A review of bilingualism in the USA:
The case of Chicano English
Winnie Wing Yee Tang
The University of Hong Kong
wingyeet@graduate.hku.hk
The linguistic environment of the United States of America (the USA) has long been a
significant field of research. Through the case of Chicano English as an illustration,
this paper attempts to review the multilingual and heterogeneous linguistic situation
in the USA. In this paper, the background of Chicano English functions as a base for
analyzing the phonological features of Chicano English as an individual English
variety. Some clarifications upon certain misconceptions regarding such an English
variety are put forward. These misconceptions include Chicano English as a learner
language or “Spanglish”. This paper also discusses some sociolinguistic concerns of
bilingualism in the USA, such as the mixed attitudes toward Spanish, code-switching
between English and Spanish, and the results of language contact.
LCOM Papers 1 (2009), 65 – 79
66 Winnie Wing Yee Tang
1. Introduction
As a multiethnic nation, the United States of America (the USA) is a country which
congregates citizens of different ethnic and social backgrounds. Bilingualism, or even
multilingualism, is a phenomenon observed in the mainland of the USA. By this,
bilingualism here means the ability to speak two languages, while multilingualism
suggests the ability of speaking more than two languages. In the paper, bilingualism
and multilingualism are used interchangeably to refer to the language competence of
using two or more languages. In the case of the USA, the languages spoken include
mostly English, Spanish and some other languages.
The linguistic environment of the USA has long been a significant field of research of
scholars. According to the statistics collected by the Modern Language Association
(2006)1, 82 % of the USA population speak English and 10% of them speak Spanish
and Spanish creoles, where Spanish creoles are the variations of Spanish spoken as
the mother tongue by Hispanic descendents living in the USA. Apart from African
American English, there is one variety among the vernacular varieties of English in
the United States which plays an important role in demonstrating some of the
bilingual complexity in the country. This variety is Chicano English.
Until today, there is still a heated debate on the issue of the status of Chicano English:
“whether it is an epiphenomenon of language contact or an autonomous dialect”
(Santa Ana 1993: 3). However, the problem is not an easy one to solve due to the
complicated structure of the Latino population in the USA. With the elaboration and
explanation on what Chicano English is and some of Chicano English features, this
paper aims to deconstruct some misconceptions led by people, including the
distinction between Spanglish and the interlanguage of Spanish speakers. This paper
also discusses the linguistic complexity of the Chicanos, the problems that
bilingualism faces in the USA, such as language attitude toward the two main
languages, English and Spanish, and code-switching, and the results of language
contact in the USA.
1
Statistics of languages spoken in the United States collected by Modern Language Association in
2006. Retrieved from http://www.mla.org/census_map.
A Review of bilingualism in the USA 67
2. Some background about Chicano English
Chicano English has been an important linguistic field of study because it
demonstrates how bilingualism affects and shapes a new language variety. According
to the clear summarized account of Tottie (2002: 228), Chicano English is “spoken by
descendants of Hispanic immigrants from Mexico”. That is to say, Chicano English is
a dialect of English “spoken by people of Mexican ethnic origin in California and the
Southwest” (Fought, 2006: 234). Chicano English is one of the non-standard varieties
of English, i.e. Latino English. It resulted from the language contact with, mainly but
not exclusively, Spanish especially in phonological aspects (Fought 2006: 74). In fact,
Tottie (2002: 228) further mentioned that,
“Chicano English is now spoken not only by people who know both English and
Spanish, but by people who know no Spanish at all but who are members of a
Hispanic community of Mexican origin. Chicano English has developed stable
speech patterns and a distinct phonological system of its own, with several
features that cannot be due to interference from Spanish.”
In addition to Tottie, several other scholars (see Selinker, 1972, as cited in Santa Ana,
1993) have suggested that Chicano English is not the “interlanguage” used by the
Spanish learners of English, i.e. “a learner’s step [of Mexican immigrants] on the way
to acquiring more or less Standard English” (Tottie, 2002: 228).
