Page 88 - 2023-bfw-FLL-2e

If you read the Central Text in this chapter, “La Gringuita,” you saw the discrimination
5
that Julia Alvarez’s mother faced because of people’s assumptions about her ability
/
to speak English, and you saw how Alvarez felt herself gaining power over her own
parents as her English improved. Later in the narrative, however, Alvarez experienced the
negative effects of the loss of her native Spanish in her inability to connect fully with her
Narrative
Spanish-speaking boyfriend.
This Conversation of texts will present you with a number of different situations in
which the writers face power challenges as a result of their literacies, or lack thereof.
At the end of the Conversation, you’ll have an opportunity to enter the discussion by
adding your viewpoint to those of these authors in response to the following question —
What should society or individuals do to ensure that there are not significant
differences in equality or power based on language?

activity Starting the Conversation

1. Meet with a partner and discuss the following questions:
• When have you found yourself in a position of strength, weakness, connection, or
isolation based on your language?
• In your experience, what factors in society (race, ethnicity, gender identity,
socioeconomic status, etc.) most affect a person’s power to speak?
2. Create a table like the one below that will help you keep track of important informa-
tion related to the ideas of language and power, especially your own responses to
the ideas you encounter in the texts you read.

Text Title/Author Steps the Author Might Best Evidence Your Response
Suggest to Prevent Inequality
Based on Language

Source A
Adams, Joshua. “Confessions of a Code Switcher.” WeOutHere.com, 8 Sept. 2013.

or those who don’t know, there’s a common versions of a running joke (if you want to call it
Fidea amongst many black people that forces that) that we are bilingual with an “around black
in society compel us to be adept at adapting. This people voice” and an “around white people voice.”
idea is captured in poems like “We Wear The The Mississippi Delta drawl I and many black
Mask” by Paul Laurence Dunbar, or the different people from the south and west sides of Chicago

186
Uncorrected proofs have been used in this sample.
Copyright © Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers.
Distributed by Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers.
For review purposes only. Not for redistribution.

06_SheaFLL2e_40926_ch05_130_243_6PP.indd 186 28/06/22 8:57 AM