Reading Response #24 (Anzaldua)

Summary:
In the articles "Tlilli Tlapalli: The Path of the Red and Black Ink" and "Toward a Mestiza Rhetoric," Gloria Anzaldua and Andrea Lunsford delve into identity and its importance in the writing community.

Synthesis:
This article reminded me strongly of the others about identity we have read, but it also reminded me of the Villanueva article. I was reminded of the latter because of the cultural aspects of the writers. In terms of subject matter, I drew comparisons to Wardle and Flynn, and could even trace some aspects of identity back to Gee. However, I believe that this article is vastly different than those of Cixous and Smitherman, because it does not really touch on either gender or race.

AEI
1. The significance of this distinction is that tribal art, with its communal characteristics, loses a bit of identity because it is being contributed to by more than one person, and identity can be lost in translation when this happens. However, Western culture is very individual and has only become more so, and as an effect, there is much more identity in Western works. I believe that due to my selfish generation, literacy and art culture are both becoming much more individual, as most believe now that the needs of community are no longer very important.

2. I don't believe that this would have been nearly as effective if it were written in traditional format. Part of Andalzua's identity is her identity as an artist, and therefore the style she writes in is ultimately reflective of her identity as an artist, which only shapes the piece more, as that is what she is trying to entice her readers to do when they write.

Personal Thoughts
I really enjoyed this article. It was probably my favorite out of all the identity-focused articles, although I believe that ultimately they were all very helpful, as I have always been encouraged to put more of my own identity into my writing. In general, this section really interested me, mostly because I'm finally reading something that I can freely think about.