Ever since the Mexicans’ immigration to the southwestern part of the USA since the
1960s, namely to California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, those previously
Spanish-speaking adults had to integrate themselves into the English-dominant
community in their new country (Fought, 2006: 234). However, the main focus of
Chicano English is not on this group of immigrants because, according to the
definition of Chicano English, they do not speak the language. The second or later
generations of the Mexican-Americans, who speak English since they were born and
were educated in the USA, might also use Spanish at home or within their community.
These factors contribute to the development and stabilization of Chicano English as
an individual variety of English itself, and they also contribute the bilingual situation
in the USA (Fought, 2006: 234).
68 Winnie Wing Yee Tang
3. Some phonological features of Chicano English
As mentioned above, Chicano English is unique as it has its own phonological
features in contrast to other vernacular varieties of English in the USA. Moreover, it
has been affected by many features of Spanish. That is the reason why people, upon
listening to Chicano English, think Chicano English speakers are non-native speakers
of English. According to Fought (2006: 80 – 82), several characteristic phonological
features can be identified in Chicano English.
3.1 Reduction of diphthongs to glides
To begin with, one of the main phonological features is the lack of glides. A glide can
also be called a diphthong, which is the union of two different vowels. For instance,
the diphthong of the word sale is [ ], which is the union of the vowel [ ] and [ ]. In
Chicano English, glides are usually pronounced as monothongs, which is similar to
the corresponding vowels in Spanish (Santa Ana, 1991, as cited in Fought, 2006: 81).
One possible reason of the phenomenon is that glides are not common in Spanish. For
the case the sale, the vowel maybe reduced to a simple [ ].
3.2 Less vowel reduction
Secondly, Chicano English tends to have a less frequent vowel reduction than other
vernacular varieties. While other English speakers in the USA tend to reduce the
unstressed vowels to schwas, Chicanos still pronounce them in a way as if they are in
stressed positions (Santa, 1991, as cited in Fought, 2006: 81). This might be due to the
fact that in Spanish, the pronunciation of the vowels never changes either in stressed
or unstressed positions. To illustrate this, in other American dialects, the first syllable
of the three-syllable word together is normally reduced into a schwa [ ] instead of
being pronounced as [ ] in the word to itself. However, the vowel [ ] is often not
reduced to a schwa, i.e. a short vowel, so it might sound like a stressed vowel and has
a different rhythm from other English varieties in the USA.
A Review of bilingualism in the USA 69
3.3 Reduction of consonant clusters
Apart from that, there is a large variety of reduction of consonant clusters in Chicano
English compared to other varieties of European-American English (Fought, 2006: 81;
Tottie, 2002: 228). Even though other types of vernacular varieties also demonstrate
this type of reduction of consonant clusters, it may be even more commonly-observed
in Chicano English than the others (Fought, 2003: 69). To illustrate this with an
example, for instance, the phrase It’s kind of hard might become [ ]
in Chicano English (Tottie, 2002: 228). In this reduction, the consonant cluster [ts] in
the end of the word it’s is reduced to [s]. Furthermore, the consonant [d] at the end of
the word kind is reduced and it merges with the next word of, while the pronunciation
of the word of is changed from [ ] to [ ]. Finally, the final consonant [d] of the
word hard is being eliminated. In this sentence, every consonant cluster is reduced
and a completely different set of pronunciation is formed.
3.4 Aspiration and intonation patterns
Another distinctive feature of Chicano English is its unaspiration of the aspirated
consonants. Chicano speakers tend to adopt the Spanish unaspirated pronunciation
patterns. Besides, for intonation patterns, Chicano English speakers use a unique
pattern, which is totally different from the other varieties of English spoken in the
USA. In Chicano English, the prosody is syllable-timed instead of stressed-timed
prosody as in Standard English (Fought, 2006: 82). That is to say, the length of each
syllable is the same in Chicano English whereas the length should vary according to
the stress pattern in Standard American English, with stressed syllables having a
longer length and unstressed syllables having a shorter one.
