Silence
(Maxine Hong Kingston)

In Maxine Hong Kingston's autobiographical piece "Silence", she describes her inability to speak English when she was in grade school. Kindergarten was the birthplace of her silence because she was a Chinese girl attending an American school. She was very embarrassed of her inability, and when moments came up where she had to speak, "self-disgust" filled her day because of that squeaky voice she possessed (422). Kingston notes that she never talked to anyone at school for her first year of silence, except for one or two other Chinese kids in her class. Maxine's sister, who was even worse than she was, stayed almost completely silent for three years. Both went to the same school and were in the same second grade class because Maxine had flunked kindergarten.
The first time Kingston had to speak English in kindergarten was the moment silence infiltrated her world. Simple dialogue such as "hello" or asking for directions was hell for her......

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Title: Silence
Approximate Word Count: 636
Approximate Pages: 3 (250 words per double-spaced page)

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