G'day
In modern society, people believe that our identity is the way we perceive our surroundings. A factor which affects and shapes our identity is language. In many communities, some people decide to reconnect to their mother tongues which they lost to see specific areas from a different perspective and overall be more creative. With almost 6,500 different languages there are many ways to see specific communities.
“Language shapes our identity but doesn’t define who we are”
Personally, I would agree with this statement. I believe a language does not define who you are, if this was the case we would be seeing the majority of our community's thinking and doing the same outcomes. Another example would be if we learn a new language, if we learn a new language that does not mean we have changed entirely, on the contrary, it just “shapes” our identity and perspectives and gives us a new sense of creativity.
“Mother tongue” written by Amy tan is a short story, Amy tan is discussing the way her home language affected her lifestyle, in particular, her mother's lifestyle. She gives examples of how her mother’s language affected the way people perceived her identity, specific actions which we do in communities like going to the store were a challenge for her. However just because her language was at such a low level did not mean she was not resourceful at other professions. She commonly read about economics and had a career in it.Throughout the short story, Amy implies a sympathetic tone, which makes the reader feel sorry for Amy's Mother. She consistently uses past experiences where her language forcefully shaped her identity, with constant struggles of judgement. As well as Amy’s Mother's identity being shaped, Amy's has as well with school being the problem, more specifically her English tests.
“ The fact that people in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good service, pretended not to understand her, or even acted as if they did not hear her.”
Here Amy implements her use of tone, she give an example which makes the reader feel angered or sad because of how she was treated, she implies that people “pretended not to understand” this sentence suggests that the people could hear her but chose not to thus shaping her identity, as well as creating the tone of sympathy.
“This was understandable. Math is precise; there is only one correct answer. Whereas, for me at least, the answers on English tests were always a judgment call, a matter of opinion and personal experience.”
Here Amy elaborates an another experience, where she is trying to break the stereotype on her culture. China is known for being good at Maths, however, Amy enjoys English more. I believe the statement “ English tests were always a judgment call ” relates to her real life. Here the keywords are English and judgement, I believe that in modern society your language is judged and shapes who you are, in Amy's mother case her identity is being shaped by people around her.
“Language shapes our identity but doesn’t define who we are”
In conclusion, I agree with the statement to an extent. Language does shape our identity but only by our environment. People's judgement is the main factor to our identity. In Amy's case, she tries to break the stereotype of China, trying to move forward into an English career, which she does.
In modern society, people believe that our identity is the way we perceive our surroundings. A factor which affects and shapes our identity is language. In many communities, some people decide to reconnect to their mother tongues which they lost to see specific areas from a different perspective and overall be more creative. With almost 6,500 different languages there are many ways to see specific communities.
“Language shapes our identity but doesn’t define who we are”
Personally, I would agree with this statement. I believe a language does not define who you are, if this was the case we would be seeing the majority of our community's thinking and doing the same outcomes. Another example would be if we learn a new language, if we learn a new language that does not mean we have changed entirely, on the contrary, it just “shapes” our identity and perspectives and gives us a new sense of creativity.
“Mother tongue” written by Amy tan is a short story, Amy tan is discussing the way her home language affected her lifestyle, in particular, her mother's lifestyle. She gives examples of how her mother’s language affected the way people perceived her identity, specific actions which we do in communities like going to the store were a challenge for her. However just because her language was at such a low level did not mean she was not resourceful at other professions. She commonly read about economics and had a career in it.Throughout the short story, Amy implies a sympathetic tone, which makes the reader feel sorry for Amy's Mother. She consistently uses past experiences where her language forcefully shaped her identity, with constant struggles of judgement. As well as Amy’s Mother's identity being shaped, Amy's has as well with school being the problem, more specifically her English tests.
“ The fact that people in department stores, at banks, and at restaurants did not take her seriously, did not give her good service, pretended not to understand her, or even acted as if they did not hear her.”
Here Amy implements her use of tone, she give an example which makes the reader feel angered or sad because of how she was treated, she implies that people “pretended not to understand” this sentence suggests that the people could hear her but chose not to thus shaping her identity, as well as creating the tone of sympathy.
“This was understandable. Math is precise; there is only one correct answer. Whereas, for me at least, the answers on English tests were always a judgment call, a matter of opinion and personal experience.”
Here Amy elaborates an another experience, where she is trying to break the stereotype on her culture. China is known for being good at Maths, however, Amy enjoys English more. I believe the statement “ English tests were always a judgment call ” relates to her real life. Here the keywords are English and judgement, I believe that in modern society your language is judged and shapes who you are, in Amy's mother case her identity is being shaped by people around her.
“Language shapes our identity but doesn’t define who we are”
In conclusion, I agree with the statement to an extent. Language does shape our identity but only by our environment. People's judgement is the main factor to our identity. In Amy's case, she tries to break the stereotype of China, trying to move forward into an English career, which she does.
Hi Andrew,
ReplyDeleteI too did this post and I also agreed with what the statement said. The only thing that learning new languages do are shape our identities but they do not entire define who we are. Another perspective would be that instead of speaking and being the same, we would just be categorized into groups and not be treated as individuals. To me, the line that stood out to me was "People's judgement is the main factor to our identity." People want to associate how other's are because it makes our lives easier, however this can be hurtful towards the person being judged and it could affect them in a negative way
Hey Andrew, I love your structure and form of your blog post, you begin with an introduction and explain the stories at hand which make it easy for people who have not read them to understand where you are coming from. I used to be like you and agree with the statement but after Anjana's post my view is a bit more neutral. I feel as if language can define your identity if you let it or want it. It is important how you analyse the literary devices within the text like the tone and mood created to prove your point. This is a crucial skill in this class that you have obviously already adapted to.
ReplyDeleteAndy, you show strong insight into this topic with your post and in particular Amy Tan's Mother Tongue. However, in terms of structure, you could have developed a better argument by using effective paragraphing with topic sentences to establish your point and evidence to substantiate it.
ReplyDelete