To further illustrate this, an example2 by Baugh (1999) is quoted to show the unique
features of Chicano English, including the syllable timing nature of the intonation and
the unaspiration. For the Chicano English clip, the supposedly aspirated consonants [k]
in calling, [p] in apartment and paper, and [t] in advertised becomes unaspirated. Also,
when it is compared to the Standard English clip, it is obvious that the prosodies are
totally different, with the Chicano one being syllable-timed. In addition, the consonant
2
Example: “Hello, I am calling about the apartment you’ve advertised in the paper”. Retrieved from
http://www.stanford.edu/~jbaugh/baugh.fft.
70 Winnie Wing Yee Tang
cluster [nt] is being reduced to [n] in the word apartment, which is also an obvious
illustration of the variety. Besides, by noticing the way hello is pronounced in each
case, in Chicano English the diphthong is reduced to a monothong [o] in the second
syllable which makes it sound more “Spanish” than the Standard English one.
However, these are only some of the most salient features of Chicano English. There
are still a lot more notable differences between Chicano English and other varieties of
English. Nonetheless, although these examples seem to validate the misconception
that Chicano English speakers must be Spanish learners of English, this notion will be
proven false in the next section of this paper.
4. Some myths and realities of Chicano English
In addition to the phonological features, the grammatical features which are beyond
the study scope of this paper also make Chicano English special. However, they can
all be traced back to the Spanish grammar and, thus, may be redundant to be
mentioned here.
4.1 Chicano English is NOT “Spanglish”
One of the important points about Chicano English is that, while Spanish elements are
found in the language used in Chicano English, people might make the overstatement
that the speakers are simply using “Spanglish”. This is yet another important issue of
Chicano English. Some people may argue that Chicano English is the same as
Spanglish, this can, however, be falsified by several reasons. Firstly, the definition of
“Spanglish” is that it is the code-switching to-and-fro between Spanish and English in
an utterance (Fought, 2005: 75). However, Chicano English is English itself, and it
may or may not contain Spanish lexical items in the utterances.
Secondly, the plugging-in of Spanish lexical items does not necessarily equal to
speaking “Spanglish” or, in other words, code-switching. A key element of the
phenomenon of code-switching is that speakers should have attained a certain level of
proficiency in both languages so that they can use the two languages interchangeably
while speaking (Fought, 2006: 236). In fact, most Chicano English speakers cannot
speak Spanish at ease due to their low Spanish proficiency. As said by Fought, “a
A Review of bilingualism in the USA 71
large number of the [Chicano English] speakers born [in the USA], especially from
the third generation onwards, are completely monolingual in English” (Fought, 2006:
70). Since the conditions of code-switching cannot be satisfied, Chicano English does
not equate with “Spanglish”.
4.2 Chicano English is NOT an interlanguage
Apart from the fact that Chicano English is not “Spanglish”, let’s come back to the
false assumption that Chicano English is the “learner language” of Spanish-dominant
speakers. Let us look into the community of the Chicanos more closely: Santa Ana
(1993: 4) observed that one source for the debate lies in the “nature of the multilingual
heterogeneity of the Chicano language setting”. The two languages, English and
Spanish, are the major languages in the Chicano English setting.
As mentioned, the Chicanos are mainly immigrants of other Spanish-speaking
countries such as Mexico, Cuba and Puerto Rico, etc. These immigrants learnt English
as their second language but are not speakers of Chicano English. Only the second
and later generations of Chicanos can claim themselves to be speakers of Chicano
English because in order to be a Chicano English speaker, one has to be a
native-speaker of English. Let us look at the Chicanos again. When the second
generation emerged, they started off speaking and learning English at school and were
expected to use English as the other Americans did. This generation is
English-dominant. They might understand Spanish but might not have a native
fluency as their parents or ancestors do. The language used by the third or later
generations is even harder to examine due to the fact that the language choice is
highly dependent on the attitudes of these generations toward English and Spanish.
Nonetheless, these three generations belong to the same community. Since the
language setting is so complicated, Chicano English might easily be mistaken as an
interlanguage. However, to recap, Chicano English is only spoken by native-speakers
of English of Mexican or Hispanic descent.
