Shaw's Incomunicado emphasizes how language barriers are not individual struggles but reflections of much larger histories of violent structures in systems that oppress us. This particular incommunicado made me tear up because it is very close to my heart since I have witnessed the inability of individuals who are children of immigrants to not be able to communicate with their grandparents and even parents. It impacts me even more because these ritualized scripts of "Hello, how are you?" I have also utilized with my friend's grandparents when I would visit my friend's home. This kind of fragmentation or disconnection is not simply a product of laziness or disinterested but the outcomes of a long history of violent structural forces. It is the long history of racism and xenophobia in the United States specially after 9/11 that continue to marginalize immigrants' identity even more which includes their use of language, the denigration of bilingualism, and specially shames a lot of parents to assimilate themselves into English and their own children.
When it comes to the loss of language, it also brings psychological effects to the grandchildren's sense of identity and their cultural history. Not having the words to ask simple questions, stories, memories, and culture knowledge further reflects the outcomes that colonists' legacies have left to strip the individual's history and identity. This Incomunicado also made me think of how language is such a key to intimate connections with family members. In the video we can see how Shaw's conversations with her grandmother and grandfather have to be mediated by her mom which can bring some exchanges of care and affection but it does not compare to having profound conversations and developing a more intimate relationship. In contrast, when Shaw's grandfather finds the sister in a vulnerable moment, the simple phrase “I love you” surpasses the fact that they can't have a conversation. This is because communication here is not about vocabulary but it is about recognition and being seen as well as being cared for.
This also brings another important point which is how silence works when it comes to language loss and how it should not be associated with having nothing to say. Shaw reminds us how not everyone is silent because they lack words but they are silent because violent institutions such as schools or even nations refuse to listen to the languages they speak which immediately also refuses to see the identity of the individual. This is when silence can become a political stance which reflects resistance and also oppression that targets identities that don't comply with the normative white rhetoric of only using English and devalues non-English languages.