Opinion

Amy Tan's article, 'Mother Tongue' discusses the issue of fallacious stereotypes and how they can make life incredibly enervating. Her Chinese mother is often disregarded and not taken seriously due to her language abilities which are often perceived as lacking. Amy Tan expresses her exigent thoughts on how and why society may perceive her mother as unintelligent, although her mother is in fact profoundly well read. I can connect to Tan's struggle because I have come across such deleterious generalizations regarding my parents as well! What I find to be the most unbearable are the sanctimonious stares that are a bonus to the package, how convenient. 

Through this opinionated post I will decry the stereotypes plastered on those whom feebly speak the English language. Excuse my candor, but I find it exceedingly acerbic to believe that those whom cannot speak the English language as eloquently as you do lack intelligence. In fact, they may very well be bilingual or trilingual speakers thus the English language cannot mark a lack of language skills. My father for one speaks Arabic incredibly fluently; in his time of leisure he enjoys reading poetry, novels, newspapers, and many other linguistically challenging forms of media. My father can also speak English, although it may not be as cogent as when he speaks Arabic, I would say that he is fluent. If anyone were to deprecate my father by telling me that he lacks intelligence due to his English language skills, I will alacrity rejoin to their criticism and I will rebuke their incredibly ignorant surmise because it is unjust to label people in such a barbaric manner. My father studied law, an incredibly rigorous and intellectually demanding course and I will not stand for such censure. I will intransigently vilify their acrimonious criticism.  

My father is very proud of the Arabic language; he always insures that his language skills are precocious. My father believes that the Arabic language is the most important thing in our lives, and with mass globalization we must strive to preserve it. It is the language of the Quraan, it is the language of our ancestors, it is the fragile string that holds our culture together. Arabic, unlike English, is incredibly complex with an immortal set of rules that you must abide by in order to be a well spoken individual. This is the reason why so many of the younger generations repudiate it and choose to steer themselves towards the English language. With all my respect and love for the English language aside, they cannot abandon their mother tongue because through doing so they unconsciously abandon their identity. Thus, they will always feel lost.

I am proud of all the languages I speak, and I must admit: I continually make mistakes in both. However, I am proud of my bilingual abilities and I will not accept calumnious criticism projected towards me by people whom cannot appreciate the true beauty of language.