Pragmatics5:2.197 -212. InternationalPrasmatiqs Associaticln DOI: 10.1075/prag.5.2.07hil
JUNK SPANISH,COYERT RACISM, AND THE (LEAKY) BOUNDARYBETWEEN PUBLTCAND PRIVATE SPHERES
Jane H. Hill
To attend to "constructinglanguages" and "constructingpublics" implicates two directions of thought. A constructionist perspective problematizes and de-naturalizesthe idea of "language,"and suggestshow the fragile textualityof our talk is the resultas much of ideologicalprocesses as of neurobiologicalconstraints. To considerthe constructionof "publics"draws linguistic anthropology in new directions.While the idea that the arenas in which opinions are formed and decisionsare made are the products of social work is not new (cf. Myers and Brenneis1984), "publics" suggests a particular kind of arena, Flabermas's([1962] 1991)"public sphere, ... a categoryof bourgeoissociety." The concept of "public sphere"exposes a new arena for our attention,distinct from the interactionalfield of the marketor the kin group,where peoplewho live in statesspeak "as citizens," with referenceto public affairs,yet not as agentsof the state. Habermasof course arguedthat the bourgeoispublic sphereflourished only ephemerallybefore it was capturedby the cultureindustry with its capacityto manufactureinauthentic "public opinion." Habermashas been much critized for his nostalgiccommitment to the freedomand rationalityof the bourgeoispublic sphere,as well as his neglectof the wayin whichit functionedas much to excludeas to include (cf. papersin Calhoun (ed.)1992; and Robbins(ed.) 1993).The conceptof "public"is, however,productive preciselybecause it sketchesin the broad outlinesof an important arena for the reproductionof exclusionsin contemporarysocieties. I do not usethe term "public"here, however, as a categoryof sociohistorical theoryin the way that Habermasattempts. Instead, I take "public"and "private"to designate"folk categories,"or, perhapsbetter, "ideologies,"for certain speakersof AmericanEnglish. (These ideological complexes are obviouslyclosely related to the theoreticalones proposed by Habermas,and, as he points out, exhibit historical continuitiesgoing back at least to Roman times). The English words are polysemous,referring to contexts("publicity," "public figure," "in public,""go public"), andto socialentities (broad ones,as in "public opinion,"or more narrowly defined groups,such as "the public" of an actor or singer).This paper aims to suggestthat what is most important about the public/privatedistinction in the United States todayis not the zonesof life clearlyincluded within each category,but the play of meaningalong the ambiguousboundary between them, especiallybetween kinds of talk definedas "public" and those defined as private." The senseof boundary betweenthese "spheres" involves several dimensions: Of the socialspaces where talk occurs,of the topicsand themeswhich it engages,of speakers,of stylesand genres. Allof theseare sitesfor contestationabout how talk may "count"and how speakers 198 Jane H. Hill may be held responsiblefor it.l I will be concernedhere with how a particular ideologyabout appropriate stylesfor "public"talk facilitatesthe persistencein this sphereof "eliteracist discourse" (van DUk 1993),and therebyconstructs the publics for such discourse as "white," excluding. people of color as audiences and partrcipants.I discussthe caseof what I call "Junk Spanish",a way that Anglos in the United Statescan uselight talk andjoking tcl reproduce the subordinateidentity of Mexican-Americans.Junk Spanish,and eliteracist discourse in general,se ems to oscillatealong the boundarybetween "public" and "private"talk, making the public reproductionof racismpossible even where racist discourse is supposedlyexcluded from public discussion.Junk Spanishis, of course,only one of a whole complexof discoursesthat havebeen recognizedas covertly"coded" as racist(for instance,talk by white politiciansabout "teenagewelfare mothers" or "gangbangers"does not conjure up an image of misbehavingwhite children,in spite of the fact that whites constitutea high percentageof such groups).Junk Spanishis, however,relatively easy to identify and "decode,"facilitating our exploration of the leaky boundary betweenracist joking construedas "private"and "seriouspublic discussion." Two dimensionsof languageideology facilitate this persistenceof a racist discoursein public talk. The first is a set of tensionsabout interest, between a "presumptionof innocence"for public discourse- that talk offered up as serious public discussionwill be presumed to be addressedto the general good in an unbiasedway - and a "presumptionof interest"- that suchtalk will be biasedand interestedin favor of speakersor those they represent.The second is a set of tensionsabout stylethat datesback to the earliestperiod of the American republic. Cmiel (1990) has traced the history in the United Statesof what he calls the "middling style": The idea that a speaker in a democracywill eschew the high languageof gentilityappropriate to monarchiesand strikea more popular tone, that admits the possibility of plain speakingincluding slang and colloquialisms"The preference for the middling style blurs the boundary between serious public discussionand light private talk, such that elementsof the latter, in this caseJunk Spanishslang, may leak into public usage.Once such slang is used "in public" it gainsaccess to the contestover innocenceand interest,and can make claimsto the former quality. At the same time, this light talk is protected by conventionsof privacy,especially those of solidarityamong interlocutors and the idea that private talk should not be taken too seriously.These two ideologicalcomplexes protect racist (and sexist)discourse, and make possibleits continued reproduction, even where conventionproscribes it. By examiningthe waysin which the racist register of Junk Spanishcan leak acrossthe public-privateboundary, we may perhapsmake progressin understandinghow this reproductionoccurs, and thereby develop strategiesfor intervention. MichaelWarner (1990)pointed out that conventionsof "public"speech that formed at the time of the foundationof the American republic required that tl'rose engagingin it should not be, "byass'dby any private or partial View, prejudicialto
