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Coming Into Language Essay example

Decent Essays

Coming into Language “There is more pleasure to building castles in the air than on the ground.” This quote by Edward Gibbon illustrates the intensity of writing and what gratification it can hold. When one writes, they are not confined to one certain formula. A person is able to express their thoughts and feelings in any way they choose. Language is a border for many people in that some cannot comprehend a certain language, understand how to use it, or recognize what is being said to them. On the other side of the border, they are not viewed as equals or as important compared to those who are not competing with this barrier. In his essay “Coming into Language,” Jimmy Santiago Baca uses his personal experiences to demonstrate how much …show more content…

Learning how to read and write while he was in prison changed the way Baca perceived many things in life. He felt the loss he had endured throughout his whole existence until this point by not bothering to read or write. When he first started reading, he “became so absorbed in how the sounds created music” in him, that he forgot, for a while, where he was (Baca 54). At first, Baca did not want to believe that he was missing out on anything special, but as he started reading, it dawned on him that language was such a critical part of life. Reading gave him the chance to visit another world and, for a moment, it did not matter to him that he was locked up in a jail cell. He could connect with the outside world for a while and not have to worry about spending the rest of his life imprisoned unjustly. Baca was able to release all of his anger and repressed feelings that he had bottled up inside of him his whole life with no way to vent them out before. He realized that language was truly a gift that he had been lacking for the first twenty years of his life. Learning language was such a fortunate thing which allowed him to escape the horrors of life. When Baca learned grammar on his own and started writing, he discovered that he had a real talent for it. He finally felt like who he really was—who he was meant to be. He says that “Writing bridged my divided life of prisoner and free

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