Will Puerto Ricans drop Spanish with Statehood?

[Ecuajey]

Originally posted by J-Rod
Puertoricans here in the U.S. have trouble speaking English, and MOST of us, even when fluent in English, still prefer to speak spanish...Most of the Southwest have bilingual programs all the way from Pre-School to High School, and most of the paperwork is done in dual, and sometimes three or four languages.

Most of whom? From what I know from living in two of the largest American cities with the largest Boricua populations in the continental USA, (NYC and Chicago) most Boricuas rather speak English. Let me rephrase that, most Boricuas who were born and raised in the USA and are at least second or third generation Boricuas. (The majority of Boricuas in the USA.) speak English with more ease than Spanish, and by the fourth generation, Spanish is nearly lost except for some words like "beso, amor" and "estupido." (Words any gringo learns with ease.)

You might have Spanish-language programs and paperwork in many languages in the USA, but the language to get around professionaly is and always will be English. If you want to be a janitor or a butcher, than Spanish might be all you ever need. However, if you want to be an engineer or a doctor, or even a secretary, knowing English is a must, and even though knowing Spanish might give you a raise, if you don't know inglés the other will be useless.

If the USA ever decides to make PR a state, the language issue will be a huge factor. It doesn't matter how many hispanic politicians there will be, most of them won't care about a small caribbean island, because most of them won't even be Puerto Rican. (Remember Rosselló's strategy of sending PR delegates to Hispanic, mostly Chicano organizations? It failed of course.) If English becomes a necessity of living the good life in PR, after three or four generations, the language will be vertually dead like Gaelic is in Ireland or Nahúatl is in México.

[J-Rod]

Raul, Ecuajey,
You both make good points, but my point is that the responsibility to teach our kids the language, and to preserve our heritage, IS OURS!...It doesn't matter if Puerto Rico becomes a state or not. About the children born and raised in the U.S., even more. If the parents don't care to teach them, of course they will loose their heritage. As for the bilingual factor, the spanish speaking population IS the one demanding bilingual education. Now, I'm sure that Puertoricans in Puerto Rico WILL NOT let the cultura y el idioma be forgotten. 500 years from now there will still be plena y seis chorreao. IT IS UP TO US TO KEEP IT ALIVE!!! Saludos cordiales...JRod...

[Waneko]

J-Rod

Your statement about how it is our responsibility to teach our future generations our language and culture is quite honorable (assuming you believe those things are important). However, it is also very unrealistic when it pertains to language. The reality is that future generations will learn and depend on the language that is spoken to them in school. They will depend on this language even more when it's the language that will further them from an economic standpoint. Somehow you failed to see Puerto Ricans in the U.S. as the perfect example of how language is lost from one generation to the next.

If you still believe parents can control whether or not a society can lose a language, let me ask you, do you believe people use drugs because their parents didn't bother to tell them to stay away from them?

[Raulgr]

Originally posted by J-Rod
. . . Now, I'm sure that Puertoricans in Puerto Rico WILL NOT let the cultura y el idioma be forgotten. 500 years from now there will still be plena y seis chorreao. . .

JR,

When was the last time that you were in Puerto Rico? I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the vast majority of the youth of this island have already given up the music of Puerto Rico in favor of salsa, merengue and rap. In fact, they have so little knowledge and appreciation of their own musical heritage that they proudly point to salsa as "our music".

Salsa, for anyone who is interested, is a 1960s creation of Puerto Ricans in the Bronx, who, in the musical void that followed the closing off of Cuba, dressed the rythym of plena in Cuban attire. Due to the rythmic similarity of plena and cumbia, central americans, notably Columbianos took to salsa like fish take to water. Salsa is not music of Puerto Rico.

While I love bomba and plena, when it comes to latin dance, I go back to the source - the rumba of Cuba, with its various forms: son montuno or mambo, guaracha, and guaguanco. I conducted a mambo workshop when I was in the states, patterned after the Eddie Torres dance workshop in New York. I particularly like mambo played in the charanga style. When I see kids dancing salsa here, I can't help thinking about what they are missing - if only they knew how to dance on clave. But, excuse me for suggesting that there is anything superior to "their music"!

Regards,
Raul

[ReddPR]

Originally posted by Raulgr

Miranda,

You are absolutely right about that process - it's called assimilation. You are a bit fuzzy on the numbers, though. I'll tell you exactly how many generations it will take - TWO! You can look at any naturalized parents in the U.S. Their children, attending U.S. schools, speak their parents first language grudgingly at home, but they ask granddad and grandmom to speak English to them because they don't want their foreign language to slip out in school and label them as foreigners. What do you think are the chances that they will speak that language to THEIR children? (Hint: Not a snowball's chance in hell!) And there's your PROCESS for you!

Regards,
Raul

You can't say "it takes x generations to assimilate." My grandparents were military and moved to the U.S. They lived there for a few decades and never really learned fluent English. They gave birth to my mother, who in my opinion was more "culturally enhanced" then they were. She jammed her aguinaldo CDs and learned her cuatro. I, on the other hand, a third generation son-of-an-immigrant you can say, dipped radically into culture and returned to Puerto Rico. I have a brother who resembles Jibaro and who is a member of the Navy, another who seems that rocks his Taino tattoo in the streets of London, a moderate PNP sister w/ very Americanized kids (this one never left PR), and a sister who married an American and has made the full assimilation to "American" middle-class culture.

Now I'll be honest. The most "Puerto Rican" people I have ever met lived in the U.S. The most "Americanized" PRicans lived in P.R.

[ReddPR]

Question. I'd like someone to look up on this.

When states like Lousianna, Florida, and so on were admited as states - states with populations made up of majorities of non-English speaking colonists and natives - were their native tongues kept in tact?

Also. Decades of English education and institutionalized attempts at Americanizations didn't result in the loss of our Spanish Language. Ironically, more people speak English now then during those times. Our threat is not a political status; it's economic and the cultural exchange that accompanies it. Free trade, liberal borders, and consemerism based on foreign products have more effect on our Spanish than food stamps and U.S. citizenship. In fact, I'd see independence as it's currently projected by the PIP as more of a threat to our culture than statehood.

[Waneko]

Redd

I strongly doubt anyone in Florida or Lousiana is still speaking French, Dutch, or the tongue spoken by the native Americans who are now sparse in population. Spanish is spoken in Miama due to the Cuban exile community. Thus, you can't find any proof there that one can maintain their native language under statehood.

When you say "Decades of English eduction" could you be more specific?

I disagree. If Puerto Rico's culture evolves as a result of being more worldly, than that's fine. The rest of the world has been forced to do that anyway without changing their identity.

You definitley have to be more specific when you try to say how Puerto Ricans on the island are less Puerto Rican than those in the states and vise versa. I just don't see it that way. You must be thinking about those people in the states who wave flags around and march in parades. Does that make you more Puerto Rican than the next guy? I ask because there are many folks in the states who do that and do not know a thing about Puerto Rico. But... even if this makes somebody more Puerto Rican than someone on the island, the issue here is really those who live on the island and the language they will speak under statehood. Again, I am not convinced that we can retain Spanish should English be implemented as the main language. I am also not convinced that the U.S. will even allow us to be a state that speaks Spanish in the first place.