' Nancy Fraser (1990) identified this boundary as a particularly interesting phenomenon. Pubtic and pivate spheres 199 your Country'sService" (Warner 1990: 4t).2 lt is this conventionthat precipitates the contestbetween innocence and interest. Those making public representations makea claimof innocence,the absenceof bias;those opposing them make a claim that the representationis interested.However, ideas about what sort of talk, and whatsort of speaker,is likelyto be "interested"are themselvescontestable. It is very easyto attackas "interested"a pronouncementon economicpolicy by the head of an investmentbank, or a defense of Social Security by the president of the AmericanAssociation of Retired Persons. But in the caseof racist discoursethe contestis heavily weighted, at least tor white speakers,in the direction of a presumptionof innocence.One of the most important reasonsfor this is that the factthat "whites" are a "race"is simplyinvisible to most membersof this group, who takethemselves to have no "race"and take their own positionsto be universal(cf. Morrison 1994.3 Thus, attacks on the speech of African-American or Latino leadersas racially"interested" are a common t'eatureof public discoursein the UnitedStates, but the ideathat Felix Rohatynor Ellen Goodmanmight be speaking for the interestsof "whiteness"is consideredby most people to be a very strange notionindeed (one that could be advancedonly out of a "racial" bias by a person of color). Not only is "whiteness"universalized and invisible,the persistenceof racismas an ideologyis denied.Most white people believethat "racists"are found only among marginalizedwhite supremacistgroups who are behind the times, inadequatelyeducated and socialized.Thus to accusea speakerof racismis a deep insultthat evokesa whole range of highly undesirablequalities. Van Dijk (1993)takes the denial of racismto be a key componentof racist discourse,one that protectsthe positive self-imageof the racist and in turn the positiveimage of whites more generally,and second,permits racist discourseand its negativeand exclusionaryfunctioning to proceed.I believe,however, that van Drjk'saccount is not complete,in that it missesthe fundamentalfact that denials of racismbecome relevant only within the terms of the contestover innocenceand interest.This explainsan important elementof racistrhetoric that van Dijk himself hasidentified: That people making racist representationsin public so often claim thatthey are being"t'air." The idea of "fairness"acquires coherence only within the contextwhere a claim of lack of bias is relevant.For instance,consider the rhetoric in defenseof California'sProposition 187 and similar legislation now beingproposed elsewhere.oThe Los Angeles Times (Nov. 19.,1994, quoted in Garc(a 1994: L3)
t Yet as Warner pornted out, these "unbiasecl"speakes could not be imagined as other than white male property owners. By this means, the point of view of this group was made universal, unmarked,its bias invisible.Thus the cultural constructionof the public sphere in the United States functionedfrom its beginning as a powerful device for masking and mystiffing racism and sexism.
3 kst there be any confusion here, my position is that'race'is not a biological category, but is a categoryavailable for the purposesof social exclusionthat is essentiallyempty, available to be filled with whatever semiotic elements are most appropriate to a particular epoch (Goldberg 1993).
4 I am indebted here to the work of Rogelio Garcia (1994). Proposition 187,which passed overwhelminglyin the November 1994 election in California, denies accessto public education to illegalimmigrants and to their children (evenwhere thesechildren are U.S. citizens),and also denies them accessto many other social benefits that are normally universally available, including non- 200 lnne H. Hill quotes a woman who supports the proposition,who says,"I work full time for benefitsfor my family, and I don't teel it is tair tbr illegalsto be coming in and getting health care free." The Aizona Daily Srarhas receiveda number of letters from legalimmigrants (from Canadaand Wes_ternEurope) who arguethat "f-airness" requiresthat benefitsbe availableonly to thosewho tollow the demandingroad of legal immigration. Preciselythe same rhetoric is used by opponentsof such legislation: In a letter to the Aizona Daily Slcr (December 26, 1994), Xavier Enriquezsays, "Opponents of PropositiclnI87 do not desireanything to be "free," but rathertair": Previous generations of imrnigrantscontributed to the U.S.economy and benetlttedfrom public education,and this shouldnot now be denied to a new generationof hard-workingimmigrants. In addition to the "fairness"argument, contributorsto the debateinvoke market "rationality,"which makesa strongclaim of disinterestedness.For instance,the Los ArtgelesTimes (November 75,199{ cited in Garcia 1994:12) qucltes a supporterof 187who says,"We're exporting jobs and importing poverty.And unlesssomething is done,this statehas nothing to face but fiscal havoc." USA Today (November 8, 1994,cited in Garcia 7994: 14) cites a "financial counselor"who says,"Everyone would like to provide all servicesto all people,but we just can't afford it." Again, opponentsof the propositionalso use market arguments,trying to quantii/ the contributionof illegalimmigrants in the form of taxespaid, jobs created,and pricesof the productsof their cheap labor kept low for consumers. For many Americans the contestabout innocenceand interest is relevant only when talk is "public":When a personspeaks "in public"(as in a letter to the editor or in a public meeting),or when a personspeaks as a "citizen"about topics held to be appropriateto "publicopinion," even if the talk is conductedwithin the domesticor intimatesphere. For instance,a speakertelling a racistjoke at a family gathering might be judged by her relatives to have poor judgement, or bad character,but she would not be thought of as "advancingan interest,"of saying somethingthat might "count"in the tormationof opinion.'Here, however,we enter a slipperyrealm of the boundarybetween "spheres," where the socialspaces in which speechoccurs, topics and themesfor discussion,kinds of personswho are speaking,and stylesand genresinteract in complexways. Consideran interestingcase of the ambiguityof a socialspace, the classroom. On the one hand,it is arguedthat studentsand their teachersmust be tree to voice
emergency medical carc. Most analystsof the rhetoric in support of the proposition find that it is clearly racist, including nearlv all the well-known tropes of elite racist discoursedirected at a vision 'illcgal of an immigrant" who is a person o[ color, Asian or [:tin American. Furthermore, a good deal of the money backing 187 and similar lcgislation now being proposed in other states comes from organizationswith well-known racist agendas.Garcia prcsentsin evidencethe following telling quote, elicited by USA Today from Don Barrington, a Tucson retiree who is leading the charge for 187-style legislation in Arizona. Barrington says,"And it's not a racial issue. My friends have never heard a racist word out of me. I just don't like wetbacks"(USA Today 1U18194,cited in Garcia 1994: 11). Garcia argues that it is no accident that the Proposition in California bears the number "L87": nmurder" This is police and highway patrol code for and the number is widely known to the citizenry 'insider" becausethe code is used on TV cop shows to give an ambience.
