this bridge we call home (2)

8 thoughts on “this bridge we call home (2)”

1. Within this piece by Anzaldua, I was surprised that I related more towards the section “The call…el compromise…the crossing and conversation.” Having an out of body experience; I have dreams just as she describes being lifted out and waking before you have any real decision to make. The imagery in this section also made me laugh, smile and reminisce on the past; I believe this is why I remembered this section so vividly. Though this section was on the topic of discovering how leaving your body reflects on your body and mind I also could relate to the booze comments in the next paragraph. Teens or young adults who feel they have nothing to lose. How physical abuse can control the minds and can reflect on your personal insight. But I agree with Anzaldua when she explains how relinquishing an old part of yourself one realizes aspects of oneself have internalized. I identify this with an example of you can never escape your past, one’s past makes the future, or ‘you can take the girl out of the trailer park but you can’t take the trailer park out of the girl.’ This is a far fetch example but I believe in change but to an extent.

2. Since I was a child I always been told or heard others say that we should try to connect with one another over are similarities and simply overlook or forget are differences. I think by recognizing our differences that we can build a stronger bond. I like the idea of turning our weaknesses into our strengths. I especially found the part where Keating talks about how she constantly readapts and makes changes to her lessons so that it can best meet the students needs’. As a future teacher I learned that we have to constantly adapt our lessons because teaching it in just one way want allow all of the students to grasp what is being taught. All of learn better in different ways. As a teacher it is our job to adapt our lessons to the best possible way to try to make it so that each student can better understand the concepts. It like whatever doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. While Anzaldúa refers to the snake when talking about rebirth and recreating oneself, I think of the mythical phoenix who like how the snake sheds its skin the phoenix instead sets itself on fire and rises from the ashes of its former self. Anzaldúa piece reminds me of the Plato’s Cave and how we view “reality”. We are already taught to see the shadows in front of us that we don’t allow ourselves to turn behind us and see what is casting those shadows.

3. AnaLouise Keating presents the idea of difference between races as something very destructive that is learned through life. As we are still small children the world is a much different place, by not taking the color of skin into account but rather the actions of someone else when deciding something about them. As this seems like a very logical way to perceive someone this skill or method is lost as we grow older, and our brain starts to categorize people based on the most common differences such as color. I think Keating is right when she says that one must change themselves before we get any further in changing the world. I think she also has the ability to change people in different ways, such as for her daughter she goes the extra mile to not just categorize people based on color but tries to emphasize that there are other ways of differentiating each other. Also as a professor she can challenge her students to not only look at the differences but to recognize them and see if there are “deeper” connections that are actually similar amongst each other. I believe that to be a very important step that many may not take into consideration, for example to recognize that you are different from someone else but to only go that far. You would be missing out on so much of that is as far as you take it but if you recognize the differences and then apply that in order to see similarities between each other, then the world will seem much more connected.

4. The ending of AnaLouise Keating’s, “Forging El Mundo Zurdo: Changing Ourselves, Changing the World”, reminded me of an experience I had this summer when I was doing research at CSU Channel Islands. One of my friend’s mom came to visit her and I had the opportunity to just sit and talk to her for a while. I started to disclose my story to her, a stranger the only thing in common we had was her daughter my friend. And as we began to share more about our stories, we began to see things in common, it was interesting to see how I could relate to an older women, mother of 3, who had just finished her masters degree. But it wasn’t until we gave each the opportunity to share our stories that among the differences we found a commonality, as Keating points. But aside from this, when Keating talks about Identity politics, I remember how my friend’s mom talked about not identifying as a Latina but as a Christian because she knows through God’s love she is able to connect with more people than with being Latina. Although she was proud to be Latina and used it to her advantage, like for scholarships for her Masters or even to play up the card of affirmative action when getting into the program itself. This idea to look past the obvious differences but find that one thing more people share and identifying with it was interesting to take in especially because at a time when I had just come to understand the complexity of being Chicana and finally labeling myself that, not because my parents were born in Mexico and I was born here as the old definition says. So this effectiveness to label ourselves does seem to fail us sometimes but its through that failure and vulnerability that we allow ourselves to learn from others just as Keating says.

5. Both chapters talk about Anzaldua’s strong spirituality, which she believed allowed us to connect within ourselves and with others. I really liked AnaLouise Keating’s interpretation of Anzaldua’s “El Mundo Zurdo.” The part that struck me the most is when she was explaining the metaphysics of interconnectedness. I’m not sure if I clearly understand it but it gave me a new understanding of spirituality. Anzaldua believed that we were all interconnected with no differences; we were connected by a “divine force.” I was also struck by Keating’s description of how she deemphasizes race when she describes people to her young daughter. This made me realize that someday I want to bring up my kids the same way. It would be nice to bring up my kids in a world where racial labeling and stereotyping is minimal or doesn’t exist. Keating mentioned that she struggled with Anzaldua’s motto of “by changing ourselves; we can change the world.” The way I see it is that each person on the planet is part of this world; therefore, changing one thing about ourselves already causes a small change in the world because we are a part of it. In Keating’s case she started changing the world through the way she talked to her daughter about race. It’s true that if we want change we need to start with the youth.

