Richard Rodriguez "Aria"

1. "Because I wrongly imagined that English was intrinsically a public language and Spanish an intrinsically private one, I easily noted the difference between classroom language and the language of home."
This quote reminded me of  "Teaching Multilingual Children" because in it, Collier talks about how teachers of multilingual students must demonstrate an appreciation for children's home languages even though they are teaching a new language. The situation that Richard is describing is an example of why this point is valid. He believed that because English was being taught to him in school and Spanish was not being emphasized, Spanish was a language that should only be spoken at home with family. It was as if there were two realms: a one in which Spanish was acceptable, and one in which only English was acceptable. This quote is an introduction to his story of how learning English was a life-changing event for himself and his family, both positive and negative.

2. "I moved very far from the disadvantaged child I had been only days earlier. The belief, the calming assurance that I belonged in public, had at last taken hold."
To me, this quote has both a positive and a negative tone to it. The fact that he finally felt like he belonged is great; although, it is sad that he didn't feel like he belonged only because he primarily spoke Spanish. This, again, is why students who are learning English as a second language need to be able to use their first language in the classroom, even though the goal is to make them successful English speakers. Otherwise, it feels as though their own language is inferior, and that the student himself is inferior, because he or she does not speak, as Delpit would say, the language of the culture of power. ESL classes should allow students to learn the language necessary to interact fully in society while not feeling culturally inferior.

3. "After English became my primary language, I no longer knew what words to use in addressing my parents. The old Spanish words )those tender accents of sound) I had used earlier-mama and papa-I couldn't use anymore. They would have been too painful reminders of how much had changed in my life."
This quote shows just how life-changing it was for Richard to change from one primary language to another. In my mind it raises the question, "Did he really need to remove all traces of the Spanish language from his life?" The school's suggestion that his parents help him practice his English skills was taken to an extreme, in that even his parents adopted English as their primary home language. Richard goes on to explain that his father had a much more vibrant personality when he was able to speak Spanish with relatives than when he spoke English with the immediate family. Practicing English skills and changing from speaking one language to another language entirely are two completely different things.

I found this story easy to read because it was interesting and its message was easy to grasp. It relates directly to "Teaching Multilingual Children," which centralizes around the theme that properly teaching English as a second language means requires emphasizing the preservation of one's original language. Essentially, "Aria" can be viewed as a narrative response to "Teaching Multilingual Children," which is a theory-based article. As I mentioned earlier, it also has a bit of Delpit in it, because English is being represented as a language of power—a "public" language—while Spanish is being degraded as a language only to be spoken at home—a "private" language. Richard was only able to feel like he belonged when he successfully learned English, even though it caused the communication among his immediate family members to suffer.