5 S.holur., of course, recognize such "private" talk as a very important site for the reproduction of racism. Public and pivate spheres 201 frank opinions,in the interestsof seekingthe truth. While many teacherstry to movestudents toward a preferencetbr "objective"grounds for opinions (thereby inculcatingthe conventionsof "publicspeech"), personal experience is alsoadmitted (as part of a general privilegingof individualitythat is beyond the scope of the presentdiscussion), thereby eroding the proscription against private bias. This suggeststhat classroomdiscussion is not precisely"public." On the other hand, it is argued(probably out of precisely the same ideology that privileges personal experience),that studentsas individualshave the right to be protected against epithetsthat may threaten their pride and identity.This drive toward protection againstthe damageof conflictsuggests that the classroomis somehow"public," that whatis saidthere "counts"in a way that a slur shoutedacross a street would not.6 Somesites are lessseriously contested. Especiallyin the worlds of businessand commerce,there are occasionsdefined as "off the record"or "backstage"when sexist andracist talk are actuallyhighly conventionalized.Thus a businessleader or politicianmay be known to possessa large repertoire of grosslyracist and sexist jokes,deployed when socializingamong croniesin the appropriate intersticesof businessdiscussion, yet be celebratedtor progressiveviews on diversityadvanced in talk framed as "public."These "backstage"zones are increasinglyentering the contestedboundary realm, as the courts carve out the rights of employeesto an environmentthat is not threateningor demeaningon groundsof race or gender,but thereis, of course,substantial backlash against this enlargementof what is "public."' Many people continue to recognizea "backstage,"an uncontestedprivate zone. Wheninterlocutors are speakingwithin this zone,it is not consideredappropriate to censuretheir talk, evenwhen it is possibleto construeit as racistand sexist,even asgrossly so. To censurebreaks a contractof intimacyand solidarity,and exposes the censureras in turn censurable,as a pettifoggingkilljoy.o Topic and theme also influencesjudgements as to whether speech is
o On at least one occasion, a slur shouted out a window was counted as "public" and accountable,because the window was in a dormitory at the University of Pennsylvania.This is the famouscase from 1992,of thc student who shouted "Shut up, you watcr buffalosnat a group of African-Americanwomen whom hc judged to be making too much noisc late at night. The student, broughtup bcfore a disciplinary pancl for making a racist slur, claimed that he had learned the "waterbuffalo" insult in Israel and did not bclieve that it had any racist content.
7 A casein point occurred as I was preparing thc revision of this paper. A staff member from the Affirmative Action Office of the University of Arizona came to brief members of my departmenton scxualharrassmcnt policy. She pointed out that it was official university policy that sexuallyoffensive matcrial could not be exhibitcd on universityproperty. This prohibition was issued whenan outsidevisitor complained to the president of the universityabout a "SexualHarrassment ConsentForm" poster that was taped to a file cabinct in the Departrnent of Physicsin an area that wouldprobably have been conventionallydefined as "backstage."Her presentationof this university polirymet with outrage from scveral members of the faculty, who rcalized that it applied to what theyhad hitherto consideredto be their own "backstage,"the "personaland private" dimension, of theiroffices and labs, like nude postcardstaped to their whitcboards or pornographic coffee cups half-hiddenin their desk cluttcr.
