"This is the most comprehensive book I’ve ever read about the use of Spanish in the U.S. Incredible research. Read it to understand our country. Spanish is, indeed, an American language."—Jorge Ramos An American Language is a tour de force that revolutionizes our understanding of U.S. history. It reveals the origins of Spanish as a language binding residents of the Southwest to the politics and culture of an expanding nation in the 1840s. As the West increasingly integrated into the United States over the following century, struggles over power, identity, and citizenship transformed the place of the Spanish language in the nation. An American Language is a history that reimagines what it means to be an American—with profound implications for our own time.

This collection of original papers presents current research on linguistic aspects of the Spanish used in the United States. The authors examine such topics as language maintenance and language shift, language choice, the bilingual's discourse patterns, varieties of Spanish used in the United States, and oral proficiency testing of bilingual speakers. In view of the fact that Hispanics constitute the largest linguistic minority in the United States, the pioneering work in the area of sociolinguistic issues in the U.S. Spanish presented here is of great importance.

The Spanish Language in the United States addresses the rootedness of Spanish in the United States, its racialization, and Spanish speakers’ resistance against racialization. This novel approach challenges the "foreigner" status of Spanish and shows that racialization victims do not take their oppression meekly. It traces the rootedness of Spanish since the 1500s, when the Spanish empire began the settlement of the new land, till today, when 39 million U.S. Latinos speak Spanish at home. Authors show how whites categorize Spanish speaking in ways that denigrate the non-standard language habits of Spanish speakers—including in schools—highlighting ways of overcoming racism.

Spanish in the United States: Attitudes and Variation is a collection of new, cutting-edge research with the purpose of providing scholars interested in Spanish as it is spoken by bilinguals living in the United States a current view of the state of the discipline. This volume is broad and inclusive of the populations studied, methodologies used, and approaches to the linguistic study of Spanish in order to provide scholars with an up-to-date understanding of the complexities of the Spanish(es) spoken in the United States. In addition to this snapshot, this volume stimulates new areas of inquiry and motivates new ways of analyzing the social, linguistic, and educational aspects of what it means to speak Spanish in the United States.

From the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of the smash hit Deep Down Dark, a definitive tour of the Spanish-speaking United States—a parallel nation, 35 million strong, that is changing the very notion of what it means to be an American in unprecedented and unexpected ways. Tobar begins on familiar terrain, in his native Los Angeles, with his family's story, along with that of two brothers of Mexican origin with very different interpretations of Americanismo, or American identity as seen through a Latin American lens—one headed for U.S. citizenship and the other for the wrong side of the law and the south side of the border. But this is just a jumping-off point. Soon we are in Dalton, Georgia, the most Spanish-speaking town in the Deep South, and in Rupert, Idaho, where the most popular radio DJ is known as "El Chupacabras." By the end of the book, we have traveled from the geographical extremes into the heartland, exploring the familiar complexities of Cuban Miami and the brand-new ones of a busy Omaha INS station. Sophisticated, provocative, and deeply human, Translation Nation uncovers the ways that Hispanic Americans are forging new identities, redefining the experience of the American immigrant, and reinventing the American community. It is a book that rises, brilliantly, to meet one of the most profound shifts in American identity.

There is growing interest in heritage language learners—individuals who have a personal or familial connection to a nonmajority language. Spanish learners represent the largest segment of this population in the United States. In this comprehensive volume, experts offer an interdisciplinary overview of research on Spanish as a heritage language in the United States. They also address the central role of education within the field. Contributors offer a wealth of resources for teachers while proposing future directions for scholarship.

Stephenson worked in Chile for nine years for the Council on International Educational Exchange, and is now director of Latin American and Caribbean studies for the School of International Training in Vermont. She offers scholars, teachers, students, travelers, and business people insights into the Spanish political and religious history, and the cultural diversity, of the nine Spanish-speaking countries of South America (Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Columbia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela). Individual chapters on each of the nine countries cover geographical and historical influences, analysis of the mix of peoples, specific cultural features, communication styles, and life and work in each country. Annotation (c)2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com).