# If Spanish is so Unamerican, why tolerate names like San Francisco and Los Angeles? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 27, 2002, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699 "2002-08-27T00:07:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Slainte](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a698b9/32.png) [@Slainte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slainte)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/41 "2002-08-28T01:23:48Z")
**Monty** don’t go putting words into my mouth and I’ll grant you the same courtesy, deal? There are two different issues here. I was addressing (in my last post) people who immigrate to the US. (Where did I imply or state outright that someone born here had to apply for citizenship???) If you are born in the US and can’t/don’t/won’t speak English then, I see it as going against the grain (The Majority) and thus _being a separatist_ as I stated before. **Monty** you won’t change my views any more than I will change yours - I offered to agree to disagree earlier - we’re not going to accomplish anything with this debate. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/42 "2002-08-28T01:28:11Z")
And an even bigger difference between “betweein” and “between.” The latter is, of course, what I should’ve typed above. ---
**Author:** ![Slainte](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a698b9/32.png) [@Slainte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slainte)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/43 "2002-08-28T01:35:48Z")
I wasn’t going to stoop to using a typo against you 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Girl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7bcc69/32.png) [@Mighty\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Girl)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/44 "2002-08-28T01:58:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by **Estilicon** \* > Mighy Girl, if you ever crossed the border to Latin America you will be shot. > Las palabras agudas llevan tilde cuando acaban en vocal (a, e, i, o, u), en n o en s. > Ej.: mamá, bebé, jabalí, dominó, champú, volcán, compás. > Las palabras graves llevan tilde cuando terminan en consonante que no sea n ni s. > Ej.: árbol, carácter, césped, álbum, Pérez. > Therefore Continuen does not have an accent. 🙂 > (You may continue) And if you had paid attention that day in class you would have not flunked… because you see, I am Latin American and I speak Spanish too. **Continúen** is similar to **actúen** , both have diptongs at the end, therefore in that particular case you must use the tilde to “break” the diptong in order to differentiate it from another form of the verb. Check [this](http://www.editame.com/0actuar.htm). ¿Comprendido? ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Girl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7bcc69/32.png) [@Mighty\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Girl)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/45 "2002-08-28T02:01:17Z")
And I should have added a smilie to that post, but I didn’t… cause I am a ditz… in two languages. All in good fun my fellow Hispano-parlante. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/46 "2002-08-28T02:16:22Z")
> [@](#): > > And exactly how good are you at picking up a foreign language? Not everyone has that ability. And, for numerous reasons, not everyone born in the United States uses English at home. Last I checked, home is where one learns their native language And how many of those native-born, non native English speakers don’t go on to learn English at some point prior to voting age? Sure, plenty of native-born citizens use another language at home, but that doesn’t mean they don’t also become fluent in English. If they’re native-born, they’ll start hearing English at least when they go to school (if not before).Children that young pick up languages much more easily than adults (and most of the people I’ve known in that situation not only ended up speaking English fluently, but speak it without a foreign acent) ---
**Author:** ![cornflakes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9d8465/32.png) [@cornflakes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cornflakes)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/47 "2002-08-28T02:36:58Z")
And I thank you, **Slainte** , for getting my name right. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Slainte \* > \*\*Let’s also please include Sioux, Lakota, Cherokee, Crow, etc in here - we need to conduct business in these languages & add it to our ballots because there are people whose ancestors spoke these languages when the White Man came in & took over. And their descendants still speak it today. \*\* Does anyone use a Native American language as their first language? Everyone spoke English as a first language on the few reservations I’ve visited. There are two arguments to this thread: “Spanish is just as legitimate of language to speak in California as English is”, and “whether or not we wish to spend tax dollars on (bilingualism).” Regarding the first, I don’t live in California, but Spanish was the first language of my state, and people have spoken it since well before this area joined the U.S., and it is the majority first language in many rural and urban areas of this state (besides being the _primary language of this entire frikking hemisphere!_) Regarding the second claim, bilingualism is an investment. It will cost far more to try to provide government services in English to a sizable chunk of the U.S. who will not learn English, and no, we will not create a one language country simply by saying that it will be so. ---