8 Hen.", the classiclightbulb joke: Q: "How many feminists docs it take to screw in a light bulb?" 'That's A: not funny." 202 JaneH. Hitt somehowaimed at the formation of opinion.For instance,Nancy Fraser (1990) pointedout an interestingcase of a more-or-lesssuccessful struggle to move a topic into the public sphere.Feminist discourse extracted what is now called"domestic" violencefrom the realms of non-momentousgossip and boastinginto a zone of "seriouspublic discussion." This required considerablework in assimilatingthe question of "beating your wife," a matter that might retlect on judgement or character,to the terms of talk about "public issues."It required the creation of a public that accepted that a woman at the domestic site was not just Joe's long-sufferingwife, but a "citizen"whose treatment could be consideredwithin the zoneof legal"rights." It requiredthe widespreadrecognition that interactionswithin the family were not alwaysand everywhere"personal", but could constitutea site where larger political structures,specifically those of a gender heirarchy that compromised an ideal of individual rights, were produced and reproduced. However,domestic violence remains ambiguous; neighbors who would not hesitate to call the police if they saw a strangerbreaking into Joe'shouse may still feel that they are "poking their nosesinto other people'sbusiness" if they make a call when they overhear the sounds of Joe smacking his wife around, and in many communitiespolice are still reluctantto make arrestsin such cases. Persona or reputation of the speaker is an important factor along the public/privateboundory.' Certain personsare definedas "public figures"(a formal categoryin libel law); the term "role model" is alsogaining currency, implying that certainpeople are influentialand accountablesimply by virtue of reputation. Talk by sucha personagemay becomethe object of censureas an accountable"public" utterance even if it is uttered backstage.Exemplary are the recent cases of backstageremarks involvingMarge Schott,owner of the Cincinnati Reds baseball team, and JesseJackson, a prominent African-Americanpolitician.lo In contrast, there exist other kinds of personswho are judged as absolutelywithout influence, who can utter racist statementswithout censurein a contextthat is unambiguously "public."For example,in a feature on "SixtyMinutes" during the 1992presidential campaign,Mike Wallaceinterviewed an elderly,obviously working-class, white man in a bar, askinghim his opinionon what the mostimportant issues were facingthe country. The man, obviously consciousof constraintson public discourse,said something like. "Well, I probably shouldn't say what I really think." Wallace reassuredhim that his opinionswere valuable. The old man thensaid, "Well, I think the biggestproblem is that the coloredpeople are just trying to get too much." Wallace'sfaciai expression made it clear(at leastto someviewers) that he was not
9 Warner (1990: 38) notes that in the 18th century public discourse was taken to be "impersonal by denition;" public discoursewas impersonal "both as a trait of its medium and as a norm for its subjects."(lbid.) Yet this "impersonality"apparently can becomea property of "persons." Fraser suggeststhat public spheresdo not in fact exhibit pure impersonal rationality, in spite of this "bourgeois"conception; instead,they are very importantly "arenasfor the formation and enactment of social identities ... construct[edl and express[edl... through idiom and style" (Fraser 1990:68).
10S.hott apparently used rough racist languagelike "nigger"with great frequency.Jackson's problems involved his reference to New York City as "Hymietown.' In these cases,the colorful and 'public' slanry language was of course provocative, but as the following example shows, the nature of these persons was probably the main reason the languagewas censurable. Publicand pivate spheres 203 pleasedwith this remark, but he thanked the man politely for participating.The interviewwas aired nationallywith absolutelyno public reaction.The notion that a personwho is an obviousnonentity should hold such views,even in his role as a citizen asked for his opinion on national television, was unsurprising and undiscussed.This caseis disturbingnot only becausethere was no challengeto this obviousracism, but preciselybecause the old man was not "taken seriously."The incidentmakes clear the difficulty of making any vernacularopinion into "public" opinion. A fourth very important zone of ambivalenceat the boundary between "public"and "private"talk involvesstyle. The contestover innocenceand interest in the"public" zone requires that stylisticchoices here indexrationality over emotional commitment,the latter being taken as intrinsicallymore "interested"(Kochman 1984).Cmiei (1990)has tracedmajor changesin the relationshipbetween public talkand stylistic choice. "Neoclassicalnotions of discourse,"writes Cmiel, "assumed thatthe ltomo rhetor was a gentleman,that his ethos,or character,would guide his everyact and word. His refinedtaste, his avoidanceof vulgarspeech, was essentially tiedto hissense of self,that humaruTaspresumed to commit him to the public good" (Cmiel1990: 14). Several trends worked during the 19th centuryto underminethis association.First, technical and professionallanguages achieved equal footing with the refinedliterary language of gentility.Second, within the democracybasic skills of "civilspeech" spread widely, and ideas of "refinement"and "vulgarity"came to referto styles,and not to socialgroups. Finally,the democraticmasses supplanted the small "rational elite" as the most important audience for public discourse, requiringthe incorporationof popular stylesof discourse.The resultingtriumph