Jaylinn Solis

Dr. Maura Tarnoff

LEAD CTW 1

MWF-1:00

Synthesis Essay

I’ve been to Mexico about four times in my life, the last time I went was in 2014 during

the summer. I felt so at peace with myself and my family. I “met” my cousins for the fourth time,

when written it seems strange but that is the clearest memory I have of my cousins. They would

all mention that they were proud of me for being in the US and getting the education of an

“American” whatever that means. The strangest thing is thinking of my education as part of my

identity. Education has become a symbol of status, if you don’t have an education, you are no

one in this world. We become a symbol of our college, our degree, and what we study. There is a

competition of who has the best education, not only within college prestige but also within the

workforce. It’s so sad to think that you can’t get far in life without some sort of education. Some

people believe that’s how it is, your education is a part of your identity, it’s something you

should say when introducing yourself, or at least that’s one of the questions that have commonly

been asked. I know that if I didn’t have to, I wouldn’t consider my education as part of my

identity, yes I go to college, yes I graduated high school, but what about the few who haven’t.

Does not having an education makes you lose a part of your identity? Should education be

considered a sign of status? When we consider this question we begin to wonder whether there

should be a correlation between education and identity. When most people correlate education
and identity, they usually put education as part of identity, I personally believe that it should be

identity as a part of education.

What does it mean to have an identity as a part of education? Education is an essential

part of life but not everyone has access to it, therefore I believe that identity is an essential part of

education. We are constantly learning, no matter what we do, it’s the way life works, there’s so

much to learn everyday. Our identity is built on our way of learning and on our way of

understanding things. Identity is something we can fortify through education but not the

education we tend to think about. It’s hard to form your own identity based on something that

isn’t your education because we live in a society that would rather have someone have a degree

than someone who has a great story to tell. Education is more of a way of communication for

those looking for a way to discover their identity. Education doesn’t have to come from higher

education, we can learn from experiences in everyday life.

These themes are present throughout various texts that we studied starting with

Anzaldua’s “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” and Chimidia Adichie’s “The Danger of a Single

Story. The texts promote the discovery of identity and how hard it is with society always

pressuring you. “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” depicts the idea that language is a part of our

identity rather than just a trait we acquire. “The Danger of a Single Story” shows the aspect of

identity from an outsider and insider perspective, more on the way people learn about certain

groups of people. This education is the kind of education that is present when we “learn” about

other traditions, for example we learn about how others formulate their ideals into a “single

story” on how someone’s identity is. People create the idea that education is only created in a
classroom when in reality, based on these two texts, it occurs outside, where we live. The way

we live in life is the best education.

Anzaldua’s text is a prime example of how we create identity through education outside

of the classroom. By education outside of the classroom I mean as in education through

experiences, not through sitting in a lecture taking notes. The prime example of this is

specifically throughout the novel when she mentioned, “Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic

identity - I am my language. Until I can take pride in my language, I cannot take pride in myself”

(Anzaldua 30). The writing focuses on how chican@s struggle only because of their lack of

language. Anzaldua elaborated on that concept of language being a reason of discrimination,

usually discrimination and oppression occur based on a component of a person’s identity. This

discrimination happened not only between different cultures but also within one’s own culture.

That sense of education and learning about yourself is present throughout the reading. Language

in this context became a part of their identity, the pronunciation made a difference in the way the

people were portrayed and seen in relationship to others of the same background. Just like with

Anzaldua, an experience I have lived through has been living with the fact that in Mexico I get

treated differently by my cousins because I go to school in the U.S and because I speak English.

Anzaldua was prohibited from using her language during school. She was punished for speaking

spanish. Anzaldua speaks for herself and other Chican@s when she mentions her language as a

means of identity. In the quote mentioned above, Anzaldua mentions how she can’t take pride in

herself if she can’t take pride in her language, it shows how language is such an important part of

identity. I feel this on a personal note because I cannot take pride in my name when people

pronounce my name wrong. I love my name, I love how it is spelled, but because of it’s spelling,
it is prounounced as Jay LINN rather than Jay-LEEN, which I love and feel more in tune with.

This connects back to education because language then becomes a barrier for education, even

talking a certain language or recieving higher education in a different language makes people

feel less validated in that sense. Language is a way of learning, far better than higher education

could give, with language you learn through experiences.

The “Danger of a Single Story” portrays education through the sense that education

forms a Single Story in our mind. Education becomes the single story of privilege, wealth, and

intelligence. Adichie mentions, “So that is how to create a single story, show a people as one

thing, as only one thing, over and over again, and that is what they become.” Higher Education is

seen as a way to formulate the single story. The quote states that when we show someone as only

one person, a person of privilege because of their education, they believe that they are entitled to

that. People become so indulged into the idea that being in college gives them power and

prestige over others who aren’t in college. College becomes a part of their identity, it becomes

another stereotype to the “Single Story”. My cousins in Mexico bought into the single story that I

am a “Gringa”, someone who’s first language is English. This is the opposite of me, I was raised

speaking only Spanish, so for most of my elementary school years I believed that having an

accent when speaking English gave me a disadvantage towards everyone. The education I had

was seen as a privilege when it should be seen as a tool. The “single story” of rich college

children living on campus and always partying is ever present throughout most teen movies and

shows. It shows the importance of media when it comes to making education a source of

privilege and power. The “single story” has the story of Adichie meeting her American

roommate and how she created the stereotype of someone that didn’t speak English and had a
tradition that was extremely different from the American culture. The story further proves the

point that education is a tool to help us become who we want to, but shouldn’t be who we are.

Throughout the text and throughout this course we explored the power of education

among all sorts of communities, and all sorts of backgrounds. One of the most important lessons

was learning that education, specifically higher education, becomes a symbol of power,

privilege, and status. This shouldn’t be the case, because the best education occurs outside of the

classroom setting, it occurs through real life experience. The texts, “How to Tame a Wild

Tongue” and Chimidia Adichie’s “The Danger of a Single Story” prove the point that education

nowadays is prestige rather than honor. My life has consisted of people always trying to use my

“American” education as an excuse to make me more powerful than I am. Identity becomes a

source of struggle as soon as we add our higher education. We don’t know who we are but one

thing is for sure: we are more than those letters and colors that a college campus shows.
Citations:

Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. “Transcript of ‘The Danger of a Single Story.’” ​TED,​

www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story/transcript​.

Anzaldúa, Gloria. “How to Tame a Wild Tongue.” Ways of Reading, 11th ed., edited by David

Bartholomae, Anthony Petrosky, and Stacy Waite, Bedford St. Martin’s, 2017, pp. 26-34.