Subject: discussion : english only

one point that jack aubert made in his recent posting is dead on : quite apart from any putative intention on the part of policy makers , in the u . s . today " bilingualism " rarely means the ability to speak two languages fluently . i ' m thinking particularly about so - - called bilingual classes in our public schools , where many people get their first notion of what this word refers to . i have enrolled my children in these classes whenever possible , but with this decision comes the responsibility to attempt to convince administrators that native speakers of english must be required to learn some spanish in these classes . ( the bilingual classes at my children 's schools are always spanish - - english . ) it has never been expected in any of the bilingual classes my kids have been in that they should be studying two languages too ! these classes are run as a one-way street - - - and everyone knows it . as one little girl ( required to enroll ) in my daughter 's class told me , " bilingual means you ' re dumb . " hmmmmmmmmmm what people say the word ` bilingual ' means in your standard want ad is probably too hot an issue to handle . ( is this a new ` ` urban myth ' ' that such ads are actually seeking people of certain ethnicity ? ) i suspect that the term is coming to mean something quite different than its traditional denotation , and sometime soon we ' ll find that the word ` ` bilingual ' ' activates a number of presuppositions about both mastery of english and ethnic identity , not unlike what happened to the term ` ` illegal immigrant ' ' , as was demonstrated in various reports which were released at the time of the debate on prop 187 . this sort of change in the use of the word ` bilingual ' will not help anyone whose goal is to encourage the study and use of more than one language in the u . s . because non - - experts , if they do not control language policy , are certainly involved in that policy making . i suggest that the way to combat it is very local action : take the time to talk to the principal ( s ) of your local public elementary school ( s ) . robin schafer rschafer @ ucsd . edu