of whatCmiel calls the "middlingstyle," defined by informality(including regional and colloquiallanguage and slang),calculated bluntness (including both "plain speaking" and deliberate insult), and inflated speech (including bombast, jargon, and euphemism)is obvious in American public speechtoday. Among the dominant classesof American English speakers,it is appropriateto inject a light note even into the most serious expression of public opinion. Jokes are a highly institutionalizedcomponent of public speaking,and even written opinion, as by newspapercolumnists, may be punctuatedby light elementsincluding slang,with onlya few expressionsstill widely consideredoff-limits in the mass media. Some politicalcolumnists, like Mike Royko and Molly Ivins, have built a reputation for theircommand of a light style,and the slangand regionalismsthat punctuatetheir wntingconstruct their opinions as especiallyhonest and authentic.Public figures thoughtto be of patrician origin are especiallyconstrained to salt their discourse withvernacular jests; George Bush's efforts to achievea rhetorical"common touch" duringhis yearsas vice presidentand presidentbecame somethingof a national joke.rlYet style presentsambiguities similar to those posed by the classification of socialspaces, topics, and persons;style and sphereare intricatelyrelated. Some
11Crum". (1991) suggeststhat the presentationof a public front with no trace of snobbery wasa specialobsession of Bush's parents, who tried to distinguish themselves from what they consideredto be untoward aristocratic pretensions of some members of their social universe. Thus Bush'spreppy light style was not a mask assumedonly when he tried to get into Texas politics, but datedback to his earliest upbringing" 204 lane H. Hill torms of vernacularexpression are proscribedin "seriouspublic discussion"(the worstracist and sexistepithets tall into that category).t2Other forms,however, are acceptable,and again,therc is a c
12 Appar"ntly convcntions againstgross racist and sexisttalk are being eroded on so-called "talk radio,' where membcrs of thc public phone in to expresstheir opinions. While there seemsto be a general agreement in the mainstream pressthat talk radio is an increasinglyimportant forum for public opinion (national leadcrsincluding candidatesfor the presidencyhave appearedon these shows), I don't listen to it and will have nothing to say about it here. Obviously linguistic anthropologistsshould be attendingto it. Pubticand private spheres 205 of a blackman with an ear-to-eargrin, rolling eyes,and a hugeslice of watermelon). I have collectedmany greeting cards and other paraphernaliawith this sort of imagery,which would invite lawsuitsif it were to appear on, say,a corporate logo or in a politicalcartoon in a newspaper.l3The positionthat I am trying to develop heresuggests that imagesof this type on greetingcards, for instance,are acceptable becausethey are "private,"a matter betweenintimates. Yet the languageof Junk Spanish,separated from these kinds of racist images,is permissible and even welcomein public discourse,and in fact is used by people who are universally creditedwith "progressive"opinions on racismand sexism. I will briefly summarizewhat Junk Spanishis (and what it is not).14Junk Spanishis a set of strategiesfor incorporatingSpanish loan words into English in orderto producea jocular or pejorative key. Three major strategiesgovern this borrowing.The first is the semanticpejoration of Spanishexpressions, by which they are stripped of elevated,serious, or even neutral meanings in the source language,retaining only the "lower"end of their rangeof connotations(and perhaps evenadding new lowering). For instance,the polite and neutral Spanishfarewell, "Adios,"has meaningsin Junk Spanish ranging from a marking of laid-back, easy-going,Southwestern warmth to the strong suggestionthat the target is being insulted,"kissed off." An excellent example (which also. exemplifies Chicano awarenessof theseusages) is a cartoon in the seriesLa Cucarachaby l-alo Alcarez, publishedin the TucsortComic News(December 1994;cited in Garcia 1994)shortly afterthe passageof Proposition187. The cartoonshowed an Anglo man holding a 187flag and calling,"Hooray, we savedour state."Next to him is an Anglo woman jumping up and down in hystericalpost-election exuberance, shouting "Adios, Pedro!"(The joke is that the supposedlysolid ground on which the two are standing turns out to be a mighty fist labelled "Latino Activism"). The second strategy involvesthe recruitmentof Spanishmorphological material in order to make English wordshumorous or pejorating.For instance,in a Joe Bob Briggs movie review (1987),we find the expression"mistake-o numero uno."The third strategyproduces ludicrousand exaggerated mispronunciations of Spanishloan material.For instance, a greetingcard shows the rear ends of a row of undulating Hawaiian dancers
13Unfortunately, one of the anthropology graduate students (whose name won't be used hereso shewon't lose her job) recently found a particularly egregiouscase of the use of the image of a "Mexican"asleep under his sombrero while leaning againsta cactus,on the Christmas gift wrap of a local chain of kitchenware shops, 'Table Talk." The image was part of a "Southwest collage" that includedthe "sleepingMexican" image, a howling coyote wearing a bandana,and a striped snake wearinga cowboyhat. A Mexican-American student complained to the manager of a branch of the chainin a major Tucson shopping mall and was told the paper would be withdrawn, but when I checkedback at this branch just before Christimas 1994, not only was this gift wrap still available, but large prewrapped packages using it were stacked in the aisles of the store.
