How to Tame a Wild Tongue and The Squirrel Mother Comparative Commentary

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How to Tame a Wild Tongue and The Squirrel Mother
Comparative Commentary

The first text, How to Tame a Wild Tongue by Gloria Anzaldua, discusses her relationship to language as a young Hispanic girl living in the United States. In this text the author makes use of a lot of metaphors and symbolism to indicate the significances in the roles of gender. When the narrator’s tongue could not keep still while the dentist worked on her, it symbolizes how the girl is trying to break free from her role as a female but is restrained. The irritation the dentist had while pulling out the metal from her mouth portrayed the anger the narrator’s peers would get if she tried to flee her role. The metal from her mouth can also symbolize restraint. When the dentist comments on how “strong and stubborn” her tongue is, it suggests that her will to break free from her gender role is also strong yet stubborn. The juxtaposed rhetorical questions then indicates that there has been attempts on ‘taming’ and ‘saddling’ her will to break away from her role, portrayed by her uncontrollable tongue and the dentist.

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We then explore a Mexican student’s experience learning English in America. As a child, this Mexican student learned about certain phrase. One of them was “Muchachitas bien criadas”, meaning that well-bred girls do not answer back. This shows that in culture, there is already a set role for both genders. In this case, if you were a well-bred girl, you are presumed to be polite and do not talk back. Another phrase is “hablar pa’tras, repelar”, meaning the act of talking back to your mother, suggests that children are expected to listen to their mothers and never doubting their ...

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