Another way to argue against the notion that “Chicano English is a learner language”
is the ability of Chicano English speakers to distinguish certain native features and not
committing learner-errors (Fought, 2003: 82). Moreover, Fought pointed out that
Chicano English speakers can make a clear distinction between phonemic pairs which
can be easily collapsed and become indistinguishable for most non-native learners
(see Fought, 2003: 82). It shows that English was acquired as the first language of
72 Winnie Wing Yee Tang
these Chicano English speakers but not Spanish or other languages. In brief, Chicano
English is spoken by second or later generations of the immigrants, where different
generations might speak them differently with unequal motives and attitudes. These
attitudes will be discussed later.
Nonetheless, a question remains: as both Chicano English and the English used by
Spanish-dominant learners are quite similar, how could it be possible to distinguish
whether a person speaks Chicano English or “Spanish-accented English”? Godinez
(1985) has conducted research to investigate the differences of vowel production
among Chicano monolinguals, bilinguals and general Californians. His results are
insightful to the understanding of the differences between these groups of speakers.
According to Godinez, there are slight differences between monolingual and bilingual
speakers of Chicano English, the differences can be minimal to the point that other
people might not be able to notice them (Godinez, 1985). Nonetheless, he stated that,
generally speaking, “the vowels of the monolingual Chicano English group are more
like those of their bilingual counterparts” (Godinez, 1985: 56). In other words, the
vowels pronounced by monolingual Chicano English speakers sound quite similar to
those of the Spanish-English bilinguals. Why is that so? He continued to point out the
vowel production, in this case the backness of /u/, of both Chicano groups may be
influenced by the similar-sounding but slightly different vowel /u/ of Spanish
(Godinez, 1985).
However, instead of “mother tongue interference”, he suggested that the continued
language contact with Spanish Los Angeles is the reason for monolingual speakers of
Chicano English to sound like bilingual speakers (Godinez, 1985: 56). He concluded
his article by saying that “rather than being primarily determined by “interference”
from Spanish, Chicano English represents an autonomous social dialect with distinct
characteristics passed on by usual processes of linguistic transmission” (Godinez,
1985: 57). His concluding remarks further assured the point that Chicano English
speakers speak a different language from the Spanish-dominant learners of English in
the USA, in which only first-language speakers of English can be speakers of Chicano
English. Also, their Spanish-like behavior of Chicano English may be a result from
language contact but not the imperfect mastery of English.
A Review of bilingualism in the USA 73
4.3 Chicano English IS a variety of English
By now, in order to further elaborate the idea of Godinez that Chicano English is an
“autonomous social dialect”, another model proposed by Butler (1997) is also taken
into account. Butler suggested five criteria for English codes to be classified as a
Variety of English (Butler, 1997). However, she also pointed out that sometimes these
language communities are developing and may not yet have fully developed into a
distinct variety.
In the case of Chicano English, certain criteria put forth by Butler (1997) have been
fulfilled. Firstly, according to Butler, a variety of English has “[a] standard and
recognizable pattern of pronunciation handed down from one generation to another”
(Butler, 1997: 106). It is obvious, after the above discussion of phonological features
of Chicano English and the reference to other sources concerning it, that a relatively
stable system and pattern of pronunciation of Chicano English has been developed in
the course of time that is known by both in-group speakers and other English speakers.
It is also likely for those features to be passed on to the following generations.
Furthermore, another principal feature of a variety of English is that certain words and
phrases are used to express “key features of the physical and social environment”,
which “are regarded as peculiar to the variety” (Butler, 1997: 106). In the case of
Chicano English, some Spanish lexicons are often borrowed and the speakers of
Chicano English use a set of vocabulary items which are different from English and
Spanish spoken in the USA or elsewhere. The lexicons of Chicano English have not
only been affected by the social structure of the Chicano community, but also the
English spoken in the USA. The unique choice of lexicon will be discussed further in
the latter part of the paper (see Section 5.3).
The third proposed feature is that “this variety of English is the way it is because of
the history of the language community” (Butler, 1997: 106). As discussed above,
owing to the immigration from Mexican people to the South West of the USA in the
1960s, a totally different linguistic community has been created and their descendents
speak English in a certain way which is called Chicano English. The history of
Hispanic descendents in the USA contributes heavily to the creation and stabilization
of Chicano English.