'spanglish' 11What it is NOT is or "Cal6" or "Border Spanish."I take "Spanglish' to be a practicewhere the target language is Spanish, but a Spanish that is wide open to English loans, often treatedin a jocular way. However, from what I know about "Spanglish,"it is a much richer and more wide-openset of practices that Junk Spanish, which is, when all is said and done, a narrow, mnstipatedlittle register of insults that doesn't really offer much potential for play or originality. This is in sharp contrast to the extravagant anglicisms of Cholos, or the rich play with the two languagesfound in Chicano authors or pcrformers like Guillermo G6mez Pefla. 206 JaneH. Hill
dressed in grass skirts. Opened, the card reads, "Grassy-ass."l'5All of these strategiesdirectly index that the utterancein which they are found shouldbe taken to be humorous,and that the personwho producedthem has that valued quality, "a senseof humor."16However, in order to achievetheir humorous effect, it is clear that a second,indirect indexicalityis required,which reproducesan image of Spanish, and, in turn, of its speakers,as objects of derision." Most Spanish speakerswith whom I have discussedthese issuesconcur, and in fact report that they are acutely aware of Junk Spanishand find it irritating and offensive. Junk Spanishis very widely used"in public" (on televisionprograms, in films, and in magazinesand newspapers).Because of the ambiguitiesof "social space" discussedabove, I give here only examplesof the use of Junk Spanishin what is, very explicitly,"public discussion":The realm of political talk intendedto help form public opinion. One notable history involvesthe use of the phrase"Hasta la vista, baby." This tag exemplifiesthe strategyof pejoration.In Spanish,"Hasta la vista" is a rather formal mode of leave-taking,that expressesa sincerehope to meet again. The pejorated line, taken from Junk Spanishby an alert team of screenwriters,was placed on the lips of Arnold Schwarzeneggerin his role as the Terminator in the film TerminatorII: JudgementDay.18 It was then exported into public political tatk by Schwarzeneggerin another role, as a Republican celebrity who appeared alongsideGeorge Bush in his secondcampaign for the presidency.From the New Hampshire primary on, Schwarzeneggerappeared regularly as a Bush supporter, and his most crowd-pleasingline, uttered at the end of an attack on the current leading Bush opponent, was, of course, "Hasta la vista, baby." The line next appearedin the Texassenatorial campaign held during the winter of 1992-93to fill the seat left vacant by the appointment of Lloyd Benson as Secretary of the Treasury. While both candidates used Schwarzenegger'stug, the Democratic aspirant, Robert Krueger, made an especiallymemorable picture, appearing in televisionads dressedin a sort of Zorro suit,with black cape and hat, uttering the famous line^It was very important for Krueger to suggestthat he had a "common touch," becauseit was well-knownthat he was in everydaylife a collegeprofessor of English,specializing in Shakespeare,and, thereby, a snoband a sissyuntil proven otherwise.Interestingly, the line backfired;Krueger was apparentlyconsidered too much of a wimp to dare to usethis famous"tough guy" tag. lncreasingly,he became a figure of fun (the commercialswere even held up to ridicule on national television),and lost the electionby a substantialmargin to Kay BaileyHutchinson.
15 I o*e this example to Barbara Babcock, who receiveclthe card in thanks for some kindness.
15 Astonishingly, many Anglos believethat they can produceexpressions of this type because they have been exposed to the Spanish language (this is true even of some quite sophisticated informants). Thus, in addition to directly indexing a speakcr'ssense of humor, such utterancesmay index that a speaker has some education and cosmopolitanism (but carries it lightly).
'direct" 17 I take the concepts of and "indirect" indexicality from Ochs (1990).
18 Sch*arzenegger is taught the "Hasla la vista, baby" tag as part of a larger repertoire of insults by John Connor, the tough little lns Angeles kid who is under the protection of the Terminator. Public and pivate spheres 207
We mustalso consider the possibilitythat the largeHispanic population in Texas, a key componentof the Democraticelectorate there, was offended by these commercialsand declinedto supportKrueger. A secondexample that exemplifiesthe strategyof pejoration was reported in the TttcsortWeekly (December 8, 1994;cited in Garcia 7994:11). The organizer of anincipient effort to developProposition 1S7-style legislation in Arizonareported to the Weekly'thathe had had buttonsand t-shirtsprinted up for saleto supporthis campaign.These items bore the legend,"lf you're an illegal,head south,Amigo." Thisusage obviously invokes the lower reachesof a semioticrange for "amigo" in JunkSpanish that extendsfrom merejocularity to this case,where "amigo"obviously meansanything but "friend." The legend attempts to difterentiate "illegals"who should"head south" from legal immigrants and citizens of Latin American background.This distinction is, however, completely undone by the factthat in order to "get"the humor of the legend,audiences must haveaccess to a generalnegative imageof Spanishand its speakersthat includesno suchsubtle discriminations. Junk Spanishconstructions using Spanish inflectional and derivational elementssuch as -o, e|...-o,and -rsrafrequently appear in public discourse.In an exampleheard on the McNeill-Lehrer News Hour in April 1993,a spokesmanfor PresidentClinton stated that the then-currentdraft of the administration's health-carereform plan was "not an el cheapo."This usage,of course, requires accessto an image of extreme trashy cheapnessassociated with Spanish. David Fitzsimmons,the political cartoonistfor the Aizona Daily Srar (who is regularly attackedby conservativesas biasedtoward the left), produceda cartoon attacking RossPerot, showing him holdinga signthat said,in part, that he was runningfor "elpresidente." The imageof Perotthus constructed was, of course,one of a tinhorn dictator,dripping with undeservedgilt medals,an image derived from pejorative stereotypesof Latin American public otficials.The liberal newspapercolumnist MollyIvins is a frequentuser of Junk Spanishelements, which are a part of the constructionof her personaas a Texan.All the casesbelow are trom Ivinscolumns printedin the Arizorn Daily ,Starduring 1993. In a column on the Canadian elections,Ivins said, "The chief difterencebetween Campbell and Chretienis that Campbellthinks the Numero Uno priority is to reducethe deficit, while Chretien wantsto reducethe deficitwithout cuttingthe hell out of the nationalsafety net." In a columnon healthcare, Ivins wrote, "...r)ne way to cut a little closerto the heart ofthe matter is to raisetwo pertinentquestions. One is:What shouldwe be allowed to die of these days? And numero two-o: What is actually going to affect the behaviorof individualpatients and individualdoctors in consultation?"In a column onKansas senator Bob Dole, Ivinsopened as follows,"With the Clintonistason a peppyschedule of at leasttwo foreignpolicy crises a week..."le
