Ilan Stavans - Spanglish

Spanglish

As a sociolinguist, Stavans is known as a world authority in Spanglish, the hybrid form of communication that emerges at the crossroad where Spanish and English speakers interact. He has edited a dictionary of Spanglish words called Spanglish: The Making of a New American Language (2003) that includes an essay in historical analysis on the development of this linguistic phenomenon. Stavans writes that its first manifestations date back to 1848, when the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed after the Mexican-American War ended and a large portion of Mexican land was sold to the United States. He describes various distinctive varieties of Spanglish, such as Cubonics (Cuban-American), Dominicanish (Dominican-American), Nuyorrican (Puerto Rican in New York), and Chicano (Mexican American). He also establishes differences across generational and geographical lines, stating that recent immigrants are prone to use a type of Spanglish that differs from second- or third-generation Latinos. Stavans studies Spanglish by making comparisons with Black English and with Yiddish as well as Yinglish (the type of Yiddish used by Jewish immigrants to the United States and their children). And he reflects on the cultural similarities between Spanglish and jazz, rap, hip-hop, and graffiti.

In 2002, Stavans published in the Barcelona newspaper La Vanguardia a Spanglish translation of the first chapter of Cervantes’ Don Quixote of La Mancha. The translation has been controversial throughout the world, garnishing celebrations and attacks. Critics accuse Stavans of using Spanglish to call attention to himself. Supporters say that the translation is an indication that the Latino community in the United States has come of age. Stavans has responded to the reactions with interviews in which he argues that Spanglish is today’s manifestation of “mestizaje,” the crossbreeding of racial, social, and cultural traits of Anglos and Latinos similar to what occurred during the colonization of the Americas in the sixteenth century.