Haven’t just

I seem to recall Bartleby, that old Melville character that so baffles many of us in this so called modern world, whenever I cherish the idea of entertaining thoughts on Chicanismo. I feel am so way beyond that that the mere thought entails and automatic I prefer not to.

I believe I have lost my English voice and I do not know how and when this happened and worst yet why. It seems as though Spanish has taken sole control over what I say, communicate and invent via the written and oral means of parlance. Mind you, this area used to be the sole realm of English hence my bafflement. As soon as I am done with the day’s rant or keyboard orgy of thoughts I am done for whatever reason and pursue only that thought in all the vanities that entail being a blog writer and in Spanish. What is up with that? One reasonable explanation is that Spanish provides a more rewarding exchange. I noticed this when I began communicating with other English writing bloggers. I could never identify with them due to some odd chasm of sorts whereby what would otherwise seem to be on the surface unity factors created deep underlying differences. Mostly because the 2 or3 years I spent peeling off propaganda from my Xicano identity also put me light years ahead of them in terms of advocating a release of the semiotic chains that entail the harmonious union of all Xicanos. I proposed to do away with Aztec semiotics and concentrate on local semiotic for identity, in my case, I became painfully aware that Aztec nor Mayan semiotic did justice to my Xicano past so I sought it out. I even went as far as to abstain from the patriotic allegiances from the nations that feed the chicano ens in an effort to be able to see my identity in a clearer light. But either way, I severed my self from the linguistic aspect of chicanismo in some respect while I rended my self asunder.

Curiously enough while I was doing all of this in English I was also at the height of my Spanish writing where I fought opinion at the frontier of ignorance towards people like me, albeit in Spanish at the gates of the then Tijuana blogsphere. This passion to discuss Chicanismo in Spanish overtook English as the preferred vehicle to convey ideas and suddenly Spanish took command of every whim and thought I had on all sorts of matter. It is not that I have lost favor for the English language but that Spanish became the language most readily available to embrace the outcome of my habitual musings. Hence, in order to get back to English as a preferred vehicle to convey my thoughts I must make sure that the proceedings of the mind occur in the language I deem to be neglected the most, in this case, English.

Of course, the implications for such an assertion can not go by unquestioned because it challenges several linguistic views of which I know nothing about yet an inkling begs to differ. We leave out the theoretical framework for some other more studious brain than mine. The degree of consciousness to extrapolate one’s recurring stream of knowledge and frame it in a choice of one language or other brings on the notion of free will to its tip since monolinguals would seem to lack the choice we bilinguals seem to have, and as the monolinguals, don’t exercise until a sufficient awareness of consciousness is achieved. But that is the least of our concerns here because the most important one lies not on the choice but the threat it represents to identity. One can readily argue that my aforementioned thoughts are proof enough that identity is a construction of language, something that patriots would most surely loath to embrace. Thank the all mighty language ain’t all in this world.

Afterthought: I realized a catharsis breakthrough in my bilingualism has ocurred. That is what I like about the blog, it brings consciousness to a new level of sorts.