The Multilingual Apple: Languages in New York City

388 Pages·2001·64.72 MB·English

by  Joshua A. Fishman

The Multilingual Apple
W
DE
G

The Multilingual Apple
Languages in New York City
Second edition
with a new foreword
Edited by
Ofelia Garcia
Joshua A. Fishman
Mouton de Gruyter
Berlin · New York 2002
Mouton de Gruyter (formerly Mouton, The Hague)
is a Division of Walter de Gruyter & Co., Berlin
First edition published in 1997.
© Printed on acid-free paper which falls within the guidelines of
the ANSI to ensure permanence and durability.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The multilingual Apple : languages in New York City / edited
by Ofelia Garcia, Joshua A. Fishman. - 2nd ed. / with a new
foreword.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 3-11-017281-X (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Linguistic minorities - New York (State) - New York.
2. Sociolinguistics - New York (State) - New York. 3. New
York (N. Y.) - Languages. I. Garcia, Ofelia. II. Fishman,
Joshua A.
P40.5.L562U556 2002
306.44 O9747'l-dc21
2001047667
Die Deutsche Bibliothek — Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The multilingual apple : languages in New York City / ed. by
Ofelia Garcia ; Joshua A. Fishman. - 2. ed. with a new fore-
word. - Berlin ; New York : Mouton de Gruyter, 2002
ISBN 3-11-017281-X
© Copyright 2002 by Walter de Gruyter & Co. KG, 10785 Berlin
All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this
book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any information storage and retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Disk conversion and printing: Arthur Collignon GmbH, Berlin. - Binding: Werner Hilde-
brand, Berlin. - Printed in Germany.
To all the multilingual people of New York City
— immigrants and natives —
who struggle in many languages
to enrich the Big Apple.
And to our Spanish-speaking and Yiddish-speaking
spouses, children, and grandchildren
who enrich our lives
with their love.

i Me espanta la ciudad! Toda est llena
De copas por vaciar, o huecas copas.
I'm terrified of the city! It is all filled
with glasses not yet drunk, or with empty glasses.
Jose Marti, "Amor de Ciudad Grande",
New York, April 1882. From Versos Libres, 1882.
NTN
1ΓΤ Ι TT
ΤΝ ,T
NTN .lUINJ NTN
. Ν τα ι m
^π Ν ρτ pa
ONI
NTN
DNIT
,^ΊϋΒ^ΝΠ Π^^-
(1919) ρΊΝ''-T'J V
undzer gortn Our Garden
aza gortn, vu der boym What a garden, where the tree is
hot zikh zibn bleter koym. Bare but for its seven leaves!
un es dakht zikh, az er trakht: It appears to be amazed:
- ver hot mikh aher gebrakht? "Who has set me in this place?"
aza gortn, aza gortn, What a garden, what a garden -
vu mit a fargreser-gloz It takes a magnifying glass
kon men zen a bisl groz. Just to see a little grass.
zol dos undzer gortn zayn, Can this be our garden, then,
ot aza in morgnshayn? Just as is, in the light of dawn?
avade undzer gortn. Sure, it's our garden.
vos den, nit undzer gortn? What else? It's not our garden?
From Moyshe-Leyb Halpern, "Our Garden". From In New York (1919).

Foreword
Ofelia Garcia and Joshua A. Fishman
This anniversary edition continues to tell the story in English of how
Languages Other than English (LOTEs) have contributed to making New
York City one of the most culturally vibrant and linguistically diverse
metropolis in the world today.
The U. S. 2000 census has confirmed that the United States will be
increasingly multilingual in the 21st century. The number of adults in the
United States who speak a LOTE at home increased by 41 % in one
decade, and those who report some difficulty with English increased by
40%. As the 21st century starts, approximately 18% of U. S. households
speak a LOTE at home. In states like California, New Mexico, Texas,
New York, Hawaii, Arizona and New Jersey, well over 25 % of the pop-
ulation live in households where a LOTE is spoken.
New York City's multilingualism in 2000 has been spurred by a level
of immigration unequal since 1910, with one million immigrants arriving
in the last decade of the 20th century. In 2000, 40 % of New Yorkers were
foreign born, compared to 28% in 1990. The greater diversity of national
origins of New Yorkers who speak the same LOTE makes New York not
only a multilingual city, but a true laboratory of dialectal heterogeneity.
The city's largest group of LOTE speakers is still Spanish-speaking. But
Puerto Ricans, in 1990 half of New York Latinos, now make up 36% of
New Yorkers, with the island-born population declining sharply. In 1999,
there were 744,000 Puerto Ricans, of whom 290,000 were born in the
island. This represents a 12% decrease in one decade. At the same time,
the number of Mexicans increased by 203 %, making Mexicans the third
biggest single group of Spanish speaking New Yorkers after those of
Puerto Rican and Dominican ancestry.
The greater diversity in national origins of Spanish speakers is also
evident among Asians. The number of New Yorkers of Chinese origin
did not rise as sharply as the number of New Yorkers of Bangladeshi,
Pakistani and Indian descent. Whereas New Yorkers of Chinese descent
increased by 51%, those of Asian descent increased by 81%. Pakistani
Urdu speakers rank among the fastest-growing groups of immigrants.
X Foreword
And immigration from the former Soviet Union continues to increase,
with Russian spoken often in the city, especially in areas of Brooklyn.
This book's introduction, written by Garcia, provides more compre-
hensive quantitative and qualitative data to show that standard American
English is not today, and has never been, the daily vernacular of most
New Yorkers. Garcia shows that when one takes into account the number
of New Yorkers who speak Spanish, Chinese, Italian and a host of other
languages, and then adds those New Yorkers who speak different vari-
eties of English, the linguistic profile of New York begins to look quite
different from what many casual observers might imagine. Garcia also
analyzes how LOTEs, as well as other dialects of English, have been used
as important tools in the economic, social and poltical life of New York.
The chapters in sections II, III and IV are sociolinguistic studies of the
languages of a variety of different ethnolinguistic groups, encompassing
those whose LOTE voices, because they arrived early, have been some-
what silenced (Nilsen on Irish, Costello on German, Kliger and Peltz on
Yiddish), those whose voices are still loudly heard today (Haller on Ital-
ian, Costantakos and Spiridakis on Greek, Zentella on Spanish, Schiff
on Hebrew) and newer groups whose LOTEs are acquiring an important
voice in the city (Pan on Chinese, Sridhar on the languages of India,
Joseph on Haitian Creole, and Winer and Jack on Caribbean English
Creole).
All these chapters include an analysis of the LOTEs' linguistic and
usage characteristics in the country of origin of the ethnolinguistic group.
The chapters look at how factors such as age, gender, religion, education,
occupation, as well as geographical region or social setting have an effect
on linguistic items in the LOTE, often resulting in distinct varieties that
are differently valued and used.
The chapters then study the evolution of those LOTEs in New York
City, and how the different sociopolitical environment and the contact
with English have affected the linguistic characteristics of, and the atti-
tude of the group toward, the LOTE. In particular, the chapters study
how the social factors just mentioned, in combination with those that are
relevant for ethnolinguistic groups in a new context, such as birth place,
generation, race, and intermarriage, affect how the group uses the LOTE
as well as English, and whether the group is maintaining the LOTE or
shifting to English. The individual chapters also look at how LOTEs are
being used in the city at large, beyond the ethnic home and community,
in such public settings as government agencies, hospitals, schools, as well
as in private business.