Cultural identity and language

There is power in words. During Martin Luther King Jr. Day his “I had a dream” speech could be seen in text or video and either way was touching and very much relevant today.

Hispanic identity, acculturation and assimilation has a language component. As reported in HispanicMarketInfo, a July 2011 study by Horowitz Associates reveals that for many U.S. Latinos, biculturalism is key to self-identity.

Eighteen percent of Hispanics identify themselves as “completely American,” 43 percent as completely Latino, and almost four in ten (39 percent) feel they are a mix of both.   

Latinos in bilingual homes are more likely to be bicultural. Four in ten Hispanics in English-oriented homes (where mostly/only English is spoken) consider themselves both Latino and American, and a full 16 percent of those heads of household define themselves as “completely Latino.”

At the same time, bicultural Latinos do not necessarily only live in bilingual homes: Almost one-quarter of bicultural Latino heads of household live in Spanish-dominant homes; one-third live in English-oriented homes.

The study also found that Latinos identifying themselves as bicultural spend the majority of their TV viewing time– 72 percent — with English language TV and 28 percent with Spanish language programming.

Source: HispanicMarketInfo.com, Cultural identity and language, January 17, 2012.

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