Cody Balderamos

9/9/14

Professor Rasheda Young

English 1100

            In “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” by Gloria Anzaldua, she makes a good point about how language is what shows our true identity.  She is absolutely correct, but that isn’t the only thing.  Your identity is anything that represents you as an individual.  This is so important in today’s world, it plays a huge role in deciding ones position in society.

            Something that identifies me is my bedroom.  Everything that I have ever accomplished or liked, since I was a little child, is in that room.  Without me telling you anything, you could walk in my room and be able to tell so much about me.  I have plenty of trophies of past sports I used to play, books, pictures, postures, and plenty of other things that pretty much describe me as a person.  My bedroom is everything to me, I’ve been trapping myself in there since I was about ten years old.  I have too many memories in that room to be able to count too.  There are endless movies that I have watched over and over again for the longest time, I have my video games in there as well which I have played since I was an infant.  Just the look of the room goes to show how messy of a person I am.  Everything that anyone would ever want to know about me, is located in that bedroom.  I think things like this are so important for everyone to have in their life because it really is who we are inside.  It’s kind of like a label of ourselves, like in my case, my room is literally me.  You walk in there and everything is, me.

            I believe that some people are somewhat scared to show their true identity, because of social challenge.  For example, I know kids that are really religious at home and are always going to church, but are afraid for some reason to show this side of them to their friends.  They think that the other kids will make fun of them for following this certain religion, or even for being religious at all.  This upsets me because I believe you should be true to yourself and true to others, and be proud of your religion or whatever it is that defines you as an individual.

            When Gloria Anzaldua said “I will no longer be made to feel ashamed of existing.”  It really caught my eye because that was such a powerful line.  That doesn’t just go for her situation with her language, it goes for everyone with identities.  You shouldn’t be ashamed, and feel like you need to hide something because of being labeled a certain way, don’t feel any less important because your skin color is different, or because you were born in a different country, or because you follow a different religion.  Stand up with some pride and wear your identity.  Say “this is me, and I don’t care what anyone thinks.” 

            Identity is one of the most important things we can have today.  Not that this matters a whole lot, but it is the way people judge us, and the way we are looked at by society, whether we like it or not.  If we don’t at least take some pride in our own identity, then nobody else will respect it at all.  This is us, and it’s what represents us at individuals.  So whether you’re black, white, muslim, jewish, or whatever, wear it like you love it and have some pride.