Language Instrumentality in Southern New Mexico: Implications for the Loss of Spanish in the Southwest

Abstract

ABSTRACT. U.S. Census data indicate that the majority of those of Spanish-speaking descent in this country continue to speak Spanish. At the same time, many researchers have documented the shift from Spanish to English in this group, and have suggested that the apparent vitality of Spanish in the U.S. may be due more to migration than to intergenerational language maintenance. Many of such studies utilize an approach that documents the transmission of Spanish from one generation to the next. The present study proposes to examine this phenomenon from a different perspective, investigating what Gal (1979) defines as 'intervening processes'. In particular, the instrumental value of Spanish in a border region of the Southwest is studied. This research, then, seeks to contribute to an understanding of how economic factors, such as wages and their relation to bilingual job skills, may have an impact on the shift from Spanish to English in one region of the U.S./Mexico border. * INTRODUCTION. U.S. Census data indicate that those of Spanish-speaking descent (often labeled 'Hispanics' by the U.S. Census Bureau) (1) are the fastest growing ethnic segment of the United States population, and now form the largest minority group in the nation (http://www.census.gov). The majority of this group speaks Spanish; indeed, after English, Spanish is the second most widely spoken language in this country, with the U.S. being the fifth largest Spanish-speaking nation in the world (Villa 2000). At the same time, many researchers have documented the shift from Spanish to English among U.S. Hispanics, e.g. Lopez (1978), Veltman (1988), Bills (1989), Sole (1990), Pease-Alvarez (1993), Bills, Hernandez Chavez, and Hudson (1995), and Rivera-Mills (2001), among others. In spite of the apparent vitality of Spanish, research inevitably points to an inexorable intergenerational loss of the language among those of Spanish-speaking origin. Thus, a major motivation of this study is to work toward a better understanding of what might contribute to that loss, in particular if economic factors might have an impact on the choice of one language over another. It would seem credible that sharing a 2,000 mile border with the largest Spanish speaking country in the world would have a positive impact on the maintenance of Spanish in this nation, especially in U.S.-Mexico border regions. For example, Grosjean (1982:101), discussing one segment of the U.S. Hispanic population, states that 'Mexican Americans are extremely attached to their language and culture and have NO PROBLEM MAINTAINING THEM' (emphasis added). However, despite the appealing notion that proximity to a Spanish speaking country promotes Spanish retention, language loss has been and continues to be documented in the population Grosjean describes above. The apparent vitality of U.S. Spanish seems to be due principally to migration; the language is in a state of flux between two extremes, one favoring the abandonment of the mother tongue, and the other a constant renewal due to the arrival of hispanophones. This study proposes to contribute to an understanding of the language loss side of this dynamic, why it is that research on this topic consistently shows a loss of Spanish among U.S. Hispanics. The principal focus here is on economic factors and how they might impact language loss. Bills' (1989) and Bills' et al. (1995) research in part motivates this approach; these authors, using demographic information from the U.S. Census, have demonstrated strong correlations between the self-reported use of Spanish and income and educational level. Bills (1989:23), for example, states that '[The] association with Spanish retention with the poor and uneducated agrees with what virtually all researchers have found regarding language maintenance in the US ...' . However, Hamel, citing Gal (1979), points out that such correlations do not necessarily provide insights into the CAUSE of the shift. …

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