So, what's the big deal about bilingualism?

[kingpengvin]

@severus

I think it’s safe to say that today francophone Quebecers don’t consider themselves as merely a protected minority in Canada, which is what official bilingualism would make them. This is, as I said, part of the reason for the coldness that may exist between them and the francophone minorities in Canada. I don’t know what would have happened had official bilingualism been enacted earlier, but I’m willing to bet that the rise of Quebec nationalism was inevitable. Of course, that is of course what I’m going to say, since it is part of my own political philosophy.

We may not always agree on things Severus but I do have to say it is always good to hear your take on these issues. Hell, it always helps to hear another Canadian’s point of view on an issue regarding the country.

I never thought of Official Bilingualism as a protection of a minority group but as what was owed to the other half of the founding culture of this country.

Personally those rights should have been entrenched right from the get go (1867).

[Key_Lime_Guy]

@tomndebb

…but using English as the de facto language has not permitted anyone to demand that we recognize their petitions to the court that have been written in Gheg, Baluchi, Frisian, or even Spanish.

do court proceedings count as ‘petitions to the court’?

…mainstream DUI court did not work for Hispanic and Native Americans because of linguistic and cultural differences. And so the alternative courts were started in 2002; the Spanish-speakers court has even demonstrated a higher success rate than the English-language court.
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/0105spanishdui.html

how about voting material?
(note: Azusa is exactly the kind of community I was alluding to in post #49)

All information that is disseminated by the City of Azusa in English about “registration or voting notices, forms, instructions, assistance, or other materials or information relating to the electoral process, including ballots,” 42 U.S.C. § 1973aa-1a(c), shall also be provided in the Spanish language. Defendants shall ensure that English and Spanish language election information, materials, and announcements are made equally available to voters, including information on the City’s website.
…
Although the Spanish language minority group is the only language minority group in the City of Azusa currently requiring election-related materials and assistance, as a political unit within the County of Los Angeles, the City is also subject to the requirements of Section 203 for Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese. To ensure future compliance with Section 203, the City shall monitor changes in the City population and voter registration, and develop contingency plans to provide election information and materials to Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese voters should the need for language assistance in these communities arise in the future.
http://cybersafe.gov/crt/voting/sec_203/documents/azusa_cd.htm

how about other bureaucratic services?

Two associations representing owners of multi-family properties have brought suit again the Department of Housing and Urban Development over new regulations that require them to provide written materials and services to tenants and potential tenants for whom English is not their primary language.

NHMC and NAA Sue HUD over Language Requirements

[tomndebb]

@Key Lime Guy

do court proceedings count as ‘petitions to the court’?

What you have presented regarding Arizona is not an example of some odd person demanding that the courts cater to their linguistic whim, but a nativist prosecutor who is upset that a local community court has voluntarily made accommodation to help various people integrate more fully into the community. The DA even goes so far as to attempt to make it a “racial” issue instead of a language issue.

@Key Lime Guy

how about voting material?
(note: Azusa is exactly the kind of community I was alluding to in post #49)

Here you have a situation where a community is being told to recognize and address the issues of substantial minority populations. This is the sort of thing that was done for the Serbs, Croations, Slovenians, and Italians in Cleveland at the cusp of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries or for the Italians and Poles in Detroit and the Germans in Milwaukee in the same period. By making sure that the immigrants have access to the courts and voting, we show them that we want them to participate in the government so that they and their children are not disaffected and stand aloof from participation. When the number of English speakers rises above a certain level, (as happens with every immigrant population), the requirements are dropped.

Nothing says that Asuza has to run out and hire a dozen foreign language translators. The city could easily arrange to go into a joint venture with neighboring communities to hire a single translator (per language) to be shared among them. The Voting Rights Act under which the Consent Decree was arranged requires that a political entity provide language assistance only if at least 5% of the eligible voters are both non-English speakers and are “limited-English proficient” (or if those people reach a population of 10,000 even if it is not 5%).
We are clearly not talking about the Feds telling a city to hire translators when one Tanzanian couple moves in, speaking the click Hadza language. (And when the percentage of non-English speakers who understand English falls below 5%, the imposed rules no longer have force.)

