Article published in:
Language, Culture and Society
Vol. 2:1 (2020) ► pp. 37–65

Latinxs’ bilingualism at work in the US

Profit for whom?

| The Graduate Center, CUNY
| Queens College, CUNY
In the current context of a globalized economy, bilingualism is increasingly portrayed as a resource for corporations and for workers competing for jobs in today’s slim market. In this paper we analyze the economic value of languages other than English in the US, Spanish in particular. Working from a political economy perspective and drawing from current theoretical approaches to language and labor under neoliberalism, we examine the reproduction of the discursive trope of language profit in the corporate world and educational spaces, and then analyze the narratives and trajectories of young Latinx workers in New York. The marginalized position of Latinxs in the social structure and the racialization of their linguistic practices result in a linguistic exploitation that remains unchallenged in the US. We conclude that today’s celebrations of bilingualism, which follow a capitalist logic, perpetuate a hierarchy of languages and speakers that is detrimental to racialized minorities.
Keywords: bilingualism, neoliberalism, bilingual advantage, language profit, linguistic exploitation, raciolinguistics
Published online: 03 July 2020
https://doi.org/10.1075/lcs.19013.alo
References

References

Alarcón, A., Di Paolo, A., Heyman, J., & Morales, M.
(2014a) The occupational location of Spanish-English bilinguals in the new information economy: The health and criminal justice sectors in the US borderlands with Mexico. In R. M. Callahan & P. C. Gándara (Eds.), The bilingual advantage. Language, literacy and the US labor market (pp. 110–137). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2014b) Returns to Spanish-English bilingualism in the new information economy: The health and criminal justice sectors in the Texas border and Dallas-Tarrant counties. In R. M. Callahan & P. C. Gándara (Eds.), The bilingual advantage. Language, literacy and the US labor market (pp. 138–159). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Barrett, R.
(2006) Language ideology and racial inequality: Competing functions of Spanish in an Anglo-owned Mexican restaurant. Language in Society, 35, 163–204. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Block, D.
(2018a) Political economy and sociolinguistics. Neoliberalism, inequality and social class. London: Bloomsbury Academic.Google Scholar
(2018b) Some thoughts on education and the discourse of global neoliberalism. Language and Intercultural Communication, 18(5), 576–584. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bourdieu, P.
(1986) The forms of capital. In J. T. Richardson (Ed.), Handbook of theory and research for the Sociology of Education (pp. 241–258). Westport, CT: Greenwood.Google Scholar
(1991) Language and symbolic power. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Boutet, J.
(2012) Language workers. Emblematic figures of late capitalism. In A. Duchêne & M. Heller (Eds.), Language in late capitalism. Pride and profit (pp. 207–228). London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Callahan, R. M., & Gándara, P. C.
(2014) The bilingual advantage. Language, literacy and the US labor market. Bristol: Multilingual Matters. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Cavanaugh, J. R.
(2016) Talk as work: Economic sociability in Northern Italian heritage food production. Language & Communication, 48, 41–52. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Chiswick, B. R., & Miller, P. W.
(2016) Does bilingualism among the native born pay? (IZA Discussion Papers 9791). Bonn: Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).Google Scholar
Da Silva, E., Mclaughlin, M., & Richards, M.
(2007) Bilingualism and the globalized new economy: The commodification of language and identity. In M. Heller (Ed.), Bilingualism: A social approach (pp. 183–206). Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Del Percio, A., Flubacher, M.-C., & Duchêne, A.
(2017) Language and political economy. In O. García, N. Flores & M. Spotti (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of language and society (pp. 55–76). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Del Valle, J., & Villa, L.
(2006) Spanish in Brazil: Language policy, business, and cultural propaganda. Language Policy, 5(4), 369–392. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Dlaske, K., Barakos, E., Motobayashi, K., & McLaughlin, M.
(2016) Languaging the worker: Globalized governmentalities in/of language in peripheral spaces. Multilingua, 35(4), 445–459. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
DuBord, E. M.
(2018) Bilingual tricksters: Conflicting perceptions of bilingualism in the informal labor economy. Language & Communication, 58, 107–117. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Duchêne, A.
(2011) Néolibéralisme, inégalités sociales et plurilinguisme: l’Exploitation des ressources langagières et des locuteurs. Langage et Société, 136(2), 81–108. [English translation www​.cairn​-int​.info​/article​-E​_LS​_136​_0081​--neoliberalism​-social​-inequalities​-and​.htm].
(2016) Language investment and political economy. Langage et Société, 157(3), 73–96. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Duchêne, A., & Heller, M.
(Eds.) (2012) Language in late capitalism. Pride and profit. London: Routledge. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Duchêne, A., & Del Percio, A.
(2014) Economic capitalization of linguistic diversity: Swiss multilingualism as a national profit? In J. W. Unger, M. Krzyżanowski & R. Wodak (Eds.), Multilingual encounters in Europe’s institutional spaces (pp. 81–107). London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar
Flores, N., & García, O.
(2017) A critical review of bilingual education in the United States: From basements and pride to boutiques and profit. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 37, 14–29. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Flores, N., & Rosa, J.
(2015) Undoing appropriateness: Raciolinguistic ideologies and language diversity in education. Harvard Educational Review, 85(2), 149–171. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Flubacher, M.-C., Duchêne, A., & Coray, R.
