The Hate U Give almost made me cry but it was very interesting at the same time. The main protagonist, Starr Carter, lives two very distinct different lives. One who lives in Garden Heights with a predominantly black population and one who goes to a private school with a diverse population. The Starr who lives in Garden Heights can be herself and not constantly worry about what people think of her. The Starr who goes to Williamson speaks like everyone else and changes her personality to fit what would be ideal to the students who go there. But at the same time, she is automatically considered cool at Williamson because she is one of the very few black kids who go there but at Garden Heights, she doesn’t stand out. Code Switching plays a huge role here because when she is with her friends in Garden Heights, she doesn’t have to worry about switching her speech because everyone speaks just like she does but when she is at Williamson, she has to worry about speaking more “White Mainstream English” because she doesn’t want people to know where she’s actually from. In Amy Tan’s article titled “Mother Tongue”, she talks about how her mother speaks English but not very clear for everyone to understand, for a lack of better terms, “broken”. Because not everyone can understand her, they don’t give her the same respect they would to someone who speaks “perfect” English. She also talks about how when she is around her mother or her husband, she talks the same way her mother would and everything is normal but when she is around her friends or in a professional setting, she switches her language. Code – meshing plays a huge role here because Tan speaks in the same “broken” English her mother does with her husband without even realizing it and her husband is used to this so he doesn’t notice any difference in her language. I can relate to this because whenever I call my mom, I tend to speak to her in a mix of English and my native language, Tamil or just “broken” English even though both my mom and I can speak English pretty well.
Blog Post #2
