Loss of Spanish language America's loss

National Catholic Reporter, Feb 9, 1996 by Moises Sandoval

I was born in a remote rural area of northern New Mexico where everyone spoke Spanish. The language had been passed from generation to generation since Spaniards colonized the area in 1598. Before I began grade school, in a one-room schoolhouse, my parents taught my brothers and me how to read a little Spanish. With that foundation, I needed no language studies when I began traveling to Latin America on reporting assignments or when I was asked to start a new bilingual publication.

Yet, I broke that long tradition. My children speak very little Spanish. They tell me it would enhance their careers in management consulting, journalism, education and health care if they did.

I trace that loss of Spanish to our family's move to Brighton, Colo., in 1944. There, we were a despised minority. The discrimination was worse if we spoke Spanish, and, trying to gain acceptance, my siblings and I stopped using it. As a teenager, I remember pleading with my mother not to speak Spanish when we went shopping so that people would not give us looks of disapproval.

Then, when I went to college in Wisconsin, the girl I fell in love with and eventually married was of Irish, French and Swiss descent. Though she had spent part of her childhood in Panama and Guatemala, she spoke little Spanish.

In recent years, Spanish has gained prominence. The notices that accompany my monthly telephone and utility bills come in both English and Spanish. At the automated teller machine, the first question the computer asks, in both languages, is: "Do you want to continue in English or Spanish?" Health care companies vying for my business write to me in both languages. A bank in my hometown had its clerks take a course in Spanish to better serve its customers. Clearly, the business world has found that Hispanics represent a vast market waiting to be tapped.

That insight has not escaped the church. Demographers predict that by 2013, Hispanics in the United States will have increased to 42 million, from a population that today numbers 24 million. They will then be the majority of Catholics in the nation. In thousands of parishes, Mass is celebrated in Spanish. Many bishops and hundreds of priests and nuns have taken classes in Spanish. When a diocese asks me to give a talk or a workshop, it often requests that it be in Spanish. In his recent trip to the United States, the pope gave part of every homily in Spanish. Not to be outdone, Protestant churches are making similar efforts.

Legislators are the only ones out of step. Hispanic magazine, which keeps track of such matters, reports that 22 states have passed English-only laws and more are planning to do so. These laws specify that the business of government must be carried out only in English. Yet it is to govern well that use of Spanish is most necessary. In Colorado some policemen take courses so they can be effective in Hispanic neighborhoods.

Spanish is useful or essential for many other public servants: immigration agents, judges, social workers, clerks and especially teachers, so they can teach children not yet ready for an all-English curriculum.

English-only laws assuage fears such as those expressed in a letter received recently the writer claimed that Hispanics are overflowing the eastern coast of America and trying to take over, turning any neighborhood into their own country, refusing to learn English."

Pandering to such inaccurate views hardly justifies English-only laws. Often such legislation leads to discrimination, even in areas where the laws do not apply. In some instances, workers have been reprimanded or even dismissed for speaking Spanish in the workplace, even during their lunch breaks.

Those who lobby for English-only laws argue that teaching children in Spanish until they learn English robs them of the chance to succeed. But Spanish has been no barrier to success for the children of that small community where I grew up. On the contrary, my contemporaries did rather well in the larger world. Among them you can find a university vice president, a dentist, many teachers, college professors, a nun, a sheriff, a judge, ranchers and businessmen. Like me, all of them found Spanish to be an asset.

Others argue that unless there are English-only laws, there will be no common language. But in fact the dominance of English is not at risk. As various studies show, most Hispanics learn English and, eventually, forget their Spanish. A recent Associated Press report describes how a radio station in Dallas stirred a storm of protest when it decided to change from bilingual to all-Spanish programming. The complaints came not from the English-speaking community but from the Hispanics. They said that many of the young people no longer knew much Spanish.

It is sad that in a world getting ever smaller, with a clear need for more and better communication, the knowledge of Spanish -- and other languages -- is being lost in America.

Moises Sandoval is editor of Revista Maryknoll, a Spanish-English mission magazine, and editor at large of Maryknoll magazine.