Exotic #7

"I like your accent" people tell me often. My responds used to be, "What accent?" Now my polite response is "Well thank you, I like yours too."This confuses people for the reason Anzaldua and Hughes agree is an eurocentric view. What is an accent and who has them? I assumed earlier that people who spoke two or more languages had accents but this is not so. British people have accents too and they speak only English. They speak the English that immigrated to the Americans. Ethnic Studies is the respond the the patriarchal, gringo based view of the world. Western thought excludes minorities as well as woman yet they create the identities of these groups. Orientalism suggest this theory by comparing the literature of Victorian writers who exposed Europe to the "exotic east."It is clear that the image of the orient were created by the west and that the orient or the real "orient" doesn't really exist. ( How come I don't see "Asian" men having sex in the media? I'm sure they are sexual beings too). This said Hugues acknowledge that as an minority, we tend to hide who we are and were we are coming from. I ask myself why is my accent so important or to be liked. We all have accents. People have the assumptions that some people required their answer to be mainstreamed. In my last speech, a classmate's evaluation said I had a "little accent." What does that mean? Is it wrong to have some type of accent and okay to have others? When the world is seen through what we, in the United States, we can view many things that had being assumed through generation as true and right. I used to be terribly upset when someone would speak of my accent like it was something exotic. I'm from Los Angeles. I have lived here most of my life. It makes me think everyone sees me as an outsider. Nevertheless as the author of Borderlands suggest, I cant punch people in the face forever "A counterstance locks one into a duel of oppressor and oppressed;" I must educate people regarding what is part of my being and culture. With he world become more globalized, I think history should be told from all sides. What I mean is that all should be as unbiased as possible. Anzaldua proposed that as an individual, we should all get to know our dual nature. We should connect with our subconscious, ancestry, and culture. We should left anything behind or reject any even if wrong. In the forever state of nepantilism.