The New California Work Requirement -- Spanish
Story by David Madrid

I just landed a job at an East Side Target store here in San Jose. Out of the roughly 30 workers in my department everyone, except for maybe six, are Latino. Out of all those Latino workers, the majority are Spanish-only speakers, and only two don't speak any Spanish at all. I'm one of them. Not speaking Spanish has been a problem from day one .

I have always felt the social segregation between Chicanos and Mexican immigrants at school and on the street. But now, in this Target warehouse, that feeling is undeniable. At times I feel unwelcome, and even animosity towards me for no other reason that I can see except for me being Chicano and I can't speak Spanish.

Throughout the different jobs I've worked, I have often seen workers discriminated against because of language, but usually it is because they don't speak English well. Here, I feel discriminated against by my peers because I only speak English.   It's bad enough that I feel uncomfortable around the big, usually white, bosses who look down upon me and treat me like a foreigner, even though my family has been here for generations.  

All over the country, there are Chicanos like myself that don't speak Spanish. And language alone can lead to misperceptions, segregation and conflict between our own people, even in Target stockrooms.   My Target situation is soon to be a California situation as four out of ten children in California now have at least one parent born in another country, the highest percentage in the nation.   The jobs many immigrants are getting are also the ones Chicano's are already in – mega stores like Target and Wal-Mart.

At work, sometimes I feel uncomfortable and have a strange feeling of not belonging, from not understanding the conversation and laughter around me during work and being ignored at lunch and breaks. On my first day, a couple of lady co-workers attempted to have conversations with me in Spanish as we went about our work, and to their surprise found out I couldn't speak the language. That would be the first and last time that I would ever have any contact with them. They wouldn't even look my way as I passed them down an aisle. I even have trouble understanding some of the morning supervisors, who use Spanish even when giving instructions to our department over the loudspeaker. Sometimes they will come walking up to me giving directions in Spanish before they catch themselves and finish telling me what they're saying in broken English.

Growing up, my Chicano family and friends who only speak English usually had similar encounters with Spanish speakers. Usually at work, or shopping, a Latino would come walking up speaking Spanish, assuming that I understood, and by the puzzled look on my face, they realize that I might not understand.   Now, if they didn't simply walk away, they would ask “You no speak Espanol?” and when I'd answer “No” they would usually do one of two things -- either smile in amazement or look at me with disgust.   Both of theses reactions may result into further questions like “Por que?” Or “Aren't you Mexican?” This situation might even end up with an insulting “pinche pocho” as the person walks away.

If I did speak Spanish, the first thing I would do would be to break down the misconception underlying the tension, namely that if you are a Mexican and you don't speak Spanish you are ashamed of your culture. That's why they consider me a “pocho”-- white washed.   This is far from the truth for most of us.   I know many Chicanos that feel ashamed for not being able to speak the language, and who are making efforts to learn, not to mention studying and embracing the culture and history of our people.   I can't deny the fact that there are some Hispanic folks out there who are embarrassed and may even look down upon their own “Raza”, but that doesn't mean if we can't speak Spanish that we all feel that way.

Why don't I speak Spanish?   You know, I even asked some other Chicanos who are in my shoes how come they don't know how to speak Spanish, and one of the most commonly heard answer was “My parents didn't teach me.”

Now, that answer hit home, because it's my response too. My parents don't speak Spanish because my grandparents did not want them to speak it, not because of shame, but out of fear. My grandma told me when she was a little girl growing up in the Central Valley she would get punished by teachers for speaking Spanish at school. You better believe there where no E.S.L (English as a Second Language) classes for our grandparents and parents growing up.   A lot of our families have endured generations of racism here in the United States and differences of language made it easy to fall victim to prejudice. Through out California and the Southwest during the 1930's and 40's it was common to see signs in front of restaurants and stores that read, “No Dog's or Mexicans allowed.”   My Grandpa told me that back in those days you could even get kicked out of some places for speaking Spanish in public. 

So it must be understood, for a lot of us Chicanos not speaking Spanish is the result of our families being the victim of a racist American society, dating back to our grandparents and years before them.  

At work, I wish those two ladies that first approached me, and all the other Spanish-Only Latinos I have run across who look down upon my English-Only language skills knew all of those feelings and history that was behind my very simple answer – “No habla Espanol.” I wish they knew that in many ways, I can sort of feel how they do when it seems like everyone around you is speaking in a foreign tongue. But there is just one thing we must keep in mind, is that even though we may find differences between us because of our imposed language barriers, we still need to remember what is similar about us. Namely, that regardless of what language we use, our big white bosses all look at us the same.