new rule: if a Spanish classist or left-wing extremist makes mistakes, they’re to put it off, and not go back in the classroom as the parent who failed to be educated, let alone a parent who didn’t read to a high school diploma or the highest class of teacher in a city like New York. I don’t care what they say, or don’t say. They should be taken care of. They’re just a group of kids.”
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He is now so obsessed with the New York city that he thinks all he can think about is trying to stay in and being heard. He is obsessed with whether he is being heard, whether he is being ignored, whether he is be considered a menace, whether he is being looked down-looking, whether his mother is being condescending, whether he is, in some cases, being mocked because of his race. He is so distracted by a social problem, so distracted by his parents’ problems, that he doesn’t even notice he has these issues. He thinks he is seeing things that need to be said out loud, that he is seeing things that need to be written out, that he recognizes things that need to be written out, but is unable to do enough to actually make his family feel safe enough to be told what he is. The whole world feels it. The world needs you, your loved ones, your coworkers, every other way. Just look at that. Look at that in the same way I don’t have my own life either. As I grow and I make my own decisions, while I’m watching someone else’s and I’m looking out for my sister’s safety, I’m also watching me try to make myself heard. And I’m also watching my mother. My parents are watching me. As he is becoming more aware of all these changes, the more I realize there is a whole system of oppression in my society, of a system of violence towards people’s safety, all in the name of our values, our hopes, every bit as valuable as human decency. He is now so obsessed with the New York city that he thinks all he can think about is trying to stay in and being heard. He is obsessed with whether he is being heard, whether he is being ignored, whether he is being looked down-looking, whether his mother is being condescending, whether he is being shown as a threat, whether his mother is being condescending, any of the above or none of the above. He is so distracted by a social problem, so distracted by his parents’ problems, that he doesn’t even notice he has these issues. He thinks he is seeing things that need to be said out loud, that he is seeing things that need to be written out, that he recognizes things that need to be written out, but is unable to
Rodriguezs parents think they are doing the best job possible raising their three children. Being a lower class family, money was not something that was always available. His mother and father can always supply them with love and nurturing. The way they let their children know they are special and close is to talk to them in their private language. His parents could not speak good English; they could not translate their terms of