In his essay, "The Achievement of Desire,"" Richard Rodriguez states that he was know as the "scholarship boy" throughout his entire educational career. He used his own personal experiences, as well as Richard Hoggart's definition of a scholarship boy, to describe himself as someone who constantly struggled with balancing his life between his family responsibilities and his need for a better education. Rodriguez reveals that over time, he has gained what sociologist C. Wright Mills terms the "sociological imagination," which "enables its possessor to understand the larger historical scene in terms of its meaning for the inner life and the external career of a variety of individuals" " (Mills 8). Rodriguez's "The Achievement of Desire" switches back and forth, between his biography and the definition of "scholarship boy," based on Hoggart's definition. As readers, we're easily able to see that Rodriguez is not the only person who has struggled with loss, confusion, loneliness, and nostalgia, but is actually just one boy in a sea of many "scholarship boys. " .
During his last year as a graduate student, Rodriguez traveled to London, and was with many other scholars. When he finally feels as if he has found a community that he belongs to, he realizes that he has joined a "lonely community " (530), filled with "the faces of young men and women worn by long study" (530). This is when Rodriguez has an epiphany, or when he gains a "sociological imagination. " Mills tells us that an individual has developed a "sociological imagination " when he is able to "understand his own experience and gauge his own fate by locating himself within his period, that he can know his own chances in life by becoming aware of those of all individuals in his circumstances " (Mills 9).
Rodriguez shows readers proof that he has developed the "sociological imagination " because he sees himself in Hoggart's definition, he appreciates and understands his parents' backgrounds, he can see how education affected him, and he can return home to his family.