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CHICANO ENGLISH Varieties of English Around the World General Editor: Manfred Görlach Englisches Seminar Universität zu Köln Albertus Magnus Platz 1 D-5000 KÖLN 41 Germany GENERAL SERIES Volume 7 Joyce Penfield and Jacob L. Ornstein-Galicia Chicano English: An Ethnic Contact Dialect CHICANO ENGLISH: AN ETHNIC CONTACT DIALECT by Joyce Penfield Rutgers University Jacob L. Ornstein-Galicia University of Texas at El Paso JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA 1985 Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Penfield, Joyce. Chicano English. (Varieties of English around the world, ISSN 0172-7362. General series; v. 7) Bibliography: p. 1. English language - Dialects ~ Southwestern States. 2. Mexican Americans ~ Language. 3. Languages in contact ~ Southwestern States. 4. Bilingualism - Southwestern States. I. Ornstein-Galicia, Jacob, 1915- . II. Title. III. Series. PE3102.M4P4 1985 427'.979 85-20103 ISBN 90-272-4865-6 (alk. paper) © Copyright 1985 - John Benjamins B.V. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publisher. CONTENTS PREFACE I THE SOUTHWEST AS A LINGUISTIC AREA 1 Introduction 1 Field Methods: Problems 3 Sociolinguistic Setting 6 Towards a Definition of Chicano English 16 II LOS CHICANOS 19 Introduction 19 Demography 19 Ethnography: Models of Bilingualism 25 Language Development 29 III SPEECH ASPECTS OF CHICANO ENGLISH 34 Introduction 34 Speech Traits 36 Discussion of Speech Traits 39 Prosody 47 Discussion of Prosody 51 Syntactic Patterns 52 IV LITERACY DEVELOPMENT 54 Problems with Orthography 54 University Level Chicano Writing 62 V LANGUAGE ATTITUDES 67 68 Attitude Studies 68 Teachers 71 VI REPRESENTATIONS OF CHICANO ENGLISH IN THE MEDIA 74 Characterization: The Anglo View 78 The Electronic Media 84 Chicano Literature: Self-Portrait 85 APPENDIX 95 REFERENCES 96 PREFACE Perhaps no place in the United States is more rich in language contact than the Southwest, especially along the U.S.-Mexican border. For over two cen turies English and Spanish have been in contact under fairly stable bi lingual conditions. The result is a particular dialect or variety of English typically used by many Americans of Mexican descent. We suggest that this dialect is different from geographic-based ones, e.g., Bostonian English, or social-based ones, e.g., Black English in that it involves an ethnic group in contact with other ethnic groups as well as a great deal of bilingualism. Thus, the intent of this work is to provide not only des criptive linguistic data and discussion but also to examine domains very much related to such a description, specifically: bilingualism, ethno- graphic issues, literacy development, education, the media, and literature. It is surprising that although linguists and others have realized the highly multilingual situation in the Southwest, few have taken any more than casual or momentary interest in researching one of its major dialects - Chicano English. As two descriptive-oriented sociolinguists, we couldn't resist the challenge to look carefully at what others seemed to avoid. With Ornstein's long-standing scholarly research on ethnicity and language varieties in the Southwest and Penfield's research experience in a very different multilingual setting - West Africa - we joined to describe and try to explain what we heard and saw written day after day in a highly bilingual community in the Southwest. This book is the result of this team effort and yet it is just a small beginning for future work we hope will continue. Currently, Chicano English has little status of a positive nature in the Southwest or elsewhere and consequently those who research it are often wrongly branded with disregard by their professional colleagues. We would hope that one day Chicano English gains the status and acceptance it deserves as a historical by-product of ethnic contact, but until that occurs linguists and other researchers address more in tently and seriously the theoretical and empirical questions which are raised by the nature and existence of Chicano English. The present volume was planned to be published in 1983; delays in the production have now meant that another volume on Chicano English, a col lection of 17 essays by 14 scholars (Ornstein-Galicia 1984), was published first. The overlap between the two books is, however, slight: it is con fined to J.Penfield's comments on intonation and literacy. I THE SOUTHWEST AS A LINGUISTIC AREA Introduction The U.S. Southwest is characterized by wide differences in ancestry, language, historical background, beliefs, attitudes, cultural back grounds, and residential patterns. The complexity of sociolinguistic situations in the Southwest reflects the diversity found in this five-state region consisting of Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico, and Texas (Map 1). Chicano English (=ChE), spoken predomi nately by Mexican-Americans (=Chicanos), is a product of these complex sociolinguistic situations. Since ChE is a product of the process of language contact, there are no doubt a variety of non-linguistic fac tors which are crucial to an eventual linguistic definition of ChE. Some of these factors are important in defining socio-cultural varia tion within the Chicano community itself. Others relate to Anglo, Black, and Mexican communities which are involved in the language con tact process. The authors feel that a discussion of these factors is a critical precedent to a discussion of linguistic variables; there fore, this discussion is given first. Since Mexican-Americans comprise an estimated seven to eleven million people, most of whom live in the Southwest, it is not sur prising to find a great deal of variation within this ethnic group in a variety of dimensions, e.g., socio-economic class, education, attitudes, life styles, residential patterns, language, and values. Those dimensions which we have observed as directly related to language choice, language use, and language acquisition will be dis cussed in detail throughout this book. Two major assumptions under- ly our treatment of ChE. First, we recognize that there are several varieties of ChE throughout the U.S. The extent and nature of this variation remains to be described. Since ChE is presently at the beginning stages of research, our study primarily suggests general patterns and tendencies with occasional mention of variation based on the research of others and informal observation. In fact, a good number of our texts were gathered in the western section of Texas and in East Los Angeles. It is possible that these texts are indi cative of other regions in the Southwest; however, there is much more fieldwork to be done to confirm this suggestion. A second major assumption of this book is suggested by the title. It is assumed that ChE is a variety or dialect of English spoken pre dominately by bilingual Chicanos and reinforced or reperpetuated as a result of border contact as well as some isolation of Chicanos from some Anglo groups. Theoretically, it is important to underline that we view ChE as a form of communication which is passed on to children and which serves an important function in the speech community along with having its own norms of appropriateness. ChE dialects are then systematic and distinct varieties. Because of the bilingual setting in which ChE is embedded, at first glance one is tempted to believe that Chicanos speaking English are simply using Standard English (=St AmE) 'incorrectly'. In many of 2 CHICANO ENGLISH: AN ETHNIC CONTACT DIALECT