**Author:** ![Slainte](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a698b9/32.png) [@Slainte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slainte)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/48 "2002-08-28T03:02:27Z")
**cornflakes** said: > [@](#): > > No, the U.S. has been in Texas for about 150 years; their ancestors have been here for thousands of years and have spoken Spanish for hundreds of those years. Considering that we are the newcomers here, maybe we should be the ones who are required to learn a new language if anyone does. So **I** said: > [@](#): > > Let’s also please include Sioux, Lakota, Cherokee, Crow, etc in here - we need to conduct business in these languages & add it to our ballots because there are people whose ancestors spoke these languages when the White Man came in & took over. And their descendants still speak it today. Then **cornflakes** responded with: > [@](#): > > Does anyone use a Native American language as their first language? Everyone spoke English as a first language on the few reservations I’ve visited. I’m sure there are people who do, just as there are US citizens (by birth) that use Spanish as their first language (as has been stated in this thread). So, my question is do we cater to everyone (Spanish speakers, Native American language speakers, etc) or no one? ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/49 "2002-08-28T03:26:07Z")
Simple, we cater to everyone who needs a ballot in another language. You should have to indicate which language you need it in when you register to vote. ---
**Author:** ![TeaElle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8491ac/32.png) [@TeaElle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TeaElle)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/50 "2002-08-28T04:00:19Z")
But the question is still begged, how in hell is someone born and raised in the U.S. without ever learning English? Is this person not attending school? Is this person not working? Driving a car? If this hypothetical person is so far removed from society that they’re not going to school, not taking part in other society-building functions that would have forced them to learn functional English, why/when/how are they so tapped into the dominant society that they want to vote? ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/51 "2002-08-28T04:23:31Z")
Wow, **Jimbrowski** , where’d you get all that venom? Did I biligual ballot kill your grandma or something? I only talk about Spanish because that is the language that I have the most experience with. If I were from Louisiana or something, I’m sure I’d be talking about some other languge. Government services do this little thing called serving their population. For example, in a neighborhood with a lot of children, they build an elementary school. In retirement communities, they do not build elementary schools. Would you argue that you either have to build a school in _all_ communities or else build none? Would you argue that they would have to build a school for five hundred kids in every community, regardless of whether they had seventy-five children or two thousand? Of course not. That’d be ridiculous. Please stop being ridiculous. In areas with a large amount of speakers of a particular language (which might be Spanish in Watsonville, or Czech in Texas, or whatever) you provide for those people. In areas where things are different, you do things differently. You do not need a hard and fast rule that applies to all situations, but rather a set of guidelines that help you to reasonable serve your community. And when making those guidelines, it is reasonable to consider the percentage of the population that speaks a given language. It is also reasonable to consider that there may be a time when things do get unreasonable (like provideing a ballot translated into two hundred different languages) and to seek to provide the best service possible while avoiding being unreasonable, But did I really have to tell you that? ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/52 "2002-08-28T04:52:35Z")
Not an American but I thought ballots were already provided in multiple languages. It was a teen Jeopardy question for pete’s sake. 🙂 [L.A Times article](http://www.latimes.com/editions/orange/la-me-election21aug21.story) and this [Denver Post article](http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%257E53%257E762382%257E,00.html) seems to imply that the Federal government can demand bilingual ballots if a county is designated bilingual. ---
