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Old 05-23-2013, 12:19 PM
 
Location: Durham, NC
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It is necessary in San Juan, but I'm guessing you're thinking of mainland US and not territories like Puerto Rico.
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Old 05-23-2013, 12:37 PM
 
Location: Pittsburgh, PA (Morningside)
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AFAIK, public education essentially everywhere in the U.S. is in English. This is why virtually all second-generation immigrants are bilingual, and third-generation immigrants monolingual English speakers.

100 years ago, there used to be a lot more areas where everyone spoke a language besides English. Not just Spanish-speaking areas either. German in large sections of Pennsylvania. French in Cajun country and northern Maine. Various Native American languages. Public education, and the rise of radio, effectively killed them all off.
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Old 05-23-2013, 08:49 PM
 
Location: San Diego
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Quote:
Originally Posted by OptimusPrime69 View Post
Of that 50% Hispanic population-- how many of them actually speak Spanish?

Anyway, the answer definitely is Miami-- that is a spanish-speaking city through and through. Whether one is in Coconut Grove, Hialeah, South Beach, Aventura, etc-- Spanish is heard everywhere.

I live in south FL about 30 mins north of Miami and when I go to Miami I can only speak English and have never had a problem either. I feel as if it's a Spanish speaking city, but also very multi-lingual and very heavily visited by tourists, so u hear languages from all over the globe spoken, not just Spanish, but German, French Creole, English, Portuguese, etc
over 5 million of LA metro's 12 million residents speak spanish. in the eastern half of LA county alone, over 3.5 million residents in neighboring communities speak spanish. that's almost twice as many as the 2 million residents who speak spanish in all of miami metro combined.... a metro of 5.5 million residents.

LA metro's spanish speaking community almost numbers the number of people who live in Miami metro, let's put it that way. if you haven't been to downtown or east LA, you should go.
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Old 05-23-2013, 08:50 PM
 
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Any Town with the exception of very large ones that border mexico, Many parts of miami and southern florida and spanish harlaam
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Old 05-23-2013, 11:51 PM
 
Location: Oakland, CA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SouthCali4LifeSD View Post
over 5 million of LA metro's 12 million residents speak spanish. in the eastern half of LA county alone, over 3.5 million residents in neighboring communities speak spanish. that's almost twice as many as the 2 million residents who speak spanish in all of miami metro combined.... a metro of 5.5 million residents.

LA metro's spanish speaking community almost numbers the number of people who live in Miami metro, let's put it that way. if you haven't been to downtown or east LA, you should go.
Yeah but more people live in LA. It's both the proportion and the distribution of Spanish speakers (the subject of this thread) that determines how Spanish-only a place is. LA does have large sections that are almost completely made up of first generation Hispanic immigrants, but I feel like it covers less than half the city. The other parts seem to be richer areas like West LA and Hollywood, and poorer neighborhoods made up of one or a mixture of ethnicities.
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Old 05-24-2013, 12:38 AM
 
Location: San Diego
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Quote:
Originally Posted by usuario View Post
Yeah but more people live in LA. It's both the proportion and the distribution of Spanish speakers (the subject of this thread) that determines how Spanish-only a place is. LA does have large sections that are almost completely made up of first generation Hispanic immigrants, but I feel like it covers less than half the city. The other parts seem to be richer areas like West LA and Hollywood, and poorer neighborhoods made up of one or a mixture of ethnicities.
Right, but do you see my point? I am dividing LA into two halves, West LA and East LA (which includes most of downtown). In East LA, the predominant language is Spanish. East LA has over 2 million city residents, and I'm not even including LA county residents that border East LA, which are also predominant Spanish speaking cities within LA County. Examples


(City, Population, Percent Hispanic):

