Texas Association of Chicanos in Higher Education Noticiario Noticiario_Summer2017 | Page 13

My Mother’s Language History: Lenguaje de la Familia
By Amanda Cordova, Doctoral Fellow
commented that her mother “was ill and I was going to have to do my part and go to work. So I
wanted to learn as much as possible.”
When she entered 11 th grade her mother’s heart disease progressed and was bed
ridden. At the same time, she received a $20,00 0 scholarship from the Baptist Convention
Association for her academics and from being a “full member at the Mexican Baptist church
called Primeria Iglesia Baptista” that is still functioning today. The scholarship was to attend
Mary Hardin-Baylor College (later renamed University of Mary Hardin-Baylor), an all women’s
college at that time. However, due to her mother’s worsening condition, she declined the
scholarship to stay home and care for her mother, who died soon after she graduated. She said
she didn’t regret declining the scholarship because “It’s just the way things were, I had to take
care of my mom first. I don’t regret that.”
Marriage & Work: A Steady Decline of Spanish
When my mother got married, she began speaking what she refers to as Tex-Mex, a
combination of English and Spanish. Her husband spoke “broken Spanish” because he grew up
speaking English. Eventually she just spoke English with him and when she had kids they also
spoke English in the home. She said they didn’t think about the use of Spanish at home with the
kids because their focus was on making sure their children did well in school and could obtain
good jobs. She explained, “I wanted my kids to have good careers and good jobs. I didn’t want
them having a hard time. Everyone had a hard time back then. Nobody had toys, we had
nothing.”
She also returned to the Catholic Church to attend services with her husband,
where the masses were in English. In addition, she also remembers being harassed during her
adult working years and getting into trouble for speaking Spanish with a colleague. Eventually,
the hostile work environment caused her great emotional and physical distress and she asked
to be transferred to another department. In her home, work, and church life her language
experiences shifted to mostly English.
Views on Bilingualism
My mother believes it was easier for her than others to learn English because she
was already familiar with the alphabet in Spanish from her experiences with the neighborhood
teacher. She didn’t think Spanish interfered with learning English, however she also noted that
she thought the first language should be English because it is easier to get employed when
English is the first language. She also indicated people “could learn both at the same time, if
they apply themselves.” Now she wishes her kids knew Spanish and had grown up learning
Spanish. She quickly laughed after that statement, noting, “but with the grandkids I like that I
can talk Spanish and they didn’t know what we [husband] say.”
She returned to a Baptist church several years ago, where the service is in all
Spanish and where she is a Sunday school teacher. In this role she tries to keep the kids
involved because they all speak English and she fears they will leave church if they can’t
understand the service or communicate with others. She has also reconnected with old friends
from her neighborhood who she visits often, and resides in San Antonio where Spanish is more
commonly heard compared to her previous home in Corpus Christi.
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