Liberty & Justice For All
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
“I pledge allegiance to the Christian flag and to the Savior for whose Kingdom it stands; one Savior, crucified, risen, and coming again, with life and liberty for all who believe.”
“I pledge allegiance to the Bible. God’s Holy word, I will make it a lamp unto my feet, a light unto my path, and will hide its words in my heart that I might not sin against God.”
“You may be seated,” says the Vice Principal. Metal chairs scrape the hardwood gym floor in a cacophony of unorganized noise as students and teachers take their seats. Chapel continues on: Prayer, standing to sing, a quick sermon, singing again, and finally, the smiling exclamation of “Back to class!” from the elementary school Principal. My private, Christian, elementary school education, did not deviate all that much over the years. Bible classes were part of the curriculum, nearly everyone went to church on Sundays, and students pledged allegiance to the American flag, the Christian flag and the Bible during chapel without much revolt.
This environment affected my life in many ways, but perhaps most profoundly, it irrevocably linked the topics of God and America in my mind. To paint the picture more vividly, back at my initial private elementary school in Texas, we did not put on a Christmas concert every year. Instead, we performed several patriotic songs — from God Bless the USA, to Yankee Doodle, to the National Anthem — all the while, waving flags and wearing red, white and blue. We called it the “God and Nation Program.” Even our uniforms at this school were patriotic — only the colors red, white or blue were allowed. And to top it all off, we recited the pledges of allegiance every morning before class. I’ve said those three pledges so many times they’re burned into parts of my subconscious. From these experiences, I understood that to love God, was to love America and to love America, was to love God. These ideals, coupled with growing up in a southern, conservative, Christian family, added a third category to this list: To love God and to love America, was to be a Republican.
In James Paul Gee’s book on Discourses, Social Linguistics and Literacies: Ideology in Discourse, he describes a Discourse as an identity kit, “composed of distinctive ways of…acting, interacting, valuing, feeling, dressing, thinking, believing with other people and with various objects, tools and technologies,” (Gee 171). So, as a child, I was part of the American Discourse, the Christian Discourse, as well as the Republican Discourse. However, because these Discourses were communities I did not chose to be a part of (because I was born into them), these Discourses made up what Gee calls, my primary Discourse. Home life and immediate family members are responsible for shaping primary Discourses (Gee 173). My primary Discourse was that of a Republican, Christian, American, but for most of my life, I never saw these Discourses as separate entities. As they were such foundational pieces of my everyday life, I saw these three Discourses as irrevocably linked. I was an American, so I was a Christian, so I was a Republican.
However, these three Discourses are not part of everyone’s primary Discourses. In fact, in most cases they are categorized as secondary Discourses, which are Discourses acquired outside of the home (Gee 174). The key component of secondary Discourses is that they are social spheres with values, beliefs, or shared interests that an individual acquires from people outside of their primary Discourse. But, in my case, because these secondary Discourses (Republican, Christian, American) were introduced and incorporated into my life at such an early age, they were part of my primary Discourse. My introduction to the values and beliefs of certain secondary Discourses at a young age is a concept Gee calls early borrowing (Gee 175). This early borrowing allowed the values associated with Christianity, Republicanism, and American pride to be instilled in me the minute I left the womb.
Secondary Discourses occur “within a more ‘public sphere’ than our initial socializing group” (Gee 174) so, for most people, our introduction to secondary Discourses happens once we enter school. However, because my initial schooling in Texas aligned so closely with the primary Discourse I acquired at home, I didn’t begin to acquire any secondary Discourses (opinions and beliefs outside of my family’s) until my family moved up to Seattle when I was ten-years-old.
After moving to Seattle, I finally met a few Democrats, lived near a big city, and met people who were not Christians. In becoming more aware of the world around me however, and in understanding that not everyone thought about the world in the same way as my family, I began to feel a bit of unease. And perhaps the introduction of secondary Discourses into one’s life isn’t always quite so unnerving. But for me, this transitional period in my life came with the complication of gradually recognizing that I did not (and maybe never did) think about the world in the same way as my parents.
Perhaps this a fairly understated thing to say because I’m sure every teenager at one point or another feels this way, but I feel as if the extent to which I disagreed with my parents is something that I wasn’t able to throw off with the casual, “Well, I won’t do that one thing the way my parents did.” Instead, I saw that when my parents went right, I went left. When they thought an opinion was rational, I thought it unreasonable. When they felt a moral conviction, I felt the opposite. Our values, thoughts and feelings, were suddenly on the different ends of the scale and I began to feel lost, confused, and quite frankly, alone. Living within the values and opinions of my primary Discourse no longer felt comfortable and I didn’t know what to do.
In Richard Rodriguez’s essay, “Achievement of Desire,” he discusses his transition of moving from his primary Discourse of Spanish-speaking parents, into the secondary Discourse of the American, English-speaking classroom. Throughout this process, Rodriguez becomes so infatuated with the secondary Discourse of Standard-English education that he concludes he can no longer be a part of his primary Discourse (Rodriguez 528) because his adoption of a secondary Discourse takes over (what Gee would call) his lifeworld Discourse. A lifeworld Discourse is the way in which we are “everyday” people (Gee 174). It often contains the values and beliefs we acquired in our primary Discourses, but there are cases when, like Rodriguez, the adoption of a secondary Discourse becomes so prominent in an individual’s life, that the influence of the secondary Discourse becomes stronger than that of the primary discourse. In his essay, Rodriguez claims that, as an adult, he can barely speak Spanish anymore and that he has become “culturally separated” (Rodriguez 532) from his parents. He explains that his primary and secondary Discourses are far too conflicting for him to exist simultaneously between the two (Rodriguez 528).
