Relationship Between Culture & the Mexican Language
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The relationship between the Chicano/a or Mexican language and culture is the tight bond of the practices, habits, and choices of a people and the words and phrases the people use to describe their cultural habits, practices, and choices. Much of Mexican culture is derived from its centuries of interaction with Spain as source of both good, such as language and religion, and evil, such as oppression and war. When a Mexican enters an American school, either as an immigrant or as a native, he brings along all of his culture which that history has produced. The American school often has difficulty addressing the educational needs of that Mexican student because the teacher often is not familiar with the needs the different culture produces. A beginning of a definition of the Mexican or even the Hispanic culture may be "the seven-league boots of hyperbole" that Fernandez uses (7). He summarizes the view of "acculturation" of the Hispanics, Mexicans included (3-4) and that therefore they are handling life in the U.S. just fine. The evidence, however, which Fernandez alludes to, is that Mexicans (and others) are handling life in the U.S. just fine, not because they are joining its culture but because they are adhering to their own. He then proposes the artist's problem, which is similar to the student's problem of expression: "But in what language? Using whose paradigms, whose syntax?" (5). Even when the Mexican is bilingual he is faced with the difficult, sometimes painful cho
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the nation of Mexico, the student all too often perceives his language as under attack. The teacher, admittedly, is trying to help the child to learn the "language of power" that will enable the child to learn more, do more, and achieve more in the United States. The child who grew up where "they speak only Spanish to each other" (23) hears the lessons in English and the exclusions Spanish as more of an assault on the mother he reveres than a path to success away from home, family, and mother (which isn't such a good thing either.)
Rechy also describes the Mexican's mother and the strength of his relationship with her. However strong that relationship, it does not seem to flow over to a relationship with La Escuela. Lopez attempted to obtain parental opinions and attitudes, and sent out questionnaires to that end. The idea was to examine parental involvement in the school between the Anglo-American and Mexican-American parents. Two hundred and eight parents were contacted, 276 of them were contacted twice, and only 50 responded in all: 24 Anglo-Americans, 19 Mexican-Americans, one African-American, and six who did not state ethnic affiliation (150).
The conclusion was that Mexican-American parents perceive public schools "a
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Medina Escamilla, Escamilla Medina, QUE VIVA, Ronda Valencia, Anchor Anchor's, Chicano/a Mexican, Hispanics Mexicans, English British, Delta Kappan, Anchor Anchor, mexican-american parents, maintenance bilingual, journal behavioral, hispanic journal behavioral, journal behavioral sciences, hispanic journal, behavioral sciences, maintenance bilingual program, bilingual program, escamilla medina, mexican culture, latin america, america literature arts, america literature, limited-language-proficient mexican americans,
Approximate Word count = 2206
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page)
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