19 Don Brenneis suggestedthat Ivins might have borrowed her Junk Spanish from her partnerin crime on the Dallas Times-Herald in the early 1980's,Joe Bob Briggs.Joe Bob Briggs was especiallywell known for his reviewsof outrageousgrade-B drive-in movies,in which he commented on the number of severedlimbs, thc size and number of exposedbreasts, the amount of blood, the disgustingnessof the monsters, the sound of the chain saws,and the like. He wrote these reviews in a "redneck"voice, and Junk Spanishwas an important component of this. Joe Bob eventually lost hisjob due to public objections to these reviews,which were consideredto be especiallydemeaning andinsulting to women. His defendersargued that Joe Bob was an especiallypungent satirist, and 208 JaneH. Hill
A third type of selectionfrom a Junk Spanishrepertoire was used by CBS anchormanDan Rather, on electionnight, November 7992. Discussing the tight race in Texas,Rather elucidatedfor his listenerswhat was at stakeas follows:"Texas is the Big Taco...If Bush doesn't take [certainTexas counties] there is No Way Jos6 he can make it." Here, the expression"big taco,"which endowsRather's speech with "involvement"and authenticity,comes from a family of borrowingsof Spanishfood terms like "the big enchilada,"and "thewhole enchilada"that constituteexaggeration and emphasisby substitutingfor Englishelements like "thing" or "one." By adding the Spanishname Josdto "No way,"this everydayEnglish negative is endowedwith specialvernacular pungency. Here, the indjrect indexicalitythat is prominent is of coursethat Spanishis a particularly"vernacular" language appropriate to a slangy style. Readers might object that English speakerscan use other languagesin exactlythese ways. This is, of course,partly true. For instance,Japanese Sayonara can be used in a sensethat is almost exactlylike Spanishadios. However. other European languagescannot easily be substitutedin these kinds of expressions.I invite the reader to try out an English epithet like "sucker"in combination with leave-taking expressionsfrom familiar languages.German, like Japanese the language of a former enemy power, almost works: ?"Attf wiedersehen,sucker." Taking up more recent internationalemnities, I can imaginethe hero of a colorful spy novel dispatchinga member of the KGB with the wise-crack ?"Do svidariya,, sucker,"although I don't think this expressionis popularlyavailable in the way that "Adios,sucker" is. French and Italian really do not work, in spite of the familiarity of the expressions- *"Ciao, sucker,"*"Au revoir,sucker" (well, perhaps in some future thriller constructed around the recent Haitian intervention, a villainous attach6might be knocked off to this soundeffect by a heroic American agent). In summary,such usagesseem to require accessto contempt or emnity which is not traceable,in the caseof Spanish,to any politicalthreat, real or perceived,since 1898! Similar experimentscan be conductedwith lexicalequivalents of the other expressionscited above,and I predict even lesssuccess. All these are caseswhere Junk Spanishis part of a code switch into a light register,in which the speakeris representedas a personwith a senseof humor and the common touch,a truly egalitarianAmerican who doesn'thave fancy pretensions. This characteristicconceit of the "middling style" requires a metaphorical code switchinto the "private"social space, where peopleare thoughtto be at their most "authentic." Thus Junk Spanishcan inject authenticityand "common sense"into public discourse,which might otherwise be "too serious."Such talk blurs the boundariesbetween public and privatediscourse. It is tairly easyanalytically to show that Junk Spanishis driven by a racistsemiotic, and that it functionsto reproduce negativeviews of Spanish-speakingpeople. Yet Junk Spanishis not racist in an obvious way: There are no epithetshere. If the examplesabove were uttered in private, most people would considerit ridiculousto censurethem. This resistance
that women who objected to his work had no senseof humor (does this sound familiar?) The reason I mention this here is that I am not at all sure that Junk Spanish is used by real rednecks. I strongly suspect that Joe Bob learned it at the University of Texas; it has been well-documented in mmpus contexts since the late 1940s. It is interesting that Joe Bob considered it to be an appropriate register for the racist and sexist persona of the reviews. Public and private spheres 209 to censureleaks into the public spaceby way of the metaphoricalcode switch,so it is extremelydifficult to attackthese usages even though they are obviously public and contestablealong the interest-innocencecontinuum. Further, such an attack wculd require that the "interest"involved be characterized:It is, of course, the interestof "whiteness,"a quality that is largely invisible and not conventionally definedas an "interest."Furthermore, to characterizesuch talk as "racist"requires that one familiarizeone's audiencewith the complexitiesof modern thought on racism,which is againremote from the understandingof a public that thinks of itself as "anti-racist."20Thus, such usagesof Junk Spanish are generally defined as "innocent." At the same time that Junk Spanishfunctions at the blurred boundaries betweenpublic and private talk, it also illustratesthe permeable boundaries of languageitself. Junk Spanishhas moved into public discoursein the last decade, at the very sametime that heightenedconcern about languageboundaries, in the formof the "Offlcial English"campaign, has grown in American life. Why, then, is thereno objectionto Junk Spanishby