If we make English “official,” does that immediately invalidate the Voting Rights Act (as amended)? If not, what additional laws must be passed (or clauses included in the Official English law) to make the appropriate changes?

[Little_Nemo]

The thing is all of the “official language” crowd is somehow assuming English is the language of the United States and people should learn to speak it when they get here. Can you explain why you think that?

I look at language as being like religion. Protestantism is the majority religion of the United States, but nobody (outside of Jack Chick) claims that so you should judge how well immigrants have assilimated to America by looking to see how long it took them to convert. Most immigrants are going to decide they don’t need to convert to a new religion. Just because somebody’s Catholic three or four generations after their ancestors entered this country doesn’t make them un-American.

By the same token, why is it assumed that an American has to speak English? Why can’t an American speak Spanish? Even if his family has been living here for a hundred or more years?

In other words, by not having an official language I could turn up in America speaking Zulu and the onus would fall on the listener to translate - anything less is cultural arrogance.

No, a monolingual Zulu speaker is going to find his language is a handicap because he’ll find few other people who speak Zulu. And a monolingual Spanish speaker is going to find himself handicapped because there are many areas of this country where people don’t speak Spanish. And a monolingual English speaker is going to find himself handicapped if he’s shopping in Hilarity’s neighbourhood.

But the monolingual Zulu and Spanish speakers are going to have to decide if the inconvenience of learning another language is greater than the inconvenience of being unable to talk to a lot of other people. The monolingual English speaker on the other hand just wants a law saying everybody else has to learn to talk in his language.

[Kokopilau]

@Hilarity N. Suze

I want to shop at the store in my neighborhood that I can walk to, not drive to some suburb. I don’t even mind that people are speaking Spanish, because I can read it, I can write it (sorta) and I can understand it (again, sorta). What I can’t do is ask where the mint sauce has been moved to. That’s sort of frustrating, you know?

If the neighborhood shoppers who go to the store want Spanish spoken there, then the store will adjust, because they stay in business that way. If everyone in the neighborhood speaks Spanish, and there are two stores in town (one that also has Spanish spoken there, and one that doesn’t), more business will go to the Spanish store, and the English-only store will probably close or move.

Likewise, if there aren’t enough Spanish speakers to keep the registers of the Spanish store open, then it is the one that will close or move.

That’s how capitalism works.

And many years ago I lived in a neighborhood known, pretty much, as a Latino neighborhood, where the stores were on one end of my block was a carniceria and across the street was a place that showed peliculos mexicanas. And what happened when I moved into this neighborhood was that my neighbors threw rocks at my house. I think I had to replace every single window on the first story in the first six months I lived there. Those people did not want me living in their neighborhood.

So jerkwads vandalized your house. That not only can never happen in neighborhoods without Spanish speakers, but that justifies your own bigotry against the residents of an entirely DIFFERENT neighborhood?

In fairness there was at the time a syndrome where a bunch of Despicable Yuppies moved into a neighborhood, bought a bunch of properties, spent a lot to pretty them up, and sold them for immense profits, raising the tax base and gentrifying the neighborhood. The DYs had some bad business practices that resulted in people not getting fair prices for their houses, not getting paid when they thought they’d sold them, and other things. The people in that neighborhood might have thought I was going to do that, but I just wanted to buy a house I could afford.

So you even admit that there’s an entirely non-racist explanation for why the residents of a Spanish-speaking neighborhood threw rocks at your windows, but you STILL use it to justify your bigotry against the residents of that entirely separate neighborhood?

But my point is, I don’t care if people move into my neighborhood who speak Spanish, I’m not throwing rocks, but I think they are trying to invade my neighborhood and turn it into another Latino neighborhood. There is already a new carniceria, elsewhere in my neighborhood. I’ve been living here all this time and they are making me feel unwelcome.

So you don’t care if people move into your neighborhood who speak Spanish, you just don’t want them actually, y’know, speaking it?

