Cook
Personal Natalie Essay, 24 June 2008
Short Personal Response on Public and Private Language by Richard Rodriguez I find it fascinating that Rodriguez, as a child, could have made the distinction between what he refers to as private languages and public languages. I appreciate the point he makes about it being easier for the upper class children to learn a foreign language so that it could be more socially accepted and therefore a public language. I also understand his comment about how he would have been able to have a certain trust for a teacher had he or she addressed him in Spanish. He has really prompted me to explore the true sense of nationalism that comes with a language. There is a certain connection between people who speak the same languagea certain bond, an alliance of sorts. A line that particularly strikes me in Rodriguezs essay is At the end of a day, I was often bemused, always relieved, to how realize silent, though crowded with words, my day in public had been. I find this statement striking and poignant on many different levels, beginning with the paradox of silence in a day crowded with words. I do understand the sentiments behind Rodriguezs statement, that his words were empty. I also really appreciate the idea that Rodriguez explains about his friend who, with firm Spanish sounds, conveyed confidence and authority English would never allow him. Not only does this make me think about the value of peoples true identities, with culture, language, etc., but it also makes me think about how some of the greatest treasures in pieces of poetry and literature are often compromised, or lost, in translation. In Rodriguezs case, it is as though his own identity, as does his friends, gets lost in translation when he is forced to convert his true Spanish ideas from his private language to a public one.