Research Paper On Mother Tongue

The world is formed of diverse languages which all have one purpose, to allow one individual to communicate with another. People have altered the way language should be interpreted by associating a language with a personality. As people continue to adapt to these changes, it will soon become the cultural norm. A norm that says people are to be judged based on their language and, not their personality. Sociolinguistics have proven that society has developed a norm which illustrates the way a person judges another individual, the way they treat them, and the way an individual is labeled in society. Often times an individual will judge another person solely based on their language. In fact, it happens more times than people think. Imagine a society …show more content…
Language is supposed to be a tool that expresses ethnicity and culture, however people have turned language into a principle that forces people to speak that language if they want to be treated equal. Amy Tan proves this claim in her text “Mother Tongue” when she says “My mother had gone to the hospital for an appointment, to find out about a benign brain tumor a CAT scan had revealed a month ago. She said she had spoken very good English, her best English, no mistakes. Still, she said, the hospital did not apologize when they said they had lost the CAT scan… the doctor finally called her daughter, me, who spoke in perfect English -- lo and behold -- we had assurances the CAT scan would be found, promises that a conference call on Monday would be held, and apologies for any suffering my mother had gone through for a most regrettable mistake.”(481).This proves that people are treated differently based on the language they speak, and how well they speak it. Individuals are affected by the proficiency of the language society expects them to speak and cultures are affected as a whole when society labels them a certain