Excuse our French

THE SWEET old lady from south Louisiana held a special place in our hearts until the day she died. She was the best storyteller, and she had a million of ’em. She also had a habit of turning on the public TV station at midday to catch the French lesson for an hour. (An hour uninterrupted by commercial TV ads.)

This aged woman, when we knew her, had the French beat out of her as a child. All her family spoke it, with that particular Cajun dialect, no doubt. All the elderly people in her childhood spoke it, with only a few English phrases sprinkled in. But the adults in her home decided early in her life, like adults from Lake Charles to Pass Christian, that fluent English was the only way to prosperity in America—and they were right. What they did wrong, however, was a lot.

In the 1930s and 1940s, instead of allowing the children to grow up bilingual, parents and schoolmarms along the coast whipped the kids who let the French slip now and then. Shrugging your shoulders and muttering C’est la vie was akin to a curse. The paddle or the yardstick was next.

A whole generation of children grew up understanding a little French but speaking none of it. The language of their ancestors was lost to their kids, and their kids in turn. It was a damn shame.

Our editors here at Arkansas’ Newspaper picked up a story from The New York Times and ran it Sunday: Schools in Louisiana are importing French teachers these days. And some schools south of the (state) border are even going full immersion with the language. Funny how things come full circle.

With names like Melancon, Cormier, Bergeron, Theriot and Fontenot, the kids down there ought to have some French. Their great-grandparents spoke it. Lakes and rivers are named in the language. So are towns and parishes and bridges. Besides, there’s nothing like knowing another language to understand one’s own.

We remember back to 2006, when a president named George W. Bush came up with something called the National Security Language Initiative, because America should “teach our kids how to speak important languages,” according to that former president.

George W. Bush’s own speech may

have been perplexing, possibily even unique, but he knew the world had grown small. His initiative focused on Chinese, Russian, Hindi, Farsi and Arabic. But, lest we forget, French is one of the important languages, too. And somehow much more alluring than Russian or Farsi could ever be.

There is a lesson for the rest of us outside the borders of Louisiana: We’ve all had to learn a language, at least one. But we were lucky enough to pick it up at the same time we were trying out this “walking” technique. And we had people who loved us guiding us along the way, just as they did as we stumbled from coffee table to couch.

Those who learn a second language as adults—when it’s much more difficult—deserve our great admiration. But multiple languages should be encouraged among the young, especially among immigrant families. A melting pot doesn’t mean everything in the pot looks (or sounds) the same. There could be a stew in there. Or a sauce piquant.

IN ARKANSAS, you can’t swing a dead gato without hitting a Spanish speaker. And what a beautiful language. It gives French a run for its money in that regard. And it’s much easier for English speakers to grasp, too, without the horoscope of German articles or the script of certain Asian ones.

The world, even the United States, will doubtless involve a lot of Spanish in the future. American corporations are already paying top dollar for those who speak it. No matter your opinion of immigration, or at least illegal immigration, you have to admit it’s smart business to communicate with your customers. Or at least dumb business to be unable to.

If we’re serious about preparing the younger generation for the next 50 years, it makes sense to give them the best tools. For all kinds of reasons beyond economics in this land, this state, this world of opportunity.

English must still be the lingua franca in the United States. A country should have a common language, what the linguists call a trade language. But there is no rule forbidding folks from knowing more. That is, being bilingual instead of American, as the joke goes.

They made awful mistakes down south three generations ago. Let’s not repeat them.