There are fleeting moments within many peoples’ lives where they realize that language is an intensely vast spectrum, far more than just a form of communication. It is evident that in some cases, language is a form of power. Growing up amongst a family with 2 immigrant parents, I learned rather quickly how the judgements you receive from other individuals may vary, simply based on the way you articulate.
My mom’s English has never been extremely fluent due to the fact that she had never continued her education after coming to America. Her speech was similar to that of many individuals who came from another land, enough to get by, but noticeably different from native speakers. I never thought much of it, that was, until I started to notice other people didn’t feel the same way.
An occasion that particularly stuck with me was when I had gone to the post office with my mother to order a new passport for myself, but I had arrived a little later than she did. When I walked in, I saw her already at the counter, leaning towards the glass, holding the required documents in her hands. The man behind the glass was barely looking at her, answering her with short, irritable responses. His impatience was evident, almost like he had more important matters to attend to than his own job. My mom continued to speak slowly and as carefully as she possibly could, trying to look for the words to communicate what she was trying to explain to him. The clerk, however, had no change of heart.
As I stepped up to the counter, excusing myself amongst the line of people looking at me, hurriedly explaining that I was with the woman at the front, I stood beside my mom, looked at the man behind the counter, and said, “Hello.” I noticed how suddenly his tone changed in his response. He sounded warmer, more welcoming, and more open. As I continued to speak with him, he nodded politely over and over, even though I had just been repeating the same information as my mother. It was as if the way I had spoken English had flipped a switch within him, one that indicated that I was more worthy of his attention to my request than my mother.
This occurrence left me perplexed, to say the least. It wasn’t simply about communication, it felt like a judgement of her worth and intelligence, and it was all simply because of the way she spoke. I questioned myself time and time again, wondering why it had taken my voice for the clerk to take us seriously. I felt an urge of natural protectiveness, but at the same time, I had internal conflict. Why would the way someone speaks determine the respect they deserve, or the intelligence they have, or how important they are?
Growing up in a predominantly immigrant neighborhood for my entire life, it was rather uncommon to see this sort of discrimination in most places. However, as I got older and would more often leave the settings of my neighborhood of non-native individuals, I would start to notice more of these occurrences repeat, whether the setting or people within the scenario had changed, people of all kinds of backgrounds. It dawned on me that many non-native English speakers felt extremely pressured to “correct” the way they speak in order to fit into societal standards due to the treatment many of them received. It is no secret that whether or not you learn a new language, there will likely be a deficiency in your speech, regardless of how minor it is. However, these minor deficiencies are the reasons many people overlook, underestimate, or even ridicule them in some cases. The striking part is, there is only one form of “proper” English in their eyes, that being the one that is used by people who were born and raised around others who spoke English and had done so themselves, granting an unfair advantage. This causes others to have to constantly try to mask their accents, shift our words in a way that makes it feel less authentic, and many other inconveniences just as a way to avoid the criticism.
My experience at the post office allowed me to understand that as much as language is a form of expression of identity, sometimes, it can be a form of identity suppression as well, depending on whether or not you allow others to define what is acceptable and what isn’t. It also revealed a large unspoken truth about how the way you speak represents your professionalism, respectability, and intelligence. This, in turn, leads to the fact that language, whether or not we realize it, enforces a social hierarchy based on how similarly you speak it in comparison to the natives. The less you fit into the category, the less competent you are treated as, regardless of whether or not you’re saying the same exact sentences. Opportunities and social mobility tends to be more restricted and gate kept in many fields from education to healthcare, expanding to government services or even everyday encounters through the filter of language.
“Language is power, life and the instrument of culture, the instrument of domination and liberation.”
— Angela Carter
That day at the post office truly opened my eyes to the discrimination we see in plain sight, and how power is determined in forms that may be less accurate than we may imagine. Language should be a form of connection, not a way to create rifts between natives and non=natives. Until we as a people learn to recognize the value in everyone regardless of the way they speak, we will all fail as a society to induce the most productivity within our community.