[John_Mace]

@Little Nemo

The thing is all of the “official language” crowd is somehow assuming English is the language of the United States and people should learn to speak it when they get here. Can you explain why you think that?

Oh, I don’t know. If they want to vote or deal with the government in any way it might kinda come in handy. Or if they want to go school.

I look at language as being like religion. Protestantism is the majority religion of the United States, but nobody (outside of Jack Chick) claims that so you should judge how well immigrants have assilimated to America by looking to see how long it took them to convert. Most immigrants are going to decide they don’t need to convert to a new religion. Just because somebody’s Catholic three or four generations after their ancestors entered this country doesn’t make them un-American.

That’s a terrible analogy. You don’t need to be any particular religion to go to school, vote, read the road signs or interact with your neighbors. It’s impossible to do those things if you don’t speak the common language. You might get lucky and have a bilingual education program in your school district, but don’t count on it (especially if your mother tongue isn’t Spanish).

By the same token, why is it assumed that an American has to speak English? Why can’t an American speak Spanish? Even if his family has been living here for a hundred or more years?

Well, they certain can do so. But if someone comes here with the intent of changing the national language from English to Spanish, they shouldn’t be surprised to meet resistance. Wars have been fought of that issue. English is the language of government, and I see nothing wrong with requiring citizens to speak it. If you want to speak another language at home or when you’re out shopping, fine. But don’t expect the government to accommodate your personal tastes in language.

BTW, how many people are there in the US whose families have been here for a hundred of years or more and who speak only Spanish. My guess is it’s so close to zero as to be insignificant. The only way we’d get a significant number of those people if parents chose to raise their kids speaking only Spanish, forcing them not to learn English. Thanks a lot, mom and dad!!

[Key_Lime_Guy]

@tomndebb

What you have presented regarding Arizona is not an example of some odd person demanding that the courts cater to their linguistic whim, but a nativist prosecutor who is upset that a local community court has voluntarily made accommodation to help various people integrate more fully into the community. The DA even goes so far as to attempt to make it a “racial” issue instead of a language issue.

Here you have a situation where a community is being told to recognize and address the issues of substantial minority populations. This is the sort of thing that was done for the Serbs, Croations, Slovenians, and Italians in Cleveland at the cusp of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries or for the Italians and Poles in Detroit and the Germans in Milwaukee in the same period. By making sure that the immigrants have access to the courts and voting, we show them that we want them to participate in the government so that they and their children are not disaffected and stand aloof from participation. When the number of English speakers rises above a certain level, (as happens with every immigrant population), the requirements are dropped.

Nothing says that Asuza has to run out and hire a dozen foreign language translators. The city could easily arrange to go into a joint venture with neighboring communities to hire a single translator (per language) to be shared among them. The Voting Rights Act under which the Consent Decree was arranged requires that a political entity provide language assistance only if at least 5% of the eligible voters are both non-English speakers and are “limited-English proficient” (or if those people reach a population of 10,000 even if it is not 5%).
We are clearly not talking about the Feds telling a city to hire translators when one Tanzanian couple moves in, speaking the click Hadza language. (And when the percentage of non-English speakers who understand English falls below 5%, the imposed rules no longer have force.)

If we make English “official,” does that immediately invalidate the Voting Rights Act (as amended)? If not, what additional laws must be passed (or clauses included in the Official English law) to make the appropriate changes?

I don’t disagree with anything you’ve said, and I don’t have an answer to your last questions; I was just providing some illustrations to show that the current situation does indeed create tangible social problems (and unfunded mandates) that communities must grapple with.

To identify social problems is not, in my view, racist or xenophobic.

I guess what’s frustrating is that we do not seem to have arrived at current policy by a collective discourse about the costs and benefits.

[Miller]

@Hilarity N. Suze

I want to shop at the store in my neighborhood that I can walk to, not drive to some suburb. I don’t even mind that people are speaking Spanish, because I can read it, I can write it (sorta) and I can understand it (again, sorta). What I can’t do is ask where the mint sauce has been moved to. That’s sort of frustrating, you know?

