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Originally Posted by HappyTexan
I think you're missing the subtle difference.
While they segregate themselves, they still consider themselves Americans.
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So who are these people that don't, other than those who like many groups that came before them came with every intention of going back home?
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In the good old days" they sent their kids to the US schools and it was important for their kids to learn English, learn the American way and be better off then them. That is where the assimilation came in.
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Once again, who are these people who don't send their kids to school (I have no idea what a US school is) and aren't interested in their kids speaking english. When ever I was doing a story in some immigrant community the kids always got me through where my own foreign language skills failed to get me through.
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Today we have a large number of immigrants from Mexico.
Some consider themselves Mexican and fly the Mexican flag over the US Flag.
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Now besides those who have every intention of returning to Mexico (just like 40% of the Italians who came to the U.S.) what empirical research do you base your findings on? And do you hold Irish and Italian Americans to the same standards, because I can go right out my house and find Irish and Italian flags, bumper stickers and the likes.
Additionally, and this is for some mind boggling reason seems to be totally ignored by Anglos, is that "Mexicans" in the Southwest are not all immigrants. Mexicans lived in the Southwest well before there was an American and well before Americans gained sovereignty over those territories. So to equate the Mexican American experience with those of European immigrants is simply ahistorical. So in short, you and the likes of yourself are arguing is not that even recent Mexican immigrants learn to assimilate but rather to abandon an indigenous American culture that predates the very founding the country.
So even for me as an African American I find it more than a little disingenuous that Mexican Americans living in Los Angeles, San Fernando, San Diego, Santa Cruz, Laredo, San Antonio, Los Gatos, Jan Jose, Santa Barbara are being told that speaking Spanish isn't being American.
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They do not want to assimilate. They want separate. They want to keep their birth nationality and their native language and live with us in America.
I do see 2nd and 3rd generation Mexican children entering school not knowing any English. And yes, here in Texas it is very possible to do everything you need to do and not worry about speaking English.
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I'm sorry, but I just flat out don't believe you regarding 2nd and 3rd generation kids who do not speak English. In fact I would describe in another manner.
So let's see what the literature says:
Language Assimilation Today:
Bilingualism Persists More Than in the Past,
But English Still Dominates
Richard Alba
Lewis Mumford Center for Comparative Urban and Regional Research
University at Albany
December, 2004
"Bilingualism is common among second-generation children, i.e., those growing up in immigrant households: most speak an immigrant language at home, but almost all are proficient in English.
Among Hispanics, 92 percent speak English well or very well, even though 85 percent speak at least some Spanish at home. The equivalent percentages among Asian groups are: 96 percent are proficient in English and 61 percent speak an Asian mother tongue."
"The very high immigration level of the 1990s does not appear to have weakened the forces of linguistic assimilation. Mexicans, by far the largest immigrant group, provide a compelling example.
In 1990, 64 percent of third-generation Mexican-American children spoke only English at home; in 2000, the equivalent figure had risen to 71 percent."
Much third-generation bilingualism is found in border communities, such as Brownsville, Texas, where the maintenance of Spanish has deep historical roots and is affected by proximity to Mexico.
Away from the border, Mexican-American children of the third generation are unlikely to be bilingual.[as in not speaking Spanish at all]
Keefe and Padilla (1987)
On cultural awareness and ethnic loyalty revealed five well-defined and homogeneous clusters in terms of acculturation.
The first cluster, Type I (25%), was comprised of primarily Mexican Americans, first generation, mostly immigrants, and clearly unacculturated who identified with Mexicans and Mexican culture. The second cluster,
Type II (14%), was comprised of individuals who were as unacculturated as those in Type I, but who identified only moderately with Mexicans. The third cluster,
Type III (35%), constituted the largest group with moderate ethnic awareness of and loyalty to both the Mexican and Anglo culture, which was characterized as a culture blend. The fourth cluster,
Type IV (21%), was comprised of individuals who were more acculturated but identified less with others of Mexican descent. The final cluster,
Type V (5%), was described as very Anglicized, and knowing little about the Mexican culture. Level of acculturation is significant in influencing both formal and informal interactions and must be considered to be important cultural factor distinguishing Mexican Americans.
Language Assimilation Today:
Bilingualism Persists More Than in the Past,
But English Still Dominates
Richard Alba
Lewis Mumford Center for Comparative Urban and Regional Research
University at Albany
December, 2004
So much for subtly.
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