The fourth and fifth criteria for establishing a new variety of English are that there is
“a literature written without apology in that variety of English”, and that reference
74 Winnie Wing Yee Tang
works such as dictionaries are present to show how people in that language
community perceive themselves and their own language instead of being judged by
outside authorities (Butler, 1997: 106). Although it is not certain whether there are
official references and literature works done by Chicano English speakers, there is a
form of guide such as comedy shows conducted by Chicano English speakers like
George Lopez and Cheech Marin. They are well-respected men in the Chicano
community and their work on the television and comedy albums are presented based
on a lot of satire, mockery and criticism as the main theme. This observation further
supports that Chicano English may be a variety of English in the USA to a large
extent.
In short, Chicano English can be regarded as a variety of English instead of
“Spanglish” or an interlangauge. Nonetheless, in a broader view of the linguistic
situation in the USA, the linguistic complexity also brings out several concerns. In the
following section, bilingualism of Spanish and English is to be discussed in a greater
depth.
5. Sociolinguistic concerns of bilingualism in the USA
5.1 Attitudes toward Spanish and Spanish-speaking individuals
Having clarified some of the misconceptions of what Chicano English is or is not,
another important issue is the linguistic complexity of the Chicano community in the
USA. It’s complexity of can be a representative case of the bilingualism in the USA.
As stated in the introduction of this essay, the Spanish-speaking group is the largest
foreign-language-speaking population in the USA. While English and Chicano
English are spreading rapidly, English happens to be a killer language which is
responsible for the disappearance of the Spanish language and heritage to a certain
extent. Christian and Wolfham (1979) stated that “language attitudes are generally
shared by members of a cultural group leading to a common evaluation of certain
language patterns and the people who use them” (as cited in Galindo, 1995: 86). In
other words, the same group of speakers generally shares similar attitudes toward the
same languages, in this case Spanish and English.
A Review of bilingualism in the USA 75
In fact, in the USA “attitudes towards Spanish in general are often mixed” (Fought,
2006: 77). According to the research done by Galindo (1995), people speaking
Spanish can be classified as “wetbacks” which is a strong derogation (Galindo, 1995:
86). Apart from that, the parents of young Chicano English speakers tend to favor
English more because they want to prevent their children from being stigmatized as
being educationally disadvantaged or with limited-English proficiency (Galindo, 1995:
88).
Nevertheless, not always has Spanish been regarded as an inferior language, using
Spanish can also “promote solidarity and in-group identity among younger Chicanos”
(Golindo, 1995: 86). The identity issue is one of the main forces for the Chicanos to
preserve Spanish. For example, a Puerto Rican woman said that “If you [are a] Puerto
Rican, you SHOULD know [Spanish], because that’s their blood, because that’s what
they are” (Santa Ana 1997: 146)3. It demonstrates the importance of Spanish in terms
of ethnic identity. Even so, there is still a seemingly irreversible trend of shifting to
English or Chicano English. Fought (2006: 77) stated the reason as follows:
“At the same time, though, increasing language shift to English suggests that,
despite the positive affirmations of the role of Spanish in Latino ethnic identities,
little progress is being made in fighting the dominant US ideology that values
English and associates Spanish with the poor and uneducated.”
In respect of this reason, Chicanos may want to use English more in order to gain a
more superior economic and social status.
Apart from that, a study of Lopez (1982, as cited in Linton, 2002: 54), it shows a
negative relationship between Spanish maintenance and economic status. Since
English has long been regarded as a higher language, it is not surprising that the
younger generation of Mexican-descent prefers English instead of Spanish in
education and other more formal contexts. These factors act as the catalysts for the
language shift from their ethnic language, Spanish, to English which is a more
dominant or powerful language.
3
The original phrase quoted from Santa Ana (1997) is “If you Puerto Rican, you SHOULD know it,
because that’s their blood, because that’s what they are. They should learn.” (as cited in Santa Ana,
1997: 146)
76 Winnie Wing Yee Tang
5.2 Code-Switching
Another issue is the existence of code-switching, i.e. using “Spanglish”. Bilinguals
who can speak both English and Spanish usually take an ambiguous stance toward
code-switching. Code-switching is the instance of switching from one language
variety to another. It can be inter-sentential, that is within a sentence, or after finishing
a sentence and start with the sentence with a new language. It can also occur in a
single person’s utterance or when another person takes on a conversation between two
or more individuals. In this case, the languages involved in this particular switch are
Spanish and English.
