So learn English already!
First of all, let me say this; I speak almost exclusively Spanish in my home. There are times when I speak Spanish with my wife outside my home when I need to speak privately to her. In fact, when I first saw Schwartzenegger make this comment last night, I was watching it on Telemundo – I watch Spanish language news programs. Well, here’s the report from SFGate;
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger told a gathering of Hispanic journalists that immigrants should avoid Spanish-language media if they want to learn English quickly.
“You’ve got to turn off the Spanish television set” and avoid Spanish-language television, books and newspapers, the Republican governor said Wednesday night at the annual convention of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.
“You’re just forced to speak English, and that just makes you learn the language faster,” Schwarzenegger said.
“I know this sounds odd and this is the politically incorrect thing to say, and I’m going to get myself in trouble,” he said, noting that he rarely spoke German and was forced to learn English when he emigrated from Austria.
When I first heard it, I thought, well, that makes complete sense. The language of commerce for the whole world is English – someone wanting to make money should learn to speak English, for Pete’s sake. Then I listened to the outraged SPANISH-LANGUAGE journalists complain about what Arnold said, and they pretty much echoed the SFGate article;
“I’m sitting shaking my head not believing that someone would be so naive and out of it that he would say something like that,” said Alex Nogales, president and chief executive of the National Hispanic Media Coalition.
“Naive and out of it”. Hey, Nogales, compa, you’re being naive and out of it. Â
From Hispanic Business.com, probably the most ignorant words in response to the governor’s statement that Latins should learn English;
“They’re busy working,” remarked panelist Pilar Marrero, political editor of Spanish-language newspaper La Opinion. “They don’t have time to.”
[…]
“Spanish media is there to do what the English media doesn’t do, which is to serve the immigrants,” Marrero said afterward.
Spanish media is there to make money for the Spanish media, Pilar. If your audiences learned to speak English, they wouldn’t need you anymore and you’d have to become a real journalist instead of victimizing and stigmatizing your audience. And next time you’re talking to the governor, and you’re trying to present yourself as a journalist, don’t end a sentence with a preposition – it detracts from your credibility.
I learned Spanish when I lived in Panama, I learned German when I lived in Germany. I already had jobs in boths places that didn’t have a language requirement for the local language, so I didn’t have to learn the respective languages – but I did out of respect for my neighbors and the people with whom I conducted daily business. There were English-language TV channels in both places, but I watched the local TV stations to immerse myself in the language.
And who better to make that “naive and out of it” statement but Scwartzeneger – an immigrant who came here speaking no English? Is it politically incorrect because he happened to be an immigrant from a European country instead of a southern country? Pilar Marrero thinks so;
Marrero said afterward. “As he said, it’s a political hot potato. I think he believes it, he thinks about his own experience. It’s different when you come from Austria than when you come from Latin America.”
That’s pretty racist, Pilar. Are you saying that Europeans are genetically predisposed to learning multiple languages? Or are you saying that Latins are too stupid to learn another language besides Spanish? Or are you just yapping to hear yourself yap?
Actually, the SPANISH LANGUAGEÂ JOURNALISTS were upset that Schwartzeneger implied that they, SPANISH LANGUAGE JOURNALISTS, were contributing to the inability of their audience to function in an English-speaking society and conduct English-speaking business. And they are. They’re just angry that he said it outloud – to a group of SPANISH LANGUAGE JOURNALISTS.
Like I said, who is being naive and out of it?
By the way, I speak Spanish in my home to keep in practice for when I visit Latin America – out of respect for the people I’m visiting. I can do that because my English (the language of commerce) is just fine.
Salud!
I have always been totally surprised (badly surprised) with the reactions people have with the language. In Spain there is a huge problem with the Catalan, Basque and now Galician nationalists who are implementing Catalan, Basque and Galician and nearly forbidding Spanish in schools and education.
The problem -I think- is that people do not take the language as it really is: a vehicle for comunication. And if you know more, you can understand more people. And that is valid both for Spanish-speaking moonbats there and for Catalan-Basque-Galician nationalist-moonbats here.
In my case, I can speak English and French, understand Italian and Portuguese and I am beginning to learn German and Russian. And I can tell you that I have not lost one inch of Spanish-ness. 😉
There is another thing though: it’s very interesting to see these far-leftists calling themselves “citizens of the world” and then being more nationslists than anyone…
Jonn Lilyea wrote: Welcome, Lady Vorzheva. Hypocrisy is not a recently acquired trait of the Left, as you know. I hope you visit often – I’m a recent fan of your blog and an admirer of your language skills. Â
This is ridiculous. I hate -HATE- how political correctness has come to dominate discourse in this country. When my grandparents left Europe for the States, they had to learn English. Plain and simple. Bilingual education didn’t exist, it was very much a sink-or-swim environment for them. And you know what? They did it. Not only did they learn English which they spoke perfectly without an accent, but they retained their native language! They didn’t lose a their native culture just by moving to a new country –whoever says that moving to a new country from one’s homeland practically necessitates a loss of culture is full of what the birds eat, as my grandmother would say– they acquired a second culture. They assimilated. And you know what else they did? They prospered. And their children and grandchildren prospered. I am fully bilingual in English and Spanish, and I can get by in Italian (understand much, much more than I speak), am learning Portuguese, and I don’t feel as if I have lost part of one culture because I had to learn additional languages; I gained a culture, and at the same time, created a new culture, one composed of the old and new worlds, as it were. Political correctness, particularly when it comes to language-learning in the States, makes me sick. Anywhere else one would go in the world, one would have to learn the local language. Maybe it makes too much sense: learn the local language to succeed in a country. Only in America can we give driver’s license tests in so many different languages, and yet, when people can’t read the street signs in English, they will begin to complain, “Why aren’t they in Spanish/French/German/etc. too?” Jonn Lilyea wrote: Welcome, rolita. A rational person would view the balkanization of the Quebecois as lesson for the rest of us. But, just as in Quebec, the Left employs our cultural differences to split us into groups of potential victims. Too many people think that criticism of their inability to communicate is an attack on their culture (I include “ebonics” in that “inability… Read more »