“GOOD Old Immigrants of Yesteryear,” Who Didn't Learn English: Germans in Wisconsin

Abstract

One myth about language and immigration in North America is that nineteenth-century immigrants typically became bilingual almost immediately after arriving, yet little systematic data has been presented for this view. We present quantitative and qualitative evidence about Germans in Wisconsin, where, into the twentieth century, many immigrants and their descendants remained monolingual, decades after immigration had ceased. Even those who claimed to speak English often had limited command. Quantitative data from the 1910 Census, augmented by qualitative evidence from newspapers, court records, literary texts, and other sources, suggest that Germans of various socioeconomic backgrounds often lacked English language skills. German continued to be the primary language in numerous Wisconsin communities, and some second-and third-generation descendants of immigrants were still monolingual as adults. Understanding this history can help inform contemporary debates about language and immigration and help dismantle the myth that successful immigrant groups of yesterday owed their prosperity to an immediate, voluntary shift to English.In the debates now raging over language and immigration, it is widely asserted by media commentators, members of the general public, and even scholars that earlier immigrants learned English quickly and that their children came to prefer it overwhelmingly over their imported or "heritage" languages. This view has recently been exploited as part of an effort to fault contemporary immigrants for purportedly not learning English fast enough. In fact, while considerable research has investigated the languages immigrants have brought to the United States over the centuries and the process of language shift to English, we find a striking gap when it comes to understanding when and how well these immigrants initially learned English.In this article, we first offer an overview of some popular and scholarly misconceptions about the learning of English among earlier immigrants. We then present quantitative evidence on the learning of English among ethnic American SpeechPublished by Duke University Press

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