Azusa, 28,522, 63.79%
Baldwin Park, 59,660, 78.67%
Bell, 33,328, 90.90%
Bell Gardens, 41,132, 93.37%
Commerce, 11,765, 93.61%
Compton, 53,143, 56.84%
Cudahy, 22,790, 94.14%
Downey, 62,089, 57.85%
El Monte, 83,945, 72.39%
Hawaiian Gardens, 10,869, 73.54%
Huntington Park, 58,636, 95.58%
La Puente, 34,122, 83.10%
Lynwood, 57,503, 82.33%
Maywood, 27,051, 96.33%
Montebello, 46,347, 74.57%
Norwalk, 64,965, 62.89%
Paramount, 39,945, 72.28%
Pico Rivera, 56,000, 88.29%
Pomona, 96,370, 64.47%
San Fernando, 21,038, 89.28%
Santa Fe Springs, 12,447, 71.38%
South El Monte, 18,190, 86.03%
South Gate, 88,669, 92.00%
Whittier, 46,765, 55.89%

Go ahead and look all these cities in LA County, and you will see that they are predominantly located in the County's Eastside, forming an eastward extension of East LA. Most of the children most certainly speak English at different fluencies, however, that does not change the fact that the prevailing home language is Spanish in virtually every single one of these LA County cities, which cluster with East LA.
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Old 05-24-2013, 12:46 AM
 
Location: San Diego
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Further, if we went a little south to predominantly Hispanic concentrated north Orange County (a county of 3 million residents), which borders large sections of east LA, and if we went a little south towards northeast Long Beach (a city of 500,000 residents of which 40 percent are hispanic), there are several cities and communities in those sections of southern California which extend the area of a predominantly Spanish speaking region. East LA borders both Orange County and the northern (predominantly Hispanic) communities in Long Beach.
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Old 05-24-2013, 09:06 AM
 
Location: Pittsburgh, PA (Morningside)
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But the question was not where are there a lot of Spanish-speaking people, it was where do you need to speak Spanish to get around.

I don't know LA that well, but I know in general, studies have found that second-generation Latinos are bilingual but prefer to use English, and third generation don't even speak Spanish. If Latino immigration stays low, the population will be integrated within 20-40 years. And there's probably plenty of American-born people in most of these neighborhoods.
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Old 05-24-2013, 09:57 AM
 
Location: San Diego
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Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton View Post
But the question was not where are there a lot of Spanish-speaking people, it was where do you need to speak Spanish to get around.

I don't know LA that well, but I know in general, studies have found that second-generation Latinos are bilingual but prefer to use English, and third generation don't even speak Spanish. If Latino immigration stays low, the population will be integrated within 20-40 years. And there's probably plenty of American-born people in most of these neighborhoods.
Eschaton,

I highly doubt there is such a thing as an American city with 10,000+ individuals where no one speaks English, so I answered the question as I saw fit. You will need to speak and/or understand Spanish in south East LA County. If you look at my compiled list above, those are each cities within Los Angeles County alone. As an American who was born and raised in southern California and frequents the LA metro a couple times a month, I can tell you right now that these communities prefer Spanish, and a throng of these citizens only speak Spanish and will only help you if you do too.

Do you see the percentage of Spanish speakers for each of those cities? I would say a good indicator of needing to know Spanish to get around successfully would be any city where the percentage of Spanish speakers is over 80%. Of course, I'm surmising based on objective stats. Just like in Mexico, or Europe, several citizens understand and speak basic English, so of course you will find English speakers in these cities I listed.

There are corridors in downtown LA with tens of thousands of Latinos who only speak Spanish, and if you don't speak it, they won't help or or even understand you for that matter. Places like the Fashion District (Santee shopping area), the area surrounding MacArthur Park, the Mexican village shops downtown, etc. It might come as a shock too many of you, but large sections of south east Los Angeles county is as Spanish speaking as this country gets, and where fluent English is known by a the minority. Yes, even the children.
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Old 05-24-2013, 10:03 AM
 
Location: San Diego
940 posts, read 3,180,282 times
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Or how about San Ysidro, a community in San Diego that borders Tijuana. There are about 100,000 citizens in this area, and I live 6 miles from it. Whenever I go to the Las Americas outlets, most of the people who shop there are from Mexico (Tijuana metro). The community of San Ysidro is probably as exclusive as Spanish speaking in America gets. I'm going to go out on a limb and say the majority in this community does not understand or speak English, other than basic phrases at best. It's imperative to know Spanish to successfully conduct business there as well. Sure, employees that work for business chains for the most part are bilingual but go to the mom and pops, and most will only speak or understand Spanish.
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