**Author:** ![MsRobyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/90ced4/32.png) [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/53 "2002-08-28T05:02:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Wolfian, but snipped heavily so as not to overwork the hamsters: \* > \*\*Dutch names like Ploughkespie and Pennsylvania, and French names such as Lousiana and New Orleans. Why start renaming things? > \*\* [nitpick]_Pennsylvania_ isn’t Dutch. It’s English (after William Penn, who had the land grant) and Latin ( **sylvania** means “woods”.) [/nitpick] Robin ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/54 "2002-08-28T05:30:10Z")
tlw: The real question is–Is the English speaking and reading society dominant in all the areas that person is likely to be? I submit that there are places in this country where someone can be born into, grow up in, get educated in, and operate in the dominant language in that area, Spanish. Now, of course that person very well may be exposed to English, but it’s not a requirement of that person’s daily life to operate in English. On a related note, there’s one area of Hawaii where the schools teach in Hawaiian. Here’s an even better example, I guess: [Sign Language has a writing system all its own now](http://www.signwriting.org); however, to my knowledge exactly zero ballots or election information is written in that language. ---
**Author:** ![Tristan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tristan/32/18058_2.png) [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 8:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/55 "2002-08-28T08:21:15Z")
**tlw** - Sadly (IMHO), it is entirely possible to get through the education system without being able to read and write, or speak, English. All you have to do is refuse to learn (or be unable to) and the school system, by law, is required to provide tutoring and material in whatever language you choose. Many folks make a bid deal that the US has no ‘official’ language. This is bull-pucky, in my opinion. The vast majority of US governmental paperwork is in english. All of the major documents of our governmental body are in english. The majority of our citizens speak english (although Spanish is rising quickly). Certain groups **won’t let** the US go to Enlish only. They whine about how unfair it is to immigrants, how cruel it is to strip latino/hispanic people of their culture. This is also crap. All over this country, there are people that are descended from German, English, Swedish, Asian, and other cultures. They speak fluent English, many of them as their primary language. And yet this still have Oktoberfest, or Chinese New Year. How, I wonder, did these folks manage to preserve their culture? If only other folks could do it to!! Oh, the humanity… Demanding seperate things (ballots, tests, etc.) in other languages is divisive. The last thing we need is another group claiming special privlidge based on something like language. We have enough of that as it is. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/56 "2002-08-28T14:05:22Z")
So, Tristan, if someone’s unable to learn another language than the one they’re exposed to at home, what’s the solution? Surely we’re not going to punish someone for an inability to learn another language? Also, they’re not claiming special privileges; they’re claiming a right. ---
**Author:** ![Jimbrowski](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9a140/32.png) [@Jimbrowski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimbrowski)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/57 "2002-08-28T16:47:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by even sven \* > **Wow, Jimbrowski … Did a biligual ballot kill your grandma or something?** No, but she got some chit in her eye and we’ve never heard the end of it. Sorry that I came across as venomous. It was the frustration talking. > [@](#): > > **In areas with a large amount of speakers of a particular language you provide for those people. …consider the percentage of the population that speaks a given language.** What’s the cutoff point? If the group represents 25% of the entire population? 10% 1%? Who decides the cutoff point? In my first post I asked you to identify which languages _do not_ rate their own ballots. You didn’t answer that question, and I’m not surprised. I suspect that anyone trying to do so would look like a divisive racist (‘linguist’ didn’t really fit, but I mean someone who discriminates against another based on the language they speak). “My language _of course_ gets it’s own ballot, and let’s see… you, you, and… you get your own ballots, but YOU! \ \ YOU are small in number. Nay, insignificant actually. No ballot for YOU!” Are you ( **sven** ) ready to deliver that message (even with a sugar coating) to a percentage of the population? What percent? That’s what I meant by having to accommodate every language other than English if we make the attempt to accommodate any language other than English. The arguments to include them are all the same (culture, heritage, community, etc.), and if you accept these arguments as valid for one language, please tell