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Proyecto Visión 21

Linguistic intimidation has changed tactics, not goals

Just a few days ago, in Nashville, Tennessee, voters rejected a proposal to make English the official language of that city. That same week, Iowa legislators began to debate a bill to repeal the “English Only” law adopted in that state in 2002.

However, according to several experts I spoke with, those two events are not the beginning of a new and positive attitude towards linguistic diversity, but only a change in the strategy of those who, due to their own linguistic limitations and insecurities, still insist in controlling who should speak what language and when.

In the United States, there are more than 30 states and 100 cities with “English Only” laws. According to Fidel “Butch” Montoya, founder of H.S. Power and Light ministries and former vice-mayor in Denver, those laws, instead of promoting the integration of new immigrants, “they perpetuate the discrimination against those immigrants, preventing them from being part of the community and civic process.”

“If I were for ‘English Only’ laws, I would be very concerned about the growth of Spanish, especially in the Southwest. And if I were a business person, I would be concerned about laws in favor of just one language,” he said.

University of Arizona Dr. Mary Carol Combs said the “English Only” movement is not as powerful today as it was in the 80’s, when Combs was the director of the English Plus Project of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC).

“However, proposals to restrict the use of other languages are still being introduced, and not only bill in the legislatures, because there are other ways to restrict and ‘punish’ immigrants,” she said.

Some of those alternative ways are laws restricting the access to jobs or housing for those who do not speak English and changes in bilingual education programs that will not help non-English speaking students.

Author, pastor, and educational consultant Stan Perea, said the recent vote against “English Only” laws was not the result of a different attitude towards languages, but it was only a pragmatic change due to the economic challenges in the country.

“Suddenly, people realized immigrants’ money is good many and, therefore, now they want to be friendly to those who they were discriminating against just a few weeks ago,” he said.

Coincidently, the same day I wrote a news story about this issue, State Senator Dave Schultheis (Republican) publicly expressed at the Colorado Legislature his opinion against a campaign created by the local Department of Transportation to promote the use of seatbelts among Spanish-speakers.

Two elements explain such a reaction. First, language, culture, and identity are indivisible, as history, anthropology, and philosophy show. Second, in our post-modern world, language has become paranoid, and, therefore, language is just rhetoric. And rhetoric is an instrument of ideology, not dialogue.

For that reason, we should respectfully but firmly reject what Gloria Anzaldua aptly describe in her book Boderlands (1987) as “linguistic ideologies” that want us to believe Spanish-speakers speak a “bastard language” or a “sub-standard language.”

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