6. I really liked how AnaLouise keating formulated the ways in which she attempts to promote change in her life and thus changing the world. I completely agree with her in the “believe that by changing ourselves we change the world, that traveling El Mundo Zurdo path is the path of a two-way movement […] a simultaneous recreation of the self and a reconstruction of society” (522). I think everyone should attempt to connect through others by embodying one’s differences and demonstrating empathy and compassion to others’ experiences. Schools are the places where transformation to this consciousness can occur. Keating mentions that children are “developmentally inclined to treat people based on their character, as revealed by their actions, rather than on the color of their skin” (524). It’s not until we grow older that we begin to lose this because we become aware of our vulnerability and the fact that society praises the act of being “strong” rather than show our emotions. As we begin to grow we are more apt to learn societal expectations through the various forms of communication, including TV shows. One person cannot change the entire world, but I believe it does start with the individual. If we are truly committed to making this place a better place to live, a better place for future generations to come, our commitment begins with our own actions, how we perceive and treat people as well as ourselves.
   Just like Anzaldua, I undergo nepantla as I stand, in what I perceive, two worlds, two opposing realities. I am “suspended between traditional values and feminist ideas” (Anzaldua, 548). I have to know how to approach a situation in which I want to give my feminist perspective without belittling anyone who like everyone of us has been socialized to think under a patriarchal power. I try to invite them to think about ways in which language dehumanizes people, especially those who continue to be marginalized by society’s ways and consumerism, including women.

7. I really liked section number 2 in Anzaldua’s work which talks about being torn between different ways to find our self-identity. One learns two different cultures, traditions and even values and gets this sense of “seeing double that she talks about because it is like belonging to two different worlds where the same thing can be seen in two completely different ways. I think this follows from the last reading that we did by Evelyn Alsaltuny. Personally I can define my two different worlds through language because I think that one of my worlds is when I am home talking to my parents in Spanish and just seeing my Hispanic culture in that form. Then I come to school and my world changes back to English and everything around me has more to do with academics and learning which is done in English for the most part. Anzaldua talks about not wanting to choose between one end of the spectrum or the other, but she says that when we decide to do this and stop ourselves from choosing one over the other, then we allow for a new identity to emerge. I can see this emersion, and interestingly enough I feel like it is something that we learn to create. I remember when I first started school and I was enrolled in the bilingual program, this was my first real encounter with a second world because before that I was always with my mom and at my house we all used the Spanish language, so that when I first started school and my teacher was talking in English I was experiencing a different way, but I was so comfortable with the way I had learned and grown in until then that I clearly remember waiting for my teacher to read directions in Spanish to start paying attention. This is interesting to me now because I feel like at that point I did not know enough about this second world and so I wanted to choose to stick to the one I knew. However, eventually I learned more about this new world and new perspective and as I grew in maturity and knowledge I decided not to be just part of one or the other, I found myself in Nepantla reflecting on both and trying to identify myself using this double vision that I have learned. I really like this part of the reading because I found this idea of Anzaldua’s living in this in-between place of Nepantla as this whole idea of living between the borderspace.

8. I really thought Anzaldua hit it on the head when she wrote in the reading, ” Motivated by the need to understand, you crave to be what you are…”(40). I think this pretty much sums up the purpose behind the women’s movement. Men won’t really get what the purpose of the women’s movement if they don’t listen to the different problems throughout the women’s movement. Not only are the struggles that women who are white, Chicana, Black, Native American, Asian, etc, have to face, but even in the women’s own racial category, there are differences. People who are ignorant of such differences in the Feminism movement world won’t understand why a woman would get frustrated if a description is put on her that labels her as something she is not. The Feminism movement has allowed women to be relieved of the world telling them who they are, they can now explore and find out for themselves who they really are and what their purpose is in life. Such craving of finding yourself is what I think Anzaldua is referring to.

   Keating also contributed to this point that women can’t just be grouped into broad groups. She writes, ” We don’t need to break the world into rigid categories and hide behind masks of sameness”. I agree that the everyone in the world won’t have the same opinions in life. Even in California there are laws that we agree and disagree on, but our reasons for agreeing and disagreeing are for different reasons. Just because I don’t agree or disagree with an opinion doesn’t automatically put me into a category that correctly express what I feel or stand for.

Comments are closed.