Like Rodriguez, my lifeworld Discourse was a tangle of two conflicting Discourses. In the last few years of high school (whether I was aware of this, or not) I identified as a Republican less and less. Obviously, I identified as an American, because I still lived in the United States. But the one tricky inconsistency of my changing opinions (and Discourses) was the fact that amidst all these changes, I still identified as a Christian. But, my parents also identified as Christians. How could we all have such opposite moral convictions and still identify with the same religion? Maybe we couldn’t. I believed in God, but I couldn’t call myself a Republican. And because my primary Discourse had so linked Republicanism and Christianity, I was convinced that I could not leave one Discourse and keep the other. In leaving my Republican identity behind, I would have to leave Christianity behind as well.
When 2015 rolled around, I was legal to vote in my first presidential election. At the beginning of the debates, I had no idea who to vote for. I wasn’t even sure of which party to vote for. So, I watched everything. Every debate, broadcasts from every network, interviews with each candidate — I did my homework. And I knew that my parents would vote Republican, but at the time, I wasn’t worried because they liked people like Rick Santorum and Marco Rubio, who didn’t bother me all that much. I disagreed with their policies, sure, but they seemed like fairly well-intentioned people. But when the election came down to choosing between Trump and Hillary, there wasn’t a question in my mind as to who would get my vote. I could not, in good conscious, vote for Trump. And I remember feeling that my decision was so morally “correct,” that I assumed my parents would feel the same.
The morning after Trump won the election, I woke up to a family group text between my immediate and extended family members that went like this:
“We won!”
“Yes! Unbelievable”
“It’s a great day! Can’t wait to see the egg on Hillary’s face. Can’t believe she won’t speak. She never planned for this *crying-laughing Emoji*”
“Just saw the news! I’m sure many at my work will not be there today. Most are liberals and hate Trump. Unbelievable!”
“It’s a ‘religion’ to them”
“Agree! Forgot you live in one of the few Clinton states. No wonder you can’t sleep!”
“I think I just witnessed a miracle. I’ve got all these yahoo’s out here apologizing to the world that they are sorry and that we ‘failed them’. Please begin the promised ‘march into Canada’! Hillary is transferring funds and probably planning for her escape.”
“I have new life.”
“So does the country.”
“All the liberals in my classes today haven’t shown up to class”
“The few liberals that are here don’t seem to want to talk to me today.”
“Be gracious in victory!”
I woke up to this thread of messages and cried. Their “victory” was my nightmare. I was lost, confused, hurt and for the first time, I understood that I couldn’t turn to my family for help. This moment illuminated just how much I no longer belonged in my primary Discourse. My tiptoeing into a Democratic secondary Discourse wasn’t just a phase. As Rodriguez suggests, I had to stop pretending I belonged in both spheres. It was time to pick a side, and in doing so, I knew my lifeworld Discourse would change.
The idea of leaving my primary Discourse behind was terrifying. It was made up of my home, and my family who, despite our differing opinions, I do still love. But loving people doesn’t mean we have to see the world in the same way. And this is something I’m trying to remind myself everyday. Now that I have left my primary Discourse, I am able to understand more fully what I truly believe. And because of this, being around my parents is becoming less and less uncomfortable. I know we don’t have the same opinions — I have my convictions, they have theirs. But I no longer see this as something that has to separate us.
My relationship with my family will never be the same, but I don’t entirely count this as a loss. It’s not like I will ever be the same either. Rodriguez says that acceptance of his secondary Discourse into his lifeworld Discourse, changed his relationship with his family, but it had also “…given [him] ways of speaking and caring about that fact” (Rodriguez 532). No, my parents and I don’t have many aligning opinions, but recognizing this difference has given me self-awareness and clarity of my surroundings that I’ve never had before. Gee calls this process of acceptance and understanding, liberating literacy, which occurs “[w]hen we come across a situation where we are unable to accommodate or adapt” and as a product of this discomfort, “gain deep insight into the matter” (Gee 200). Understanding that I could not continue calling myself a Republican, forced me to see why I could no longer identify with that Discourse. And because of this process of reflection, I was able to finally articulate what I believed in.
And perhaps most importantly, stepping out of the Republican Discourse allowed me to see Christianity through a new lens. So now, for the first time I can see that despite what I grew up believing, being a Christian doesn’t mean I must also be a Republican. I can be a Democrat and I can be a Christian. The two are not mutually exclusive. I can leave behind a piece of my primary Discourse while holding onto another, because the Discourses of my childhood are not irrevocably linked. Only in stepping outside of my primary Discourse was I able to separate and articulate the values and beliefs of my lifeworld Discourse, as opposed to ones I grew up accepting without question. And it’s only in untangling and putting back together allegiances I memorized so long ago, that I think I’m finally starting to find my freedom.
Work Cited:
Gee, James Paul. Social Linguistics and Literacies: Ideology in Discourses. Routledge/Falmer, 1996.
Rodriguez, Richard. Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez: An Autobiography. Dial Press Trade Paperbacks, 2005.
