Standing Out Is Fitting In

Like many others, I do not fit into many of my friend groups. I am usually the only gay male, often having to explain why it is okay or not to say certain phrases (Hint: if you have to ask it’s probably not okay). Not only do many gay men feel this way but other minority groups feel the same way. A lot of times it is because of the “categories” or “labels” we are forced to fit into, whether they are true or not; this is beautifully and painfully described by Gloria Anzaldúa’s personal essay, How to Tame a Wild Tongue. While majority-race group members think that immigrants and other minority groups have an easier time fitting in to feel like a true “American” now than when they did many years ago, Anzaldúa feels as though being “American” is subjective based on where you come from and what you believe in, in terms of labels and identities.

Anzaldúa makes it evident that immigrants are not welcomed in the United States even though this country is the “melting pot” of the world. Racist ideals have been prevalent towards immigrants for decades in the United States. To prove this, Anzaldúa painfully recounts her tales of being in elementary school and getting in trouble for trying to stand up for her identity. By correcting her teacher on the pronunciation of her name she was ostracized in front of all of the other children in her class by being sent to the corner of the room. If she spoke spanish with her other friends on the playground, she would get three slaps on her knuckles for speaking in her native tongue. She was silenced about her Chicana identity for so long that when she was finally able to read Chicano works for her education, she realized that her whole life of silencing this identity was not worth it. She had seen that you can claim your identity and not be held back by it. Her confusion went from being daunting to understandable; she learned that being open about who you are could help influence other younger generations, having it have happened to her. Today, there are still very similar racist ideals toward any speakers of spanish that are fueled by our government’s administration. The “Build the Wall” ideals are fueled towards spanish speaking immigrants, no matter where they are from. People who speak fluent spanish, are automatically accused of being undocumented citizens for their language. The people who accuse them of being “illegal” are the same people who will tell you that they believe that physical punishment is wrong but immigrant children should be separated from their parents and put into kennel-like living conditions because even though they are legal citizens, their parents aren’t, as if it is the child’s fault. This racist sentiment that narrates foreign policy decisions in our government also helps explain why many immigrants do not feel comfortable to be open with their identity; the fear of being seen as inferior silences many.

The subjectivity of being such a broad identity, such as “American,” can change the way a person identifies culturally due to that fact of all that it encompasses. Anzaldúa often states that her main expression of identity are the languages she speaks, however, the United States does not have a national language, making it easy for Anzaldúa to openly admit to using eight different languages, including Standard English, Working Class and English Slang, Standard Mexican Spanish, and Chicano Spanish. Throughout her essay she takes the most pride in the fact that she identifies as Chicana Tejana. She dwells on this fact and often reminds her reader that it is when she speaks to a fellow Chicana Tejana that she feels the most free to use her mix of languages fluently. She begins the final paragraph with, “Los Chicanos, how patient we seem,” and ends it with “we, the mestizas and mestizos, will remain.” Her sudden and abrupt change of identity proves how subjective identity can be; because she talked about it so much it can be assumed that her Chicana identity can be the most fervent in her life, however, she decided that day that she was feeling more Mestiza than Chicana. The fact that many people who are hispanic have so many different cultural identities shows that labels and categories do not always fit one-hundred-percent of the time. Depending on where a person is or who they are with at the time they choose to express their identity, they can leave certain parts of themselves out or bring in certain parts of their description of their identity based on the support or comfort they have in expressing themselves. Sometimes a person can choose to not mention any specific identity due to resentment towards it in a specific group (for example: a muslim person might not admit that they are from the Middle East due to islamophobic hatred that is prevalent).

Not only does Anzaldúa struggle with her identity with herself and others that are not like her, she struggles with the people that are like her in a search to be American. Anzaldúa describes “Chicana Feminism” as, “… to be close to another Chicana is like looking into the mirror. We are afraid of what we’ll see there. Pena. Shame. Low estimation of self.” This depicts that even though women of the Chicana identity fight to be themselves freely, they look at others like themselves with, in a way, disgust. Chicanas have a sense that they are not associated with the rest of the Chicanas in their area because of the resentment that exists to all Chicanas. To accurately describe this, Anzaldúa writes, “We oppress each other trying to out-Chicano each other, vying to be the ‘real’ Chicanas, to speak like Chicanos. There is no one Chicano language just as there is no one Chicano experience.” This shows that there is a true divide in the belief that members of an identity can also not agree or fit in with how their identity is perceived.

All of these ideas addressed in Anzaldúa’s anecdotal essay perfectly describe how “Americanness” is subjective. If a person cannot fit into their own identity that is specific to them, people cannot expect to fit into a general identity, such as “American.”

First Draft – https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ufr1bIpbT519Mx4-mMyW-Ok4Sh5lIZfLz1mnYMFl4gM/edit