languagepurists? I believethat no objection occursbecause Junk Spanishin fact stronglysupports the essenceof the purist campaign:That foreignlanguages, while theymay be permittedin the home, should not be allowedin public discourse.As is well-known (Woolard 1989), "Official English"objections to foreign languageshave been aimed especiallyat bilingual ballotsand other forms of the public use of Spanish.The use of Junk Spanish constructsa particularplace for the Spanishlanguage in American public discourse: It canfunction only in light talk, in the "code-switching"that protectsan American speakingin publicfrom being seenas too pompousand domineering.This function seemsto be well established,and will make it increasinglydifficult for any public usesof Spanishto be heard as "serious." It will, by definition,always be "private," and thuswill have in the public sphere no more than a poetic function. For this reason,Junk Spanish in fact advancesthe purposes of the Official-English movement.Furthermore, to the degreethat it is covertlyracist, this will presumably be sensedwith approvalby thosewith racist agendas. Finally,the use of Junk Spanish(as well as other subtly and not-so-subtly codedforms of racistdiscourse) in public talk functionsimportantly in "constructing the public""If an appreciationof the humor in Junk Spanishrequires unreflective accessto negativestereotypes of Latinos,then thesesallies are clearly shapedfor theappreciation of peoplewho definethemselves as "not Latino." (I use this phrase ratherthan "define themselvesas 'White'" becausethe public thus defined almost certainlyincludes African-Americans, although this fraction of the U.S. population is of coursethe object of an unendingrepertoire of other exclusionarydiscursive strategies).Junk Spanishthus is one of many devicesthrough which the sphere of 'public discussion'in the most widely-diftusedmedia in the United Statesbecomes profoundly,invisibly, exclusionary against people of color. In closing,I wish to turn to a point raisedrecently by David Palumbo Liu (1994). Liu suggests,in an analysisof the media characterizationof racist alignmentsin the recent Los Anseles riots. that Hispanicsin some contextscan
20 Claudia Brodsky Lacour (Ig92) has pointed out the paradox of racism, "whose pervasive existencedepends on its tenacious nonadmissionand complicitous nonrecognition." 2IA Jane H. Hill
standin as a surrogatefor more dangerousand problematicAfrican Americans.Liu pointsout, for instance,that Latino participationin the ricltswas hardly mentioned in the mass media, which emphasizedthe polarizationof the Black and Asian communities.However, after the riots Hispanicswere apparentlyarrested and deported in great numbers.Liu suggeststhat the deportationsprojected onto Hispanics desiresthat were in fact aimed at African Americans- who cannot, of course,be deported becausethey are all, without doubt, recognizedas citizensof the United States.It is interestingto considera similar complementarydistribution between Junk Spanishand African-Americanmaterials in the English of Anglos. African-American slangexpressions of coursemove rapidly into the slangof White Americans.Often, this slangis reshapedinto virtual unrecognizability,so that those who use it are unawareof its Black Englishorigins.2l However, a registerthat might be called"Junk Black English"is an importantcomponent of the grossjokes that are told in the zonesof privacymentioned above, in light talk especiallyamong men. Graphically offensivejokes are often told using reported speechin a broad "Sambo" or "Aunt Jemima" dialect.However, as far as I know, no whisper of this practiceever leaks into the public discourse.In fact, as long ago as the 1950'sa cabinet officer (Eisenhower'sSecretary of Agriculture,Earl Butts), was fired after reporters overheard him telling a grosslyoffensive "Sambo" joke. To produce obviousparodies of African-Americanspeech of the type that are apparentin Junk Spanishis simplytoo dangerous.However, Junk Spanishis apparentlyconsidered to be entirelyharmless. We must considerthe possibilitythat it is a safesubstitute for this more dangerouspossibility for covertracist discourse, for the voice of Amos 'n Andy, of Minstrelsy.Interestingly, even parodistslike Joe Bob Briggs,who tries to be as outrageousas possible(see note 19)do not dareto ventureinto this realm, althoughBriggs' cast of charactersdoes include at leasttwo foolishand quarrelsome buddieswho have Hispanicsurnames. "Junk Spanish" is a very useful tool for exploring the ambiguities and problems of the boundariesbetween the public and the private. It is easyto spot it: Its obvious morphology and lexicon function like a sort of radioactivetracer, which can be identifiedimmediately when it showsup at a new site.What I think we learn from looking at these materialsas they move back and forth acrossthe public/privateboundary is that the idea of the "public" and of "public discourse" continuestoday as an ideologythat mystifiesand confoundswhat is going on in the way of race,sex, and class-basedoppression in Americanlife, just as it did in the Revolutionaryera. The imbricationof "light talk," "plain talk," "humor," and "commonsense" have created an impenetrabletangle under which a great deal of racist and sexisttalk, both public and private,can be produced,and a shieldby
21 A particularly famous case involvcs the expression"up tight', which in White English means overly concerned for propriety (the organ that is "tight" is the rectum). The expression probably entered general American English in a song madc popular in the 1960s by African- American singer Stevie Wonder, where the line was "everythingis up tight, all right, clear out of sight' (the organ involved was probably thc penis). In recent years,with the enormous popularity of rap music and hip-hop culture among young peoplc of all races,slang of known African-American origin is increasingly widespread among whites. However, I am unaware of a parodic register of African-American English that is comparablc in range of usageand context among whites to Junk Spanish. Pubtic and pivate spheres 2Il whichcritique of thesepractices can be very effectivelydeflected. Through these practicesof languagethe structuresof "citizenship"by which people are licensedto participatein publiclife are produced- and alsoraced, and gendered.
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