Of course, American English hasn’t just borrowed heavily from those coming from distant shores. Words like kayak, chipmunk, tobacco and hurricane are derived from some of the roughly 300 Native American languages spoken by those who were here long before most of our ancestors arrived. More than half of America’s states owe their names to Native American origin. I think of the poet Natalie Diaz, who wrote:
Manhattan is a Lenape word.
Even a watch must be wound.
How can a century or a heart turn
if nobody asks, Where have all
the natives gone?
Our nation’s founders would likely understand little of what we say today, given the amount of fresh acquisitions we’re always making. John Adams, our second president, was convinced that American English required a federally funded version of L’Académie Française in order to safeguard the people’s tongue from “going to the dogs.” He proposed, in 1780, a strategy to build one. But Thomas Jefferson, who sought to protect Native American languages and is credited with introducing words like belittle and pedicure into our lexicon, disagreed. He believed that a language has its own survival mechanisms.
Adams, fortunately, was on the losing side. American English is of, for and by the people, and its well-being depends on us. We do with it as we wish — or as we feel, since language is so often shaped by gut emotions. There are authorities within each language, of course, chief among them parents, educators, language scholars and dictionaries.
When our foundational dictionary, Noah Webster’s “An American Dictionary of the English Language,” published in 1828 it only included 70,000 words. To be accepted into it, words must suit a specific criterion. Over time, it became Merriam-Webster, a commercial lexicon that now contains over 15 million examples of words. It is descriptive rather than prescriptive, as dictionaries in other languages might be. That is, Merriam-Webster doesn’t tell us how to speak. It’s the other way around: Native speakers and immigrants alike dictate what the dictionary should contain.
A Mexican immigrant myself, I am constantly amazed at how, in its 450-year history, American English has