Hey, I want to be able to shop at the store in my neighborhood, too. Unfortunetly, it closed. Now it’s a Bed, Bath, and Beyond. So I have to drive three miles to go to the store. Yet, somehow, I don’t feel entitled to demand that the Bed, Bath, and Beyond turn back into a Safeway, just because it would be more convenient for me personally.

[Bridget_Burke]

@John Mace

… But if someone comes here with the intent of changing the national language from English to Spanish, they shouldn’t be surprised to meet resistance. Wars have been fought of that issue. English is the language of government, and I see nothing wrong with requiring citizens to speak it. If you want to speak another language at home or when you’re out shopping, fine. But don’t expect the government to accommodate your personal tastes in language.

BTW, how many people are there in the US whose families have been here for a hundred of years or more and who speak only Spanish. My guess is it’s so close to zero as to be insignificant. The only way we’d get a significant number of those people if parents chose to raise their kids speaking only Spanish, forcing them not to learn English. Thanks a lot, mom and dad!!

Ah, the spectre of Mexicans plotting to wipe out the English language! Yes, folks, that’s the real danger behind bilingualism. (Could the carnicerias springing up on every street be part of the plot?)

Why, my cable system just added another “Latino themed” channel! It already carries the half dozen broadcast Spanish channels–plus a few on digital cable. Why? Si! TV is aimed at the younger generation–programming is 100% English. (Well, I’ve heard a bit of Spanish–with subtitles.)

Learning English is required for US citizenship–with exemptions for the very old. Yet the voting machines in my precinct offer Spanish & Vietnamese translations. The unending amendments to the Texas Constitution are hardly written in conversational English; so the translations don’t bother me.

And I’d prefer the signs in restaurant restrooms informing employees they must wash their hands before returning to work be available in many languages. (I’ve seen them in English, Spanish, Vietnamese & Chinese.)

[John_Mace]

Bridget: Just to be clear, I was not suggesting that such people exist. I was responding to a poster who was saying it should be perfectly OK to do that.

[Little_Nemo]

Oh, I don’t know. If they want to vote or deal with the government in any way it might kinda come in handy. Or if they want to go school.

That’s a terrible analogy. You don’t need to be any particular religion to go to school, vote, read the road signs or interact with your neighbors. It’s impossible to do those things if you don’t speak the common language. You might get lucky and have a bilingual education program in your school district, but don’t count on it (especially if your mother tongue isn’t Spanish).

And this is my point. The government shouldn’t decide what language you should speak to deal with it. The people should decide what language they want to speak and the government should accomodate them. The government should serve the will of the people not vice versa.

Suppose the government decided that Esperanto was the best language and from now on was the official language of the government. All laws were to be written in Esperanto, school classes would be taught in Esperanto, the courts would work in Esperanto, traffic signs would be posted in Esperanto, etc.

How is it any different for the government to tell English speakers that they have to speak Esperanto to deal with their own government then it is for the government to tell Spanish speakers that they have to speak English to deal with their own government? If you say that the difference is that English speakers are the majority, then go back and explain how my analogy about Protestants being the majority is wrong.

[magellan01]

@Little Nemo

How is it any different for the government to tell English speakers that they have to speak Esperanto to deal with their own government then it is for the government to tell Spanish speakers that they have to speak English to deal with their own government? If you say that the difference is that English speakers are the majority, then go back and explain how my analogy about Protestants being the majority is wrong.

Because you can practice any religion you want. It is a private matter. Living in a society simply requires a degree of interaction with others and the government. It’s a huge difference. A government shold pick one language. In France, French makes sense. Here, English. Sure oyu could choose Esparanto, or Cantonese, or Pig Latin, but how wold you decide. Maybe, as you point out, the people themselves should decide.You know, vote on it. And if they did, woldn’t it make sense for them to choose adopting as the official loanguage the one that would be the least disruptive for the society as a whole to adopt to?

