In A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood Rodriguez talk’s about what can be viewed as “the thing and the other thing.” “The thing” is growing up bilingual. The “other thing” is bilingual schooling and the world’s interaction with bilinguals as children. Although the main chunk of the essay is about Rodriguez’s personal experience, he returns to the subject of bilingual schooling a few times throughout it. His point is to disprove the effectiveness of bilingual education. He uses the bulk of the essay to give himself credibility in disproving this. His life is used as reasoning for his view that bilingual schooling doesn’t work. He talks about not being able to join society until he chooses to speak English all around instead of speaking Spanish
