THE CASE AGAINST "SPANGLISH" (AND EBONICS AND EVERY OTHER BASTARDIZATION OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE)

(sigh)

Damn. I know you're wondering what the devil has caused me to get on this language kick I seem to have indulged for the past week or so, and the reason is as obscure to me as it most likely is to you. I THINK I've just gotten so frustrated with trying to compete any more for an English speaking person on the telephone or in person that I've lost all sense of balance when it comes to this stuff. I'm beginning to feel like a minority in this country and I'm struggling to find a common language by with to communicate with people in my everyday life. I'm not kidding either.

"Spanglish," Ebonics, even Yiddish, have become so much a part of our language in this country that it's hard to find anyone any more who doesn't either revert to one of the above or have such an accent that it's hard to determine whether it's even English they're trying to speak. These intraethnic essences of language have become so prevalent that I wonder what our speech will look like (and sound like) 25 years from now. What's the scholarship and theory behind bastardizing our language to the extent that we have? I understand the desire of certain cultures to form their own vernacular to establish their identities in this country, but I truly believe we've gone beyond the pale here.

I go to have my nails done and have to draw a picture of what I want because the Vietnamese girl has two English words in her vocabulary: "Jerry Springer."

I call about my subscription to a magazine and am diverted to a remote area of Pakistan (where's Bin Laden?) and have to try to communicate with a man who speaks so little English that just giving him my account number is a challenge. I think this is a ploy to keep me from cancelling my subscription.

I call the doctor's office in Richmond to make an appointment and am immediately asked if I need a Spanish translator. Noooooooooo. In Richmond, Virginia, I'm asked this! Richmond!

I try to check out at the local Food Lion and Mohammed (no kidding) tries his best to ask me in English if the round thing is a yellow onion or a sweet one. It comes out something like, "Dis oonyun - kind? Yool? Swit?"" OMG.

The ultimate irony?

I go to an international market for Ras-el-Hanout, a spice I need for a Moroccan dish I'm making, and am helped by the "boy next door" -- a "WASP" who can -- guess what!!! Speak perfect English! He couldn't even pronounce the Middle Eastern spice correctly! I was ecstatic!

(sigh)