Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Eric Castro
English 28
Professor Batty
01 May 2018
bilingualism has great benefits in human beings. Moreover, the Science Magazine and The New
York Times writer Y. Bhattacharjee wrote in his article “Why Bilinguals Are Smarter”, not only
show bilingual children outstanding social skills but they also are smarter. He reports the
findings of neuropsychologist Tamar Gollan of the University of California, San Diego, where
bilingual people were much less disposed to dementia and symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease
speaking more than one language, such as benefits in business, tourism, or just simply
broadening your employability. Thus, Americans should be thinking like former president
Barack Obama when he suggested in 2008 that "You should be thinking about... how can your
child become bilingual. We should have every child speaking more than one language"
(Grosjean). Contrary, for young immigrants, who are in the stage of discovering who they are,
and are negotiating an ethnic identity in the host country (Arel 21), being bilingual may
negatively affect their sense of self identity, which can happen when their original culture is
denigrated when they immerse in a monolingual, xenophobic, and racist host society.
Castro 2
Although every year thousands of immigrants arrive to the U.S. most of them speaking
another language than English, the U.S. is a stubbornly monolingual society. Of course, many
will probably disagree with this statement because the presence of foreign language speakers
makes the U.S. appears multilingual. Nevertheless, according to the Modern Language
Association, English is only spoken by 80.38% of people over 5 years old (MLA) confirming
that this country is mainly monolingual. Furthermore, there is a clear intention to keep the status
quo of English only in America when we observe that thirty-one states have embraced English as
their official language, 27 of these 31 since the 1980s. (Liu). And if this is not enough, there is a
tendency in the U.S. to reduce the number of foreign language speakers, like what happened with
Italian, German and Polish languages. Regarding Spanish, the most spoken language after
English, it is projected that it will reproduce the same pattern of decline (Lopez) instead of being
In addition, while it is true that historically speaking, the U.S. is a society formed by
immigrants of many origins, inexplicably, the U.S. is mainly a xenophobic society. In fact, the
current U.S. administration since the first week in office took very aggressive measurements
against foreign people. As a matter of fact, it is still trying to ban travelers from some Muslim
countries (Williams), has terminated the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA,
program that benefited young immigrants in higher education, and is trying to isolate the country
from its neighbors building a wall at the U.S.-Mexican border. Perhaps, more worryingly is that
school policies harm bilingual children when they naturally try to use their foreign maternal
language. As it happens, when schools embrace approaches that explicitly make minority
languages invisible, they give a strong message to the minds of those children that their maternal
language is “backward, useless, of low status” (Salome 75), something that it is not only against
Castro 3
their more elemental rights but also deliberately cruel. Now, ask yourself, what would you feel
if you move to another country where a different language is spoken and your children’s teacher
hit them every time they speak your own language? In truth, there are too many real stories of
physical punishment in schools in the Southern U.S. because Hispanics children spoke in
Spanish. Gloria Anzaldúa would tell “I remember being caught speaking Spanish at recess – that
was good for three licks on the knuckles with a sharp ruler” (Anzaldúa, 1). Those Spanish
speaking children struggle with their self-identity development as Richard Rodriguez recalls, “I
grew up victim to a disabling confusion” (Rodríguez 5). It seems to be that the cause of all these
social abnormalities are based in a false sense of superiority that certain Americans have against
language, phenotype, accent and surname (Yosso 72) and I, as an immigrant, may tell that
xenophobic events happen, such as the episode experienced by Carla, the character from How
The Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents by Julia Alvarez, when “the boys pelted Carla with stones.
Aiming them at her feet so there would be no bruises [and shouted] Go back to where you came
Unfortunately, America is still a racist society. “Racism overtly shaped U.S. social
institutions at the beginning of the twentieth century and continues, although more subtly, to
impact U.S. institutions of socialization in the beginning of the twenty-first century” (Yosso 70).
Consequently, it is undeniable that the U.S. is founded over the burden of a heinous racism
exemplified by the American slavery and later for racial segregation, as T. Yosso explains
clearly, “Race and racism are central, endemic, permanent and a fundamental part of defining
and explaining how U.S. society functions” (73). At the same time, I recognize that many
Americans will say that there are many improvements with the racial issues, and others may even
Castro 4
deny its existence, it also true that everyday news show us that racial discrimination is still
hurting our society. For example, just days ago, April 12, 2018, two young African American
were victims of stereotyping and racial bias that ended in their arrest, when a Starbucks manager
accused them for trespassing when the young men asked to use the restroom and were told it was
In conclusion, the problem is not being bilingual per se, by contrary, being bilingual in
the world is a characteristic that brings social, economic, intellectual, even health benefits.
However, for immigrants in the U.S., being bilingual disturbs one’s sense of self identity because
they have moved to a dysfunctional society that tries to remain monolingual, its government
focus in xenophobic political measures, and its population suffers of chronic racism that keep
their communities disengaged, making the United States of America a divided country instead of
being a nation that ponders how American children may become culturally enriched knowing
several languages and perhaps, and more importantly, how to eliminate xenophobia and racism,
Works Cited
Alvarez, Julia. How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents. Plume, 2003.
Arel, Sari. Ethnic identity in children of immigrants: identity pathways, academic outcomes, and
the mediating effect of parents and peers. PhD thesis, University of Michigan, 2014. 17
Bhattacharjee, Yudhijit. “The Benefits of Bilingualism.” Times, The New York Times, 17 Mar.
2012, www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/opinion/sunday/the-benefits-of-bilingualism.html.
Grosjean, Francois. “Bilinguals in the United States: Who Are the Millions of Bilinguals in the
Liu, Amy, and Anand Edward Sokhey. “When and Why do U.S. States Make English Their
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2014/06/18/when-and-why-do-u-
s-states-make-english-their-official-language/?utm_term=.0c0ec13c5cb0. Accessed 20
April 2018.
Lopez, Mark, and Ana Gonzales-Barrera. “What is the Future of Spanish in the United States?”
MLA. “Most spoken languages in the entire US in 2010”. Found MLA Language Map Data
Vera, Amir. “Starbucks isn’t the Only Chain That’s Faced Claims of Racial Bias” CNN, 20 Apr.
2018, https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/20/us/racial-incidents-at-restaurants-and-
Williams, Joe. “Trump Travel Ban Returns to U.S. Supreme Court” NBC News, 24 Apr. 2018,
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/trump-travel-ban-returns-u-s-supreme-
Yosso, Tara. “Whose Culture Has Capital? A Critical Race Theory Discussion of Community
Cultural Wealth.” Race Ethnicity and Education, vol. 8, no.1, 2005, pp. 69-91.