Marina Pyfrom's Language Autobiography

Marina Pyfrom

C- Band

12/17/10

Benchmark Rough Draft

            “Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voice to infuse them with deeper meaning.”- Maya Angelou.  I hate to say it but sometimes people are not giving that opportunity without being judged. I know personally from experiences. Making your voice heard in certain places can often make you the outsider. Pronunciation of words can determine your place like education, learning process, and etc.  Language will always be distinguished, for the wrong things. People need to stop portraying the idea of the “perfect or correct” language. It doesn’t exist.

            As I sat in the reclining chair, looking at the mural of dancing toothbrushes, I waited patiently. My dentist came rushing in to check up on me because he knew I been waiting.

“Ahh , Marina, how have you been” ,said Mr. Solov as he sat in his little rolling stool.

“I’m fine,” I responded, readjusting my head so the dentist can check my teeth.

“Uhm, will can I get braces”, I said sort of mumbling.

“Oh yeah, let me check right now”, said Mr. Solov.

He placed the mirror like object in my mouth. He started making noises of reassurance “uhmm mhmm hmm”

“Marina, can you move your tongue back, and talk, it doesn’t matter what you say”, said the dentist.

I tried to position my mouth, to perform the exercise, as I was instructed to do. I failed the task horribly.

“I know the problem” ,said the dentist but I had cut him off saying, “Wooah, what problem, am I gonna die.”

He said with laughter “Noo silly, it’s not a big problem, just if you want braces, I would have to perform an additional operation because of your tongue condition”.

“What’s wrong with my tongue” I said with a crackling tone.

“Nothing, major. You just have a lisp. Do you notice how sometimes, maybe all the time, you tongue hangs or you always have your mouth open. Or maybe when you say some words the letter “s” slurs. Some say you have some type of speech impediment. Maybe its runs in your family.” Explained Mr. Solov.

            Listening to the dentist, I thought about the past. I never really noticed anything wrong with the way I talk. But now I was piecing the puzzle together. Sometimes while reading I struggled with words. It wasn’t because I never saw the word before and was sounding it out, it was the way I pronounced it, It wasn’t correct to my teachers.

Soon after my mom entered the room with my doctor and he briefly went over with her what he told me.

“Marina, its nothing wrong with it.” Said. Mr. Solow

            Mr. Solow was wrong. My lisp was the reason for everything. The arguments with teachers, they would always correct me as if I had no clue what I was doing.

            United States of America was said to be a free land of change, diversity, and a new start.  Accepting of any kind in any condition. “Don’t judge a book by its cover” was the line all adults taught children. How come it doesn’t go for adults also? I simply stumble on a couple words.             Just because I slur the letter “s”, making the “z” sound, it doesn’t make me any different. But, now living during this time I am labeled and categorized as “having a speech impediment”.

            I don’t understand how people down in the Caribbean have grown accustomed to the lisps for generation and generation. They may not even know what a lisp is.  Their thick accents over power what people from America call “lisps”. They pay no attention to because it is not important. Long as they are communicating, then nothing else matters.  Us, as Americans worry too much about stuff that is irrelevant, well to me it is. Like if you use improper over Standard English, it is a problem and you get penalized.

            You get punished for speaking, looked downed upon when heard. From having a tiny lisp made me the outsider. “the confidence of “belonging” in the public was withheld from them both” ( Aria by Richard Rodriguez , pg. 12)  I know the feeling and isn’t a good one. Hopefully, it will be figured out that everything with Language will forever be judged.  Sooner or later it will be discovered that “correct” language is not obtainable.