Popular linguistics
Translators aren't linguists, but I do come from two families of notable talkers (get my cousin Jack to telling stories sometime), and both my own language and other people's have always caught my interest. So I find myself reading about the study of language and how people communicate.
Official languages: The point of American participatory democracy is that everybody gets to participate. As long as you have to speak English to make a living in this country, people who must make a living will find a way to speak it or, as history everywhere proves, their children will. They won't vote, they will just do it. If in a few generations you have to speak Mandarin to make a living here, we will become a Mandarin-speaking nation, and it won't be laws or regulations that make us so. "English-only" comes in several flavors, but all share the principle that "our" forefathers spoke the only right language. The premise isn't true now (some of "our" forefathers spoke Cornish or Cherokee) and it never was. Crypto-racism, that's the real story of "English-only."
Anyway, click on a title to see some notes.
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Popular linguistics