Barbara Mellix (1999) in "From Outside, In" explains how a person of different ethnicity is also able to succeed in appropriating his or her own academic discourse through determination and diligence. She reports her own childhood as a little girl of two diverse, but similar languages. One of her mother tongue, "Black English," which she could use with her own community in a warm environment, and the other of the "others," "Standard English," which was used for articulate communication with the public that made her more influential and persuasive, as well as appear to be more educated. As a young girl, she had been taught what to speak and when to speak. She says that she always spoke proper English among the "others" whereas she spoke naturally to her own family. She knew that in speaking standard English, she demonstrated equality with the "others," but she also knew they were acknowledging their own inferiority and shame of their true selves. Nevertheless, school taught the significance of the standard language as it would be the difference from having a low paying occupation or a well paying one.
Mellix continues with the explanation as she describes her experiences of the move up north to the big cities and her desire of being a better writer. There in Pittsburgh she was exposed to a wide use of both tongues and in time she learned to manage them with ease no matter the situation. Her writing had been the same since she left school until she began her work at a health insurance company where she learned to write letters. There she studied the letters of her co-workers and acquired their form and style through memorization, but this only revealed to herself that her compositions were still mechanical and thoughtless. As time passed she matured and soon became a mother and that's when her ambition for becoming a better writer started taking effect. She became increasingly drawn to new developments in her life, the possibilities and opportunities for change, and in conclusion led her to enroll in a basic writing course in college to become possibly a school teacher.