Richard Rodriguez: A Bilingual Teacher

Aside from the adjustment that she had to make when participating in extracurricular activities while maintaining her academic performance, there were a few things that she did when doing her work, that was different than the way we (mainstream American students) interacted with it. I will never forget her mini laptop looking translator! She used it a lot, especially in classes like biology and English, when a lot of the words that were being taught were not words frequently used amongst she and her peers. This translator helped her a lot because she was able to decode the meaning of words without having to constantly ask the people around her. She would type the word in English into the translator and in turn be given the definition of the …show more content…
Another thing that was important to her parents was their Japanese traditions and lifestyle. They lived in Japan way longer than they had in America, so as expected, they stuck to what they had known majority of their lives and were not influenced greatly by American ways, especially since they were unable to communicate as effectively as Mai could in English. While they visited Hawai’i once a year before their big move, her parents stayed true to their roots. In Rodriguez’s, Hunger of memory: The education of Richard Rodriguez, he points out, the idea that “Today he hears bilingual educators say that children lose a degree of ‘individuality’ by becoming assimilated into public society” (Rodriguez, 1982, p. 26). However, in Mai’s situation that was definitely not the case. Through the assimilation and enculturation process her identity and culture was never taken away from her. The English language and American culture became a part of who she was, and her Japanese culture remained in her cultural backpack. “One can become a public person while still remaining a private person,” (p. 34) and Mai is living proof that this can be the case, because she spoke Japanese at home and English at school. She also maintained her culture ties through participating in Japanese traditions at home, and enrolling in our school’s Japanese club. On the other hand, Mai believes that she herself was “Americanized” in a sense that she adapted/loves American fashion and is even a brand ambassador for a well known, American based, bikini company, San Lorenzo. She has returned to her homeland and now goes to school and works at a clothing company. She explained that going back was hard because she had to leave all of her close friends, however, she has made new ones in Japan, and still maintains the friendships that were made in America. The food is different, the fashion is different, and