No more Autobus Magico, as Nevada school district bans Spanish on the bus

[Wilson Gray]

Perhaps these people might want to use the guaranteed-to-work method
that quickly reduced French minority languages to déclassé patois and
changed monolingual Celtic speakers into monolingual English speakers.

>From the primary grades on, the teachers were monolingual speakers of
the "national" language. Pupils who couldn't learn because they didn't
understand French or English were simply caned until they did. As the
students learned the national language, there was likewise a simple
method to keep them from making mistakes in class or reverting to the
use of the home language during recess and such. Anyone caught using
the home language had a stick hung around his neck and the other
pupils were encouraged to take this stick and use it to beat the shit
out of the offending child during recess, on the way home, and on the
way back to school the next day.

This may seem a little harsh to a few bleeding hearts, but its record
of success is unmatched.

-Wilson

On Feb 4, 2008 9:31 AM, Dennis Baron <debaron at uiuc.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Dennis Baron <debaron at UIUC.EDU>
> Subject:      No more Autobus Magico, as Nevada school district bans Spanish on
>               the bus
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> There's a new post on the Web of Language --
>
> No more Autobus Magico, as Nevada school district bans Spanish on the =20=
>
> bus
>
> First a Kansas school bans any language but English on school =20
> grounds. Now a Nevada school district has banned Spanish on the bus. =20
> In October, 2007, Robert Aumaugher, superintendent of the Esmeralda =20
> County Schools, sent a note informing parents of students attending =20
> Fish Lake Valley High School that their children would not be allowed =20=
>
> to speak Spanish on the school bus.
>
> Aumaugher, whose office is in Goldfield, the Esmeralda county seat, =20
> decided to go English-only on the bus after learning that Nevada=92s =20
> Spanish-speaking students have lower rates of high school graduation =20
> than English speakers. Plus the bus drivers, who don=92t speak Spanish, =20=
>
> are convinced that students are disrespecting them by speaking Spanish.
>
> Goldfield, pop. 440, is a ghost town that once boasted Virgil Earp as =20=
>
> its deputy sheriff. But since it no longer has a high school, =20
> students from Goldfield, Dyer, and other nearby towns are bussed to =20
> Fish Lake Valley in nearby Nye County.
>
> But even though Nye=92s county seat, Pahrump, declared English its =20
> official language, Nye school superintendent Rob Roberts insists that =20=
>
> in his county, Spanish-speaking students can use their native =20
> language on the bus as much as they please, and the Nevada ACLU has =20
> stepped in to ask that Esmeralda=92s no-Spanish rule be dropped....
>
> The state of Nevada doesn=92t have an official language. An official =20
> language law recently passed the Nevada senate, but the House has =20
> taken no action on the bill which states =93that a command of English =20=
>
> is a critical component of the success and productivity of the =20
> children in this State.=94 If passed, that law would also bar =93any law =
> =20
> which diminishes or ignores the role of English as the common =20
> language of [Nevada].=94 But since official English is still bottled up =20=
>
> in the legislature, counties like Esmeralda, towns like Pahrump, and =20
> even school buses driven by English-speaking drivers are making their =20=
>
> own English-only rules.
> ...
>
> Read the rest at the Web of Language
>
>
>
> DB
>
>
> Dennis Baron
> Professor of English and Linguistics
> Department of English
> University of Illinois
> 608 S. Wright St.
> Urbana, IL 61801
>
> office: 217-244-0568
> fax: 217-333-4321
>
> www.uiuc.edu/goto/debaron
>
> read the Web of Language:
> www.uiuc.edu/goto/weboflanguage
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
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>



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