LINGUAPHOBIA

The jingoistic fever that accompanied the Olympic games allowed America to thump its chest in triumph over the rest of the world. This celebratory brouhaha is harmless enough when it comes to tallying medals. However, the same fever seems to have gripped House legislators who, on August 1, after much grandstanding and rhetoric about the disappearance of civilization as we know it, legitimized prejudice by declaring English to be the official language of the United States. It is ironic that with new legislation in Russia, Europe and elsewhere recognizing the multilingual realities of the global village, the U.S. House of Representatives is trying to turn back the hands of time to some presumably kinder, simpler world where everyone spoke English.

Newt Gingrich laments the fact that academic subjects in California public schools are taught in more than 80 languages. But where Gingrich, advocate of universal access to information by electronic means—provided it is in English only—sees the Balkanization of our society, we see schools taking on the proper role of preparing students for a global society. These pupils are not unlearning English as they learn certain subjects in other languages; indeed, all immigrants know that the best way to achieve their goals in their adopted country is by mastering English.

The pros and cons of bilingual education are likely to be debated for years to come. Still, it is strange, in this day and age, after the U.S. emerged victorious from the cold war—whether by default or design it is hard to say—when stocks are soaring, and the “free market” economy is touted as the cure for all evils, that language legislation would seem necessary. No one doubts that English is the de facto official language of the United States. Do we really need legislation to forbid bilingual Federal office workers to help people in languages other than English? Should it be illegal to speak any other language whenever one feels the need to communicate, or joke around? Surely it should not take a class action suit for children to claim their birthright, to speak pig Latin in school. History has shown that when language policy is restricted, speech goes underground and resentment grows, often bursting to the surface years later. Such backward legislation might be expected from an insecure regime that governs through repression and fear, but it is not worthy of the United States. This misguided measure harms plurality. The message to recent immigrants and refugees is that they are welcome to these shores but God help them if they don’t speak English.

Irrespective of whether and how such a measure might ultimately affect the translation and interpretation industry, all who practice that profession should write or call their elected representatives and make known their opposition to the English-only bill.