(2018) Language investment and employability. The uneven distribution of resources in the public employment service. London: Palgrave Pivot. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Fraser, N.
(1995) From redistribution to recognition? Dilemmas of justice in a ‘post-socialist’ age. New Left Review, 212, 68–93.Google Scholar
Fry, R., & B. Lowell
(2003) The value of bilingualism in the U.S. labor market. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 57(1), 128–140. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Gándara, P. M.
(2014) Is there really a labor market advantage to being bilingual in the U.S.? (Policy Information Report, Research Report No. RR-15-07). Princeton, NJ: Educational Testing Service.Google Scholar
Gershon, I.
(2011) Neoliberal agency. Current Anthropology, 52(4), 537–555. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Gibson, K.
(2004) English Only court cases involving the US workplace. The myths of language use and the homogenization of bilingual workers’ identities. Second Language Studies, 22(2), 1–60.Google Scholar
Harvey, D.
(2010) The enigma of capital and the crises of capitalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Heller, M.
(2010) Language as resource in the globalized new economy. In N. Coupland (Ed.), The handbook of language and globalization (pp. 349–365). Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Heller, M., & Duchêne, A.
(2012) Pride and profit: Changing discourses of language, capital and nation-state. In A. Duchêne & M. Heller (Eds.), Language in late capitalism. Pride and profit (pp. 1–21). London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Hidalgo McCabe, E., & Fernández-González, N.
(2019) Framing ‘choice’ in language education. The case of freedom in constructing inequality. In L. Martín Rojo & A. Del Percio (Eds.), Language and neoliberal governmentality (pp. 69–90). London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Jaspers, J.
(2011) Talking like a “zerolingual”: Ambiguous linguistic caricatures at an urban secondary school. Journal of Pragmatics, 43, 1264–1278. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Joseph, J. E.
(2004) Language and identity. Nacional, ethnic, religious. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Mahili, I.
(2014) ‘It’s pretty simple and in Greek …’: Global and local languages in the Greek corporate setting. Multilingua, 33(1–2), 117–146.Google Scholar
Martín Criado, E.
(2014) Mentiras, inconsistencias y ambivalencias. Teoría de la acción y análisis de discurso. Revista Internacional de Sociología, 72(1), 115–138. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Martín Rojo, L.
(2013) (De)capitalising students through linguistic practices. A comparative analysis of new educational programmes in a global era. In A. Duchêne, M. Moyer, & C. Roberts (Eds.), Language, migration and social inequalities. A critical sociolinguistic perspective on institutions and work (pp. 118–145). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2016) Language and power. In O. García, N. Flores & M. Spotti (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of language and society (pp. 77–102). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
(2019) The ‘self-made speaker’: The neoliberal governance of speakers. In L. M. Rojo & A. Del Percio (Eds.), Language and neoliberal governmentality (pp. 162–189). London: Routledge. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
New American Economy
(2017) Not lost in translation. The growing importance of foreign language skills in the U.S. job market. www​.newamericaneconomy​.org​/wp​-content​/uploads​/2017​/03​/NAE​_Bilingual​_V6​.pdf> (6 February 2020).
Pérez-Milans, M.
(2015) Mandarin Chinese in London education: Language aspirations in a working-class secondary school. Language Policy, 14, 153–181. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Porras, D. A., Jongyeon, E., & Gándara, P. C.
(2014) Employer preferences: Do bilingual applicants and employees experience an advantage? In R. M. Callahan & P. C. Gándara (Eds.), The bilingual advantage. Language, literacy and the US labor market (pp. 234–257). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Ricento, T.
(2005) Problems with the ‘language-as-resource’ discourse in the promotion of heritage languages in the U.S.A. Journal of Sociolinguistics, 9(3), 348–368. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Robinson-Cimpian, J. P.
(2014) Labor market differences between bilingual and monolingual Hispanics. In R. M. Callahan & P. C. Gándara (Eds.), The bilingual advantage. Language, literacy and the US labor market (pp. 79–109). Bristol: Multilingual Matters. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Rosa, J.
(2015) Racializing language, regimenting Latinas/os: Chronotope, social tense, and American raciolinguistic futures. Language & Communication, 46, 106–117. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Shin, H.-J., & Alba, R.
(2009) The economic value of bilingualism for Asians and Hispanics. Sociological Forum, 24(2), 254–275. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Subtirelu, N. C.
(2017) Raciolinguistic ideology and Spanish-English bilingualism on the US labor market: An analysis of online job advertisements. Language in Society, 46, 477–505. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Talmy, S.
(2010) Qualitative interviews in applied linguistics: From research instrument to social practice. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 30, 128–148. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Urciuoli, B.
(2008) Skills and selves in the new workplace. American Ethnologist, 35(2), 211–228. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2016) Discussion: Imagining the languaged worker’s language. Multilingua, 35(4), 469–481. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Urciuoli, B. & LaDousa, C.
(2013) Language management/labor. Annual Review of Anthropology, 42, 175–190. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Villa, D. J. & Villa, J. R.
(2005) Language instrumentality in Southern New Mexico: Implications for the loss of Spanish in the Southwest. Southwest Journal of Linguistics, 24(1–2), 169–184.Google Scholar
Zentella, A. C.
(2014) TWB (Talking while Bilingual): Linguistic profiling of Latina/os, and the other linguistic torquemadas . Latino Studies, 12, 620–635. CrossrefGoogle Scholar