In the article Francine Prose’s Problem, author Gina Apostol bases her writing on the idea that people “need a brown savior to tell them how to read.” Essentially she is referring to the concept that people who come from backgrounds other than white, share a sense of “double consciousness.” This double consciousness serves as the ability to view a situation from other perspectives rather than just in the “white dominant” perspective. In her writing, she discusses the accusations made by Francine Prose, an American novelist. The novelist claimed that plagiarism took part in a story on Pakistanis in the U.S, and was very similar to a story on Canadians within Europe. Apostol believes Prose way of thinking like a white woman, disregarded the context surrounding both stories and believes Francine Prose did not take the stories meaning and purpose into consideration. As a person of Mexican descent unlike Prose, when it comes down to interpreting texts my ability to acknowledge the origin and distinct purposes falls much further than just the literal statements being made. I exemplified this in my class engagement, especially at the beginning of the semester when we covered My Mothers Garden by Kaitlyn Greenidge. My Mother’s Garden reflects the upbringing of a young girl and how she is battling with her life after her parents’ divorce. She struggles with adjusting to her new life in public housing, while also being a scholarship student at a wealthy high-class school. Some would say that her struggles as a person came from home, rather than the oppression she was clearly facing at school. From the story I could take that it wasn’t her mom or her living situation that bothered her, it was the ignorance being spread around her school. My ability was that I could interpret that ignorance and see the real issue.

In My Life’s Sentences, Jhumpa Lahiri writes “the best sentences orient us, like stars in the sky, like landmarks on a trail.” My interpretation of this is, just like there is a meaning behind everything there is a meaning or story to be told surrounding writing. In much of my writing and reading, I’ve encountered various instances in which I noticed there was more to wording than its literal meaning. For example in Superman and Me, the author Sherman Alexie shares his experience with literature when growing up on a reservation and while doing so makes certain statements that carried a greater meaning than perceived. Throughout his writing, he repeatedly said “I was smart, I was arrogant, I was lucky” and while many would have seen this as a general statement for me it meant much more. I saw that he was frustrated at how circumstances for other Indians on the reservations were even though he wasn’t saying it directly. He was upset at the fact that things had become so difficult, that his own people were doubting themselves to be more than what society has limited them to.

Referencing the article, If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me What Is? By James Baldwin, like the novelist, I feel as if much of my reading has influenced my identification within my writing. Throughout the semester we explored various texts that incorporated people of different backgrounds, like Native Americans through Sherman Alexie, and African Americans through Kaitlyn Greenidge. As a person who is categorized as a “minority” in America, I found that I constantly identified with not only the prejudice but many of the social norms that are placed on people every day. My writing has grown to touch on things about myself, like my experience as a Bronx Native who’s been apart of different environments. While some may feel hesitant about talking about their backgrounds, I felt that I was able to share much more of my identity and views as a person.