I live in the North, so this entire argument has no bearing on myself or my employment.
But if I lived in the South I would most likely just learn Spanish. As it is, I am going to buy Rosetta Stone anyway....I have always wanted to learn another language and I cant think of a better (ie more applicable) language to learn than Spanish.
True... if you're going to speak a second language, it's hard to beat Spanish in terms of similarity to English combined with the number of people it allows you to communicate with. You get the entire rest of the Western Hemisphere except for Brazil, Quebec, Guyana, and a couple of islands.
You do realize that most forms either have english on one side, spanish on the other, or english and spanish on the same side (usually english and spanish separated by a "/"). Besides the added cost and care of translating and designing, you have added ink costs, and for the double sided variety, added mechanism costs. (aka, while each bilingual form probably only costs $0.005-0.01 more than the English version, when that cost is repeated BILLIONS of times it adds up).
Just as an example, the IRS spends a few extra hundred thousand dollars a year printing Spanish tax information. Bilingual ballots cost in the 10's of millions range.
No, I mean it wouldn't affect the business outlook, period. Businesses would still place an emphasis on bilingualism to communicate with customers on a more comfortable level. I'm saying nothing would change period, and if you think it would, you don't understand the difference between government and business.
And here's the difference: 9/10ths of the US population speak English at home. You last statement implied you would rather 90% of the country make an effort than 10%. That's just stupid.
I wouldn't expect Mexicans to learn English if I moved down there, or if I moved to France I would learn expect to be able to get around without knowing French.
I've met several people in my portion of the city that are 3rd or more generation immigrants and cannot speak English even conversationally, let alone fluently. They were protected under screwed up programs like ESOL (or in some cases home schooled) and were never forced to learn English in schools, home, etc... This is under a system where English proficiency is supposedly required.
Usually by the 3rd generation, English is the primary language, but that's not even close to always the case.
I personally believe than knowing multiple languages is a wonderful thing. I can usually understand enough from Spanish, German, or Japanese to get the gist of the statement, but I really can't communicate well in any of them. That's my personal choice of where to be with linguistics.
Like I said, I don't particular care whether English is adopted as an "official" language and any restrictions are put on other languages or not. I like having bilingual ballots. I'd hate to see EVERY language represented so, just because that's a huge amount of languages to deal with, and most with small number of speakers in the US. I do not like ESOL and similar programs that hide non-English primary speakers, though.
You do understand what racism means?And this is not racist??
If you don't, it means prejudice against a RACE of people.
His complaint is about 1) illegal immigration and 2) those who don't learn English don't really want to assimilate into society.
While the Mexican government and many spanish immigrants (as well as many liberals wishing to paint the convservatives as hate-mongerers) portray that as racism, it's not.
By assuming his statements imply racism, YOU are sterotyping the people you believe targetted by his comments, and YOU are perpetuating racist at udes.
Unfortunately, my profession lies within the auto industry. The landscape of the industry has changed dramatically, although I am much too "new" (ie young) to know what the good ol' days were even like. My reality has been the same since I entered the workforce....it sucks.
The majority of my customers are foreign. I routinely kiss the asses of Japanese, Chinese, Mexican, German, French and French Canadians (and just recently an Indian gentlemen with lots of cold hard cash funded exclusively by some people in India...not checks, not transfers....straight cold-hard dollars....very su ious).
Interestingly, I was in a meeting with oh-so-many Japanese men who were being interpreted by one American. I didnt recognize it at first, until after the meeting I asked the American "You speak Japanese?"
He said "No, I dont. One of them speaks Spanish. So, the others would communicate to him their terms in Japanese, he would in turn communicate those terms to me in Spanish and I would then tell you in English."
Its about that time I realized I needed to man the up and expand my lingual horizons.
Why buy rosetta stone when you can download it for free??????
Hook a brotha up.
That was mostly tongue in cheek, but in general, as an American child of an immigrant, I'm starting to get tired of people in this country telling me I have to bend over backwards to accommodate people who only speak Spanish.
If you want to live in this country, you should be adapting to its culture and language, not expecting everyone here to turn around and learn your language. That's ing lame.
Sorry if that pisses anyone off.
It's like the whole argument over illegal immigrants. My mom went through the proper process, and it took her ten years, TEN years, to get into this country legally. I think it's bull when I hear someone say that all illegals should be granted amnesty, shouldn't have to go through the due process and paperwork to get into this country legally, etc.
that. Other people who came to this country (like my mother) had to wait a long time and meet all the requirements to become a permanent resident here.
As to the whole English thing, it's there in black and white to become a naturalized citizen - you have to be able to handle basic english.
http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/usc...0045f3d6a1RCRD
If it's a legal requirements to enter this country as an immigrant to learn basic english, what's the big ing deal with making it our official language, exactly?
torrentscript.com is your friend azeurus is also your friend.
I agree with j-6. We should include other languages more into our schools. Otherwise, the US will continue to fall behind the rest of the world. Some of you might have heard of this globalization thing.
Don't most high schools these days have a foreign language requirement to graduate?
I mean... I suppose we could start earlier, but the ability to formulate a curriculum is probably not the limiting factor in the U.S. educational system. The fact that a plurality of children come from home backgrounds that render them completely unprepared to learn anything is the limiting factor.
Reading this forum every day convinces me that English as an official language is untenable, if only because so few Americans actually use that language as it was meant to be spoken and written.
Actually, its the malleability of English that makes it ideal for a common, official language.
whatchoo talkin bout willis
A perfect example.
i say we dump the spanish language, but we'll need to rename some cities.....san antonio...san diego.......los angeles.......el paso.....no, let'em keep el paso. i spent a month in el paso.......one day.
The non-Anglosphere world learns Enlgish as it is.
Theyve come to us, not the other way around.
What people and how are you bending over backwards to accomodate?
Where did you mom come from?
My parents also came over legally and my mom is a citizen, but I understand why some come over illegaly if the wait is too long. Do i agree, no, but I understand.
I've visited Mexico through out my life and seen first hand how difficult life is there. And its not by choice.
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