me why they aren’t valid for all? And if they are valid for all (as I suspect), then we have to either provide ballots in every known form of communicative medium, or we have to deliver some version of the ‘No ballot for YOU’ argument to some percentage of the population. I’d rather deliver this message, to 100% of the population: “Yes, your native language is beautiful, rich, expressive, and vital. Yes, we print our ballots in English. One does not correlate to the other.” [rant] “Culture” consists of history, music, art, language, dance, folk tales, often a common religion, often a geographic region, ‘contemporary community standards’, and at least 10 other things I haven’t mentioned. Does anyone other than me think that “culture” is not interchangeable with “language”? Language is a part of culture, often a large part, but it is not the only part. Declaring English as the official language of the U.S. is not, I repeat not, an assault on your “culture”. Tell your stories, play your music, generate and appreciate your art, speak your language, dance like there’s no tomorrow, worship together, visit the homeland at least once in your life, and take an active role in your community. THAT is your culture. If your culture is endangered by people speaking a language other than yours (GASP! in Public!), then I suggest your “culture” is already way past saving.[/rant] > [@](#): > > _originally posted by Monty_ > > …they’re claiming a right Puh-lease… Which ‘right’, exactly? Is it really a ‘right’, or is it more of a ‘want’. (“I want a ballot in my native language.” Yes, true. “I have a right to a ballot in my native language.” No, false.) ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/58 "2002-08-28T21:09:12Z")
> [@](#): > > Puh-lease… Which ‘right’, exactly? Is it really a ‘right’, or is it more of a ‘want’. (“I want a ballot in my native language.” Yes, true. “I have a right to a ballot in my native language.” No, false.) It **is** a right: [Voting Right Act of 1965](http://hcl.chass.ncsu.edu/garson/dye/docs/votrit65.htm) > [@](#): > > (1) Congress hereby declares that to secure the rights under the fourteenth amendment of persons educated in American-flag schools in which the predominant [p\*342] classroom language was other than English, it is necessary to prohibit the States from conditioning the right to vote of such persons on ability to read, write, understand, or interpret any matter in the English language. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/59 "2002-08-28T21:42:56Z")
> [@](#): > > So, Tristan, if someone’s unable to learn another language than the one they’re exposed to at home, what’s the solution? Surely we’re not going to punish someone for an inability to learn another language? If you really think it’s a punishment, then why is it okay to punish speakers of language X who can’t or won’t learn English , but not speakers of language Y, depending on how many speak each language. If it’s a punishment not to have a ballot in your native language or if there’s a positive right to have a ballot in your native language, it doesn’t depend on how predominant the language is . > [@](#): > > All you have to do is refuse to learn (or be unable to) and the school system, by law, is required to provide tutoring and material in whatever language you choose. I know this isn’t GD, but do you have a cite? Because ESL classes meet the requirements of the law in New York State, and those are not taught in the native language (in fact, the students may not even share a native language). ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699/60 "2002-08-28T22:08:39Z")
> [@](#): > > It is a right: > > ## Voting Right Act of 1965 quote: > > (1) Congress hereby declares that to secure the rights under the fourteenth amendment of persons educated in American-flag schools in which the predominant [p\*342] classroom language was other than English, it is necessary to prohibit the States from conditioning the right to vote of such persons on ability to read, write, understand, or interpret any matter in the English language. That’s right. They can’t condition your voting rights on whether you can read, right, understand or interpret in English. And they don’t .Nothing prevents a citizen who only speaks Italian, for example, from voting even though he doesn’t speak a word of English. Nobody tests him and says you can’t vote because you can’t function in English. He’s perfectly free to vote. He can have someone write out the names of the people he wants to vote for , so he can match them up in the booth and write out how he wants to vote on referendums (1- no, 2- yes and so on) so he can match it up. He may be permitted to bring a translator into the voting booth with him. He can even go into the booth and vote randomly if he chooses.The Voting Rights Act doesn’t say a word about bilingual ballots, and if it did, we’d already have them, in every language spoken by even a single non- English speaking American citizen. . [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-spanish-is-so-unamerican-why-tolerate-names-like-san-francisco-and-los-angeles/125699.md?page=4)