[Indistinguishable]

It’s true that the language and religion analogy doesn’t really work. Still, what are the supposed costs we’re suffering by not having English as the official language for all government work? I mean, is this really a big problem for anyone, that there’s no law requiring all government interaction to be done in English? So far as I know, it’s pretty much all done in English anyway. And if some government services are currently available in other languages as well, well, that’s a benefit of the current system, that it’s more useful to people in that way. Weighing the costs (monetary? In terms of efficiency? I’m not even sure what exactly is supposed to be gained) of English as an official language against the costs of the current system, what is it that makes the former come out on top?

But, then, I suspect most of the supporters of that movement are really pushing for English as more than merely the language of government.

[magellan01]

@Indistinguishable

But, then, I suspect most of the supporters of that movement are really pushing for English as more than merely the language of government.

Some my very well be. Speaking as one who feels strongly that we should have English as an official language, I do not hold that the “official” designation should play any role outside government. The corner store shold be able to advtertise in any language it thinks will be most effective. The pharmacist should hire help that enables better communication with his customers. Now, that said, I also think that more people speaking English during the course of their day is a good thing, and makinig English the official language would encourage that more than the current situation. The very reason that we are so diverse as a people argues for us encouraging to build some common denominators. This is one. The message itself I think is helpful.

[Annie-Xmas]

I have no problem with bi-lingualism, provided:

One of the languages is English
Nobody tells you what the other language has to be.

Anyone who says that bi-lingualism must include Spanish has an agenda. And people who only speak Spanish who say everyone should be bilingual are hypocrits.

[Gala_Matrix_Fire]

@Annie-Xmas

…And people who only speak Spanish who say everyone should be bilingual are hypocrits.

Well, obviously. Just like people who only speak English who say everyone should be bilingual are hypocrits. Fortunately, I doubt there are a significant number of people who say either of those things.

[tomndebb]

@magellan01

makinig English the official language would encourage that more than the current situation.

English is the (sole) official language of California. How is that working out in terms of uniting the state, so far?

[wonky]

@bluethree

Well, obviously. Just like people who only speak English who say everyone should be bilingual are hypocrits. Fortunately, I doubt there are a significant number of people who say either of those things.

Well, I will say that “everyone should be (at least) bilingual!” the same way that I say, “Everyone should eat right and exercise!” In other words, I think it’s a great goal that I don’t live up to.

I learn languages very quickly, but I have no opportunity to use anything but (Appalachian) English, so I lose them just as quickly. Lots of Americans are in this same situation, where they simply don’t have ways to use and grow in a language other than English. That’s a shame for some and a boon for others.

[magellan01]

@tomndebb

English is the (sole) official language of California. How is that working out in terms of uniting the state, so far?

We’re just one big happy familia.

First, having a state declare an official language has not near the import of having a nation do this. This should be obvious, so I’m surprised you missed it. Second, it appears to be merely a declaration, as you can get many governement documants in myriad languages. Not to mention that politicians can give speeches in any tongue the desire. I’m not sure of discussions in the sate congress have to be in English, but they should be. I recall someone in The U.S. House, or was it the Senate, last year addressed his colleagues in Spanish. A horrible idea; to all but those whose knees start jerking madly when anything can be even described as “racist”.

[John_Mace]

@Little Nemo

And this is my point. The government shouldn’t decide what language you should speak to deal with it. The people should decide what language they want to speak and the government should accomodate them. The government should serve the will of the people not vice versa.

Well, now you are proposing something different. You were talking about individuals before, and now you are talking about “the people”, as a collective. Yes, “the people” should decide what language is used by the government, and right now “the people” want that language to be English.

If you want to propose that any subgroup of “the people” should be able to determine what language they use to deal with the government, then that would be chaos. You could have hundreds of languages chosen by increasingly small interest groups. That would also be an excellent way to make sure there were strong ethnic tensions in the US across multiple fault lines.

Suppose the government decided that Esperanto was the best language and from now on was the official language of the government. All laws were to be written in Esperanto, school classes would be taught in Esperanto, the courts would work in Esperanto, traffic signs would be posted in Esperanto, etc.

In this country “the government” and “the people” (as a collective) are really the same thing. Unless the president were to issue some directive, what you are proposing could only come about by an act of Congress-- an act by our duly elected representative. That is the only way we decide things nationally.