Reclaiming La Lengua: A Self-Narrative on Language Loss, Learning, and Identity

• In Event: Education as a Source of Erasure and Resilience in the Lives of Latina Women

Abstract

In the United States, the loss of the Spanish language has been the source of problematic identity and linguistic experiences for many Mexican Americans, amongst other Latinos. The 20th century promotion of English only ideologies led Spanish speaking immigrants to acculturate while others resisted by continuing to speak their native Spanish language. These stories are often erased from educational research and the history of schooling. Although students of color have been described as holders and creators of knowledge, some of them feel as if their histories, experiences, cultures, and languages are devalued, misinterpreted, or omitted within formal educational settings (Delgado-Bernal, 2002).

Anzaldúa’s (1987) and Delgado-Bernal’s (2002) work have helped scholars understand the linguistic impact of Spanish on the enmeshed bicultural identities of Mexican Americans. Drawing on Critical Race Theory, which challenges systemic racism and its effects, this paper analyzes how the loss and acquisition of Spanish is entangled in the bicultural identity of a fifth-generation Mexican American woman born and raised in San Francisco, California. The study uses personal narrative told through journal entries, kept over a semester, and a self-written memoir of the author’s grandmother. The data was synthesized into 15 short stories or language vignettes to critically analyze the major themes in relation to language, identity, and the concept of erasure. In this qualitative study these language vignettes are analyzed not only through thematic analysis, which focuses on the ‘told’ story (Riessman, 2008, p. 53) but also through structural analysis, which focuses on the telling of a story (p. 81).

The research questions guiding this inquiry were: What are the effects of language loss and second language acquisition of Spanish on the cultural identity of a fifth-generation Mexican American? Furthermore, the researcher aim at understanding how did the narratives speak to the relationship between language, identity, and the concept of erasure? How did this relationship affect her and how did she combat erasure? From her grandmother’s experiences of being punished with a ruler for speaking Spanish to the author’s efforts to recover her heritage language, the findings describe and analyze how this fifth-generation Mexican American reclaimed her ruler through language. The results may inform future bilingual educators or English as a second language teachers in their pedagogies inviting for more multicultural inclusive pedagogies.

Author

• Noell Marisol Cantu, Teachers College, Columbia University