Spanish in the USA. Language Shift to English or Language Maintenance?

Index

1 Introduction

2 Spanish in the USA

3 Language Shift Through Generations
3.1 Signs of Language Shift to English
3.2 Signs of Spanish Maintenance

4 Conclusion

Enclosures

References

Abstract

The seminar Sociolinguistics, hold by Dr. xxx, gave me first insights into language use. Thereby, the isolation of languages is unrealistic, especially in times of globalization. Even in the United States is not only English spoken. Beside other languages, you can hear Spanish in a lot of American cities. Researches into this will be the matter of this term paper.

1 Introduction

America is not a monolingual country as often assumed. Rather, a number of languages like these of the natives, Chinese or French, come in contact with English, the language of the Anglo-American majority.

The following work focuses on Spanish in the USA. It will consider to what extent language shift to English takes place or whether the minority language maintain it's ground. Hypothetically, the descendants of Spanish-speaking immigrants can get their language in future through the third generation and beyond.

To understand the whole set of issues, some information about the history and the current situation in the USA are given first. Then, the language shift through generations in general is illustrated. Facts, speaking for and against a language shift from Spanish to English today, will follow. At the end, there is a conclusion.

2 Spanish in the USA

Most Americans speak English as their native language, although “there is no law or constitutional amendment establishing a national language“ (Potowski 2010: 1). Instead “a linguistic culture that supports the use of English [...]“ (Schiffman 2005: 121) prevails. Spanish-speaking people make up the second largest part of society in the United States as the American Community Survey examined in 2007 (Enc. 1).

Nowadays, over 50 million people in the USA - which is about 16 percent - are rooted in Spanish-speaking countries of origin, according to the latest investigations of the U.S. Census Bureau released in 2010 (Enc. 2).

Here, the term Hispanic is quite unclear defined by the American government. It denotes “all persons of Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Central or South American, or other Spanish culture or origin” (census.gov 2010: 2). False associations were raised because the term implies the Hispanic, i.e. Iberian, origin of the speaker. Indeed, the majority of Spanish speakers immigrate from Latin America to the United States. The term, immigrants and their descendants prefer, is Latino. Both names describe the minority due to their linguistic and cultural heritage, whereas race is no distinguishing feature (cf. census.gov 2010: 2).

Mexican Latinos provide the largest group of Spanish speakers in the USA, followed by the Puerto Rican. Both communities have basic historical, cultural and linguistic differences. So the Mexican culture has been significantly influenced by indigenous elements, while the Puerto Rican has taken decisive elements from African cultures. Since the first Spanish settlements in the 16th century, Mexico is in close contact with the United States because of the shared border. The U.S. states of Arizona, California, New Mexico, Texas and parts of Colorado temporarily belonged to Mexico in fact (cf. Potowski 2010: 66- 67).

The colonial relationship between Puerto Rico and the USA differs from that of Mexico fundamentally. It is part of the United States since the 1898 Treaty of Paris. In 1917 the Puerto Ricans acquired US citizenship automatically (cf. Potowski 2010: 67). But both communities also have similarities. The Spanish language unites them, even though there are different varieties. The same applies to America. There is no single Spanish variety. Instead, a rich multiplicity of types of Spanish exist. In the northeast and southeast for example one predominately hears Caribbean Spanish, whereas in the southwest Mexican varieties of Spanish engross the conversations (cf. Potowski 2010: 75).

3 Language Shift Through Generations

No matter where the immigrants come from, language shift begins immediately upon their arrival in the USA. In STÖßLEIN 2005 one find the following figure to illustrate the process:

Abbildung in dieer Leseprobe nicht enthalten

Image 1: language shift (Stößlein 2005: 118)

Based on the language situation of the Latinos in the United States Spanish is the L1 language and L2 represents American English. The author avails himself of research findings on language shift provided by FISHMAN in 1966 and VELTMAN in 1987. He also notes that language shift to monolingualism is not always the only way to immigration. Rather, this is an pure type within three generations (cf. Stößlein 2005: 118).