Code-switching can be a tricky and complicated matter to deal with. In fact, there are
mixed attitudes toward code-switching as reported by Fought (2006: 78). For negative
attitudes, one of Zentella’s research subjects stated that code-switching is disapproved
by her father and she was taught to speak one language at a time instead of
code-switching (Zentella, 1997: 66). Some people think that using only one language
at a time can make a person seem more educated in that particular language. Another
subject cited code-switching as “confusing” (Zentella, 1997: 154). Code- switching is
often been regarded as a bad habit in the education discourse because students are
expected to learn how to use only one language at a time (Fought, 2006: 78). One
possible reason may be that students know that code-mixing is preserved negatively
when they go to work in the future.
Nonetheless, code-switching can still be used as a communicative tool to link
speakers with their ethnic identity (Fought, 2006: 78) or, in other words,
code-switching is the “act of identity” (Le Page and Tabouret-Keller, 1985, as cited in
Zentella, 1997: 114). According to Zentella (1997: 114), “on the periphery of a
prestigious English monolingual world and the periphery of a stigmatized Spanish
monolingual world…[t]heir code-switching was a way of saying that they belonged to
both worlds”, in which they are unwilling to give up one for another world, or ethnic
origin, they belong to.
To be frank, being a bilingual actually puts people at the advantage to communicate
with the speakers in both worlds. Certainly, having a good mastery of two languages
is better than having only one, as they can enjoy the privilege of knowing the
information and culture of the two languages at the same time. This is also the reason
why a young Mexican-American speaker claims that it is better for him to speak two
languages instead of one (Fought, 2003: 209).
A Review of bilingualism in the USA 77
5.3 Spanish influence on American English
Despite the fact that Spanish is being undervalued in the United States, language
contact between Spanish and English is still contributing to the changes of lexicons in
the languages of the USA. The features discussed below are salient in Chicano
English, which show that Chicano English is indeed a stable variety of English. In fact,
not only has Spanish affected Chicano English in terms of lexical items, but it also
affects English in general in the United States. It is an undeniable fact that Spanish
influences contribute to the distinctiveness of American English when compared with
British English (González, 2000: 292).
Some well-known Spanish loanwords such as siesta, fiesta, flamenco and señorita
have immerged into the American society with an already-diluted sense of Spanish
origin (González, 2000: 294). These words no longer carry their original meaning but
have been modified to the meanings that fit into the context of the USA. Another type
of Spanish loanwords is known as “mock Spanish”, for example hasta banana instead
of hasta mañana and hasty lumbago instead of hasta luego (González, 2000: 294).
People play with the sounds of the Spanish words and substitute them with
similar-sounding English words or phrases.
Another trace of Spanish influence is on English derivational morphology with
Spanish suffixes added to English words, for instance –teria (washeteria), el –o (el
cheapo), and –ista (Clintonista) (González, 2000: 294). However, these applications
are not merely the plugging-in of Spanish suffixes, but often carry some kind of
twisted or even negative connotations. The list of above-mentioned examples can go
on forever as the language contact continues, and is important in giving evidence of
the importance of Spanish in the American English lexicons.
6. Conclusion
In essence, the linguistic situation in the USA is a complicated one. Bilingualism, or
multilingualism, may become a common trend in the whole world. Nonetheless, as
illustrated by the case of Chicano English, it is apparent that the predominantly strong
English language in the USA, on the one hand, is dominating over the weaker
78 Winnie Wing Yee Tang
language of Spanish, while, on the other hand, English cannot resist the flood of
interference of Spanish because of language contact.
After all, with the information above, it is too superficial to project the future of
Standard American English, Spanish and Chicano English. However, one thing which
is certainly true is that, because of globalization, the language mixing phenomenon
will only be more common and no language will be able to isolate and purify itself
from other languages. Language contact may eventually become a force so strong that
it may influence the meeting of the world cultures as well as contribute to the
disappearance of many languages in the world.
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