It isn't racist to insist immigrants in Nashville learn English


Phil Valentine
phil@philvalentine.com

A common language can unite a people. Disparate languages can divide. We've known that since the Tower of Babel.

Why, then, would a city such as Nashville move in the direction of dividing the city through language? Councilman Eric Crafton has been asking that very question.

It's not that Crafton advocates discouraging the learning of different languages. Crafton is fluent in Japanese. He is a magna cum laude graduate of Vanderbilt. He's also a graduate of Keio University in Tokyo, where he studied Japanese and political economy. This is not some xenophobic hayseed who wants everybody to "speak American." Crafton simply wants to build a better Nashville, and you don't do that by dividing people by language. Teddy Roosevelt understood that in 1919 when he said, "We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language."

This is an English-speaking country. Tennessee is an English-speaking state. Nashville should be an English-speaking city. Crafton's English First initiative would see to it that all official business done by the city of Nashville is done in English. If you insist on coming here and not learning the language, then the cost of interpreters is going to be on your dime, not the taxpayers of Nashville.

It's that simple.

Crafton's proposal doesn't ban speaking your native tongue in public or private. Nor does it discriminate against anyone, as opponents have suggested. It simplifies our way of doing business, casting aside the ridiculous duplication of government documents in multiple languages. It also saves us a great deal of money.

Crafton's measure passed the Metro Council last year, but was vetoed by then-mayor Bill Purcell. Mayor Karl Dean appears poised to use the veto pen once again, calling the measure dangerously restrictive, economically regressive and unproductive. It is none of the above.

In fact, prodding non-English-speaking residents to learn our language is economically beneficial to them. Unless you want to be relegated to menial labor for the rest of your life, you must learn English to prosper in this country.

Nashville is behind the curve when it comes to assimilating immigrants. California, Arizona and Massachusetts have chucked their English as a Second Language (ESL) programs in their schools and have replaced them with English immersion.

Metro schools brag that immigrants can become English-proficient in two to three years. With English immersion, students can become English-proficient in two to three months.

The University of Cincinnati has been using this technique for years in something called The Valentine House (no relation). Students live an entire school year in the house, speaking nothing but French or Spanish. The results have been nothing less than fantastic. Students begin to pick up on their chosen foreign language quickly because they have to. No crutches. No French as a Second Language classes.

There's nothing racist or inurbane about insisting that people here do their government business in English. It's just common sense, really.

This is the way we assimilated the first large wave of European immigrants just after the turn of last century. The risk we run in coddling to foreign tongues is producing a fractured society, which will ultimately deteriorate into civil unrest.

For evidence of that we need look no further than Quebec. The language divide in Canada has divided an entire nation.

Is this what we want for Nashville?

Opponents to the Crafton measure, like Mayor Dean, see English First as a barrier. Not learning English is the real barrier.

But let's not fool ourselves. Many of those who choose not to learn our language before moving here are illegal immigrants. I suspect many of those opposed to English First are masking the fact that they've found a way to make money off these illegal immigrants.

Regardless of how the council votes or what the mayor wants, I believe the people of Nashville recognize the wisdom of Crafton's proposal.

For those who choose to come here and not assimilate and not learn the language, the city of Nashville should have but one word for them: adios.
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Phil Valentine is an author and syndicated radio talk show host with Westwood One, heard locally on SuperTalk 99.7WTN weekdays from 4-8 p.m. His column appears on Sundays
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