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Richard Rodriguez

Richard Rodriguez Quotes

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Famous Richard Rodriguez Quotes

“When the Irish nun said to me, "Speak your name loud and clear so that all the boys and girls can hear you," she was asking me to use language publicly, with strangers. That's the appropriate instruction for a teacher to give. If she were to say to me, "We are going to speak now in Spanish, just like you do at home. You can whisper anything you want to me, and I am going to call you by a nickname, just like your mother does," that would be inappropriate. Intimacy is not what classrooms are about.”

IfsWantGivingDoeSaidUseHomeWould BeMotherGirlNamesSpeakLanguageBoysClearTeacherLike YouAskingStrangerIntimacyLoudAppropriateInstructionClassroomNunInappropriateBoy And GirlNicknamesSpeak Now
Author:Richard Rodriguez
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“For them [LGBT group], language has to say exactly what it means. "Why aren't you proud of being gay?" they wanted to know. "Why are you so dark? Why are you so morbid? Why are you so sad? Don't you realize, we're all okay? Let's celebrate that fact." But that is not what writers do. We don't celebrate being "okay." If you want to be okay, take an aspirin.”

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Author:Richard Rodriguez
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“America has never had a very wide vocabulary for miscegenation. We say we like diversity, but we don't like the idea that our Hispanic neighbor is going to marry our daughter. America has nothing like the Spanish vocabulary for miscegenation. Mulatto, mestizo, Creole - these Spanish and French terms suggest, by their use, that miscegenation is a fact of life. America has only black and white. In eighteenth-century America, if you had any drop of African blood in you, you were black.”

IfsIdeasFactsUseAmericaBlackTermWhiteBloodCenturyDiversityDaughterWideNeighborBlack And WhiteVocabularyFacts Of LifeHispanicOur DaughterCreoleMiscegenationMulattoes
Author:Richard Rodriguez
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“Mexicans who come to America today end up opposing assimilation. They say they are "holding on to their culture." To them, I say, "If you really wanted to hold on to your culture, you would be in favor of assimilation. You would be fearless about swallowing English and about becoming Americanized. You would be much more positive about the future, and much less afraid. That's what it means to be Mexican.”

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Author:Richard Rodriguez
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“If you want to live in Tennessee, God bless you, I wish for you a long life and starry evenings. But that is not where I want to live my life. I want to live my life in Carthage, in Athens. I want to live my life in Rome. I want to live my life in the center of the world. I want to live my life in Los Angeles.”

IfsWorldWantLongWishEveningLos AngelesBlessRomeLiving My LifeLong LifeGod BlessTennesseeAthensGod Bless YouCenter Of The WorldCarthage
Author:Richard Rodriguez
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