I found this essay by Richard Rodriguez to be somewhat unsettling. In this essay Rodriguez relates how his academic education despite its many benefits, served to alienate him from his family and culture. Further Rodriguez describes his education to have been empty as far as substance. He felt that he did not develop his own opinions or ideas through school and readings, he just regurgitated up the information that he memorized. Overall, Rodriguez concludes that he didn’t really find his own voice until he ended his education.
Rodriguez continually refers to himself as a “scholarship boy” throughout the article, meaning a student from a poor and/or uneducated family who excels beyond what would be expected of him based on his demographic. He states, “I was a certain kind of scholarship boy. Always successful, I was always unconfident.” (pg. 431) Rodriguez tells us that his academic success was based more on extrinsic motivation, mainly the praise and approval of teachers, rather than a genuine love of learning. Further, Rodriguez explains that becoming a scholarship boy removed him more and more from his Mexican immigrant family. He quotes from Hoggart, “What he grasps very well is that the scholarship boy must move between environments, his home and his classroom, which are at cultural extremes, opposed.” (pg. 432) He felt embarrassed by his parent’s lack of education and English fluency which he came to see as a sign of one’s worth. His relationship with his parents also grew more distant as he became more and more driven by academia and “important books.”
It seems that Rodriguez found in retrospect that his academic education was detrimental to him in many ways. He describes always being nervous and seeking approval. As I mentioned above, he also claims to not have developed any critical thinking skills, ideas, or opinions or his own. He states, “I was not a good reader. Merely bookish, I lacked a point of view when I read. Rather, I read to acquire a point of view.” While he has clearly become successful because of his education, Rodriguez also stresses what he has lost in life by becoming the “scholarship boy.”
I believe Rodriguez is trying to convey that too much emphasis is placed on the value of a good education. Conversely, he is also saying that people are judged unfairly by lack of education. His parents, for example, had many skill sets, cultural knowledge, and other assets despite their limited English proficiency and lack of college education. Yet, Rodriguez felt embarrassed by them. He placed the idea of a scholarly educated man on a pedestal in his own mind, striving for that image rather than striving for real knowledge. I believe Rodriguez tells us these things about himself to demonstrate how prevalent these same perceptions are in our culture and educational system. More emphasis needs to be placed on intellectual development instead of becoming well read or scholarly.
Gere and Rodriguez made very similar points in their essays. Gere described the how the teaching of composition in schools and colleges neglected the points of view of those not considered “scholarly”. She stated she felt that the field of composition purposefully neglected extracurricular writers in order to gain credibility. Rodriguez describes himself in a similar way; he neglects his cultural background and own creativity in order to gain what he perceived as credibility. My interpretation of both authors is that they criticized this point of view and indicated that a broader, more inclusive perspective would be more positive for learners.
