America is Fast Becoming a Bilingual Nation

Just like our neighbor Canada to the north, where both French and English are spoken, the United States has moved rapidly toward becoming a bilingual nation of English and Spanish speakers. To most people, this is already apparent. When you visit the grocery store and use an automated teller machine, it offers instructions in both English and Spanish. When you call the electric company or even the Internal Revenue Service, you are usually forced to listen to about seven or eight menu options, and included are choices for Spanish speaking representatives. By now, most people know what "oprima dos" or "oprima nueve" means, even without a formal course in Spanish instruction.

It's not much of a mystery why America is moving toward bilingualism. With election season upon us now in 2008, we are constantly reminded in political ads about our "border problem" with our Hispanic neighbors to the south. We now have about 12 million of what are euphemistically referred to as "undocumented workers." Estimates state that we may have about 3 million Hispanic immigrants here legally. What is interesting to point out is that practically overnight, it has become U.S. government policy to accomodate Spanish speakers, regardless of the legality of their immigrant status. A classic example is the IRS. When you check out their web site, they have an option you can choose to view all the IRS has to offer in "Español." The IRS is notorious for being difficult to contact by telephone, and if you ever have the opportunity to call them, you will wait through a number of menu options in Spanish before reaching a courteous, customer-service oriented representative from the recently consumer conscious IRS. No doubt the IRS is eager to track down undocumented workers and make them pay their fair share, although employers who hire undocumented workers might have more to be concerned about.

To illustrate how pervasive Spanish has become in the U.S., it is now a fact that the United States has the sixth greatest population of native Spanish speakers in the world. It is believed that the number of native Spanish speakers now exceeds the number of native English speakers worldwide, even though English is considered the international business language. Language departments of major universities across the country usually fill up their Spanish classes quickly. Finding work as a Spanish translator has become difficult due to the great number of competitors, to the point where some translation firms will offer free translation work just to get their foot in the door of a potential client. As a translator, you are more in demand in you speak Arabic, or Mandarin Chinese. It is especially true right now with Arabic translators, given the situation in Iraq right now. Lawyers usually take out the biggest yellow page ads in the phone book of any size city, and are going after Hispanic clients who need help with their immigration status and obtaining drivers' licenses by prominently displaying "se habla español" as part of their yellow page ad.

When you go shopping nowadays, it's interesting to note how virtually every product you buy has an explanation in both English and Spanish, especially with regard to such items as cleaning products and how to avoid harmful ingestion. From the electric utility you do business with, to the cable TV provider you use, virtually all of such businesses have Spanish menu options on their telephone answering system when you call them. Sometimes it's amusing to listen to a menu option being offered in Spanish, when it's being presented by an English speaker who doesn't have a Spanish accent. It reminds you of someone from Texas speaking English with a Texas drawl.

It really doesn't matter what side of the immigration issue you support. The Hispanic immigrants have arrived and instead of making them assimilate into our culture, our unofficial government policy seems to be one of total accomodation. In the last election, the state of Kansas had to print bilingual ballots in six of thier counties in Southwest Kansas at taxpayers' expense. The voters should take that issue up in the upcoming elections, but the real rub appears to be that while Americans have been made to accomodate Spanish speakers who don't speak English, our neighbors to the south don't reciprocate. Unless you're traveling to a resort area or are doing business with someone who expects to work with an English-speaking clientele, it's fairly safe to assume it will be difficult to find anyone else who understands English. And it isn't likely that the government of Mexico and other countries south of Mexico will print bilingual pamphlets explaining their rules and regulations, except for maybe the tourists.

Many of us remember that when immigrants of yesteryear arrived in the United States, they made an effort to learn English and assimilate into our culture. What we have today are Hispanics who want to retain their language and culture when they arrive in America. It is not uncommon at all to run into a Hispanic immigrant who has lived in the United States for a number of years and still doesn't know a word of English. Even John McCain, the Republican nominee for president, travels to Colombia and Mexico in a symbolic gesture to court the Hispanic vote, said to play a significant role in determining the outcome of this year's presidential election, particularly in the state of Florida. None of this is meant to criticize Hispanic immigrants for importing their cutlure into the U.S., but it does pose a problem for the rest of us as to how to interact with them. Perhaps we could get a few tips from Canada as to how to solve the problem of dealing with both French and English up there. One thing appears to be certain, and that is that it's not likely the U.S. government will come up with some kind of immigration policy that deals fairly with immigrants already here any time soon. At least the generation that is alive now probably won't have to be concerned with needing to speak Spanish with their next-door neighbor. But with minorities now in the "majority" in states like California where Hispanics and Asians outnumber the rest of the population, one has to wonder how we'll adjust to the language barrier. Hispanics are now the number one minority in America, outnumbering African Americans, the latter of which are being thought of less and less as a minority.