Is speaking Spanish necessary?

[~PaperMoon~]

Originally Posted by Packard fan

Uh; English is the language of the world and money. Spanish ain't. What gets me is how WalMart even hired people who don't speak English down in Douglas, Douglas ain't Mexico.

I work at Walmart and like half of my coworkers speak Spanish and half of the customers too. When I was being interviewed for the job it was nerve racking because the interviewer had a very thick Spanish accent and half of the questions I couldn't hardly understand let alone think of the right answer to give, I had to restate most of the questions to see if I was understanding her right. But I got the job thank God. But yes there are a LOT of Spanish speakers here and the TV in the breakroom stays on the Spanish channel with English subtitles. I've never seen such a thing, and a lot of the customers want to ask questions and always ask if I speak Spanish, which I can speak some Spanish, I learned it long before I knew I would be moving to Arizona, so I guess it's a good thing I did learn it! I went into another store, not Walmart one day and needed to find something and had to ask a worker for help finding it, but they all spoke only Spanish no English and the thing I was looking for I didn't know the Spanish word for it. I had to do charades to make them understand what I was looking for. My coworker said her daughter goes to a daycare and how everyone there speaks only Spanish and her 4 yr old daughter is bilingual because of it, and whenever she needs to communicate something out of the ordinary to the daycare workers she has to get our Spanish speaking coworkers to write it out in Spanish for her to give to the daycare people. She should just let her daughter tell it to her in Spanish but I guess she wants to make sure the right thing is being said. LOL I've never seen such a thing here in America before moving here to Tucson.

[teddyearp]

While i agree it is a fact of life that being bi-lingual in both English and Spanish can be an asset, I just wish that is wasn't 'necessary'.

I mean, even when I go to visit another country, I make an effort to learn at least a little of they're language so I can speak there language while I'm their. It is a matter of respect, I think.

[chaparrito]

When you take a snapshot of our present situation, especially in retail situations, it looks like the whole SW is turning Spanish linguistically. It isn't true. Adults have a much harder time learning a second language. Adults are the ones we have to deal with in a retail setting.
A longitudinal perspective (multi-generational studies) shows Spanish speaking immigrants assimilating linguistically at about the same rate as any other historical or contemporary ethno-linguistic group. Generally speaking by the third generation the necessity to communicate in Spanish is extinguished and English is the dominant language. There are many studies that back this up. This one is very well done:

http://www.popcouncil.com/pdfs/counc...323Rumbaut.pdf

[ji603]

Originally Posted by Hawk J

Uno fria cervesa por favor......

I can speak dog & cat latin too......

¡Ay!

[Steve Pickering]

[orphaned]

Now I do agree, if you work in an US store you should speak and understand English if you have contact with the public. I also think you should not be there (working) if you are not here legally. And I think if you live in that part of the country, and I do, you should learn some Spanish as not every legal Spanish speaker can communicate in English. The illegal I could care less about.

[Christine88]

Originally Posted by jfjkd01

I'm relocating to Sierra Vista soon, and I wanted to know, is speaking Spanish necessary for jobs in Sierra Vista? I only speaking English, and I was wondering if this will make communicating harder working with the general public?

Thank you.

America is an English speeking nation. Anyone living here legally or illegally who can't speak English is in for a very hard time.

[Packard fan]

Originally Posted by Steve Pickering

[orphaned]

Now I do agree, if you work in an US store you should speak and understand English if you have contact with the public. I also think you should not be there (working) if you are not here legally. And I think if you live in that part of the country, and I do, you should learn some Spanish as not every legal Spanish speaker can communicate in English. The illegal I could care less about.

Agreed. trying to talk with tourists from LatAm to help them is 1 thing. Like you said: I DON'T care about the feelings of an illegal alien.

[teddyearp]

Originally Posted by Christine88

America is an English speaking nation. Anyone living here legally or illegally who can't speak English is in for a very hard time.

Originally Posted by Packard fan

Agreed. trying to talk with tourists from LatAm to help them is 1 thing. Like you said: I DON'T care about the feelings of an illegal alien.

x2. And keeping with my previous posts in this thread, my main reason for learning some Spanish in the past as in "Hablo un pocito Espanol" was when I would go to visit Mexico. After all, No cervesa, no trabajo.

I did the same when I visited Israel in 2011. Ani mediber kitzat ivreet.

[Huckleberry3911948]

i dont know your area, but for me it was critical. and at the time i thought it was stupid what i was doing. LOL. saved my posterior.

[teddyearp]

Originally Posted by Huckleberry3911948

i dont know your area, but for me it was critical. and at the time i thought it was stupid what i was doing. LOL. saved my posterior.

Living on SoCal, yes it would be so. Too bad. I got out when I started seeing too many billboards in Spanish . . . . . .