Bilingualism Should Not Be Continued

980 Words2 Pages

Bilingualism, a very controversial topic to debate in today’s United States. People generally define bilingualism as the ability of using two languages that individuals have. However, this is not the reason why that bilingualism becomes such a debatable issue. In this case, bilingualism is defined as the government’s use of languages other than English for public services in order to support the immigrants’ lives in the United States. People who support bilingualism want the government to continue having this kind policies. They think that bilingualism helps immigrants to assimilate into the American culture and moreover, it will unify everyone who are on this land. Although bilingualism provides some kind of benefits toward immigrants, they cannot solve the problems in the deep root. Bilingualism should not be continued in the U.S. Why? It reduces the immigrants’ incentive to learn English, threatens national unity, and costs so much.
James Fallows, a proponents of having bilingualism in the U.S. Fallows claim that there is no need to declare English as the official language in the U.S. “because it already is that” (263). Fallows argues that English is already the most powerful language in this world, and obviously the immigrants knew that fact. Therefore, bilingual services will not reduce the incentive of immigrants to learn English. However, his argument is not fully correct. From 2000 to 2010, over 9 million immigrants came to America (Camarota). Because of this huge population of immigrants, most of the immigrants merely formed communities within their own ethnic or linguistic groups. In their communities, they can live well by speaking their native languages. Furthermore, when they are facing public problems, they have...

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...ericans who are retired can go there and do voluntary teaching. This would help the seniors with English and also brings people together as a united community.

Works Cited

Camarota, Steven A. "A Record-Setting Decade of Immigration: 2000-2010." Center for Immigration Studies. N.p., 05 Oct. 2011. Web. 02 Dec. 2013.
Goshgarian, Gary, ed. Exploring Language. 8th ed. New York: Longman, 1998. Fallows, James – “Viva Bilingualism” (pp. 259-265)
Goshgarin, Gary, ed. Exploring Language. 11th ed. New York: Longman, 2007. Mujica, Mauro. E. – “Why the U.S. Needs an Official Language” (pp. 580-585)
Goshgarian, Gary, ed. Exploring Language. 8th ed. New York: Longman, 1998. Hayakawa, Samuel I. – “Bilingualism in America: English Should Be the Only Language” (pp.251-258)
"The Costs of Bilingual Education." The Social Contract. The Social Contract Press, n.d. Web. 02 Dec. 2013.

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