On their arrival in America, the first generation of Latinos is monolingual Spanish usually. Afterwards, they either stay monolingual or become bilingual speakers with their mother tongue as dominant language and English as L2. To remain monolingual, the social environment must be applicable. All areas of everyday life need to be covered by the minority language, which is almost impossible (cf. Stößlein 2005: 118ff.). Spanish-speaking immigrants moving to an area with a high density of Latinos are able to receive their mother tongue longer than it would be the case in predominantly Englishspeaking areas. There, they are much more exposed to the pressure of the majority language, resulting in a faster language shift (cf. Stößlein 2005: 119).

The children of the first generation, i.e. the second generation, become bilingual. Due to contact with English in school and in public this is a spontaneous development. Children born in the USA lose Spanish faster than those who were born in the country of origin and partly grew up there. The age is crucial here according to BEARDSMORE. If children come into contact with English before the age of twelve, the language shift will be easy. For the second generation, the question is whether they use English monolingual already or as L2 (cf. Beardsmore 1986: 166ff.).

The language shift differs in each family. Characteristic for immigrant's children is that older ones have a higher Spanish competence than their younger siblings. The reasons behind are the language skills of the parents. They mostly speak Spanish. Not until living in the United States for a while, they use English to communicate (cf. Zentella 1997: 56ff.). Besides a positive attitude toward English, most Latinos like their children to speak Spanish. However, there is a discrepancy between will and implementation. Total commitment for this goal come to pass only in the Spanish dominant first generation of immigrants and decreases in each generation (cf. Zentella 1997: 57).

Older members of the community often tend to correct children. Sometimes they were even ridiculed if their Spanish is not accurate. Especially in early childhood, this can lead to frustration. Speakers prefer to use only English then, what brings about decreasing competence and lack of vocabulary in Spanish (cf. Zentella 2002: 331).

The third generation of immigrants is predominantly monolingual in English, the former second language. It is considered as mother tongue, although the group often has at least a passive knowledge of Spanish. Above all, the sentimental value is worth preserving the language, whereas the communicative value usually disappears (cf. Stößlein 2005: 118). The identity of Latinos who speak merely little or no Spanish anymore, requires a special explanation. They draw on traditions like food or dance, which are not lost like the language. Thus, they want to honor their origin. It is interesting that the identification with the culture increases while language competence decreases.

“Es kommt also bei Latinos zu bestimmten Zeitpunkten zu Positionsbestimmungen gegenüber der eigenen Kultur, der eigenen heterogenen ethnischen Gruppe, aber auch hinsichtlich der eigenen Identität. Dabei geht parallel zur Abnahme der Sprachkompetenz eine höhere Bewertung der Werte wie Tradition, Kultur, kulturelles Erbe, Latino-Stolz (orgullo, pride) einher.“ (Stößlein 2005: 151)

These aspects should replace the lack of language as identity marker (cf. Stößlein 2005: 149). Latinos whose parents have gone through a rapid assimilation develop a strong affinity to the language of the old country. Participants in Stößlein's examinations often breathe the wish to relearn Spanish; another indicator for Spanish maintenance (cf. Stößlein 2005: 143, 211).

3.1 Signs of Language Shift to English

Code-switching is one of the most striking phenomena in the course of Spanish-English language contact. It usually refers to the multiple language exchange within an interaction.

“Code-switching is the use of material from two (or more) languages by a single speaker in the same conversation. […] all the other participants also speak, or at least understand, both (or all) the languages.“ (Thomason 2001: 132)

Sometimes it is not easy to distinguish between an element of code-switching and lexical borrowings. In contrast to single words, which are integrated into the target language, code-switching requires certain bilingual competence (cf. Thomason 2001: 72). Its function differs from situation to situation. Immigrants cannot describe extra-linguistic realities of their new country in their language of origin sometimes.

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