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In English We Trust
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20611 |
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BOOK WORLD
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10 / 1992 |
2,959 Words |
| Author
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Robert L. Spaeth
Robert L. Spaeth is professor of liberal studies and
codirector of the Christian Humanism project at St. John's
University, Collegeville, Minnesota. He is coauthor (with R.W.
Franklin) of Virgil Michel: American Catholic (Liturgical
Press, 1988) and the author of Exhortations on Liberal
Education: A Dean Speaks His Mind (St. John's University,
1988); The Church and a Catholic's Conscience (Harper & Row,
1985) and No Easy Answers: Christians Debate Nuclear Arms
(Harper and Row, 1983). |
HOLD YOUR TONGUE
Bilingualism and the Politics of "English Only"
James Crawford
New York: Addision-Wesley, 1992
320 pp., $24.95
The Bilingual Education Act of 1968, idealistic in its goals and benign in its provisions, triggered a language war in the United States that rages to this day. At stake, some say, is the English language itself as the common tongue of Americans; others insist that the rights and welfare of millions of Americans whose primary language is not English are on the line.
The 1968 act did not intend to start a fight. Sen. Ralph Yarborough of Texas only hoped to restore some justice to Spanish speaking minorities, such as Mexican Americans and Puerto Ricans, whose children suffered discrimination in schools where English was the only language of instruction. But languages other than Spanish are also spoken in the United States, so the act included all students whose English was "limited" in some way. Funds were soon appropriated, and the complications began. (Five years after the enactment of the bilingual law, $5 million was being spent annually for programs involving twenty-six languages).
Right from the start, a vexed ambiguity caused trouble. If federal money was to support bilingual programs in schools, what outcomes would be desirable" in short, what did the word bilingualism really mean? Two possibilities quickly emerged: (1) bilingual education should facilitate the transition of students from, say, speaking Spanish to speaking English; or (2) bilingual education should help non-English speakers maintain their native language and hence their native culture.
The goal of transition suggested that the law intended non-English speakers to move briskly toward proficiency in English without suffering from the objectionable sink-or-swim pedagogy that seemed inherently discriminatory. The goal of maintenance implied that languages other than English (and their associated cultures) were to be not only respected but also granted equal status with English. Transition implicitly aimed at Americanization of all U.S. citizens; maintenance implicitly aimed to perpetuate languages other than English.
It seems clear enough now that the goals of transition and maintenance would naturally be understood to be different enough to be mutually
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