I wish I hadn’t picked up the flu there, though, and spent the next week in bed.

Yeah, I remember reading your posts about that … you certainly seemed pretty damn excited to be returning to Ohio (sarcasm). I try not to say I was raised there, but I did live in Dublin from 6 – 11 and I went to St. Timothy’s Catholic school in Columbus. My parents were obviously trying to stifle my incredible potential.

I do however have fond memories of going to Germantown during Indian Summer (the one bearable month out of the year) and eating bread and looking around the bookstores and shops.

The language has all but died out in the U.S., and I think it’s because the people of my parents’ generation used Yiddish as a secret language to keep information from their children. I know that’s how it was for me at home.

(My wife speaks about as much Yiddish as I do. She was raised a Congregationalist in Columbus, Ohio, is descended from Scottish nobility, and could belong to the Mayflower Society and the DAR if she didn’t know I’d rag on her mercilessly about it.)

At the turn of the last century, 30 percent of the population of Cleveland was German-speaking and spoke no English. The English-language newspapers of the day Viewed the Situation With Alarm.

I’m a third-generation American myself, and I’ve always been fascinated by immigrant communities. My parents, aunts, uncles and grandparents were all part of immigrant communities, but I was outside of it because of the circumstances of my birth. There’s a vast difference between being raised by immigrants and being raised by native-born Americans, even if the native-born Americans who raised you were raised by immigrants.

For the record, I am in agreement with Latino Pundit on this. I know Black Pundit (BP) personally, and I know he didn’t mean any harm, his post did come off as overly hostile (especially the Mexico Plaza comment).

After talking to BP about this offline, I realized that what he meant to convey (BP is, like myself, a mathematician at heart, we have some difficulty expressing ourselves through writing) was immigrants in general, and Mexicans in particular, need to make a better effort to assimilate into society. He is basically arguing that our (I am Mexican American) culture seems to foster an environment that prevents us from learning English as much as we should. Which is, btw, a fair point to make. Like it or not, English is a tool that is absolutely essential if you want to move up economically. Not being able to take college courses is reason enough to encourage more recent immigrants to learn English.

However, with that being said, I do think there is an argument to be made in favor of keeping your native tongue. While I agree with the general principle that immigrants should assimilate into the American culture, I would disagree strongly with anybody who believes immigrants should completely abandon their culture. I am of the opinion that it is several different cultures all working together that makes America the wonderful country that she is. America is, almost by definition, a melting pot. It is our diversity and our wide differences in cultures that make America so beautiful. I love being able to drive down the street and buy Mexican food from my fellow Mexicans that work there, in the same way, I love to drive down the street the next day and buy Vietnamese food from Vietnamese people, or Chinese food from Chinese people, or Indian food from Indians. It is this wide variety of cultures all working together that makes this country so different, so strong, and so popular. This level of different cultures is greater than in any other country throughout the world, and unheard of in human history. It is the paradox of all of us being completely the same, yet at the same time completely different that makes this country great. Going too far in either direction is definitely bad, but it’s that middle area that should be encouraged and admired.

So in conclusion BP’s general point is valid, but his point should not be taken too far. We as Mexican Americans need to learn to speak both languages, English and Spanish. We need to embrace the American culture, while at the same time keeping our own.

And in the meantime, to respond to BP as far as what he should do when he gets to a place where he has trouble communicating, remember that you’re in America, the nation of capitalism, so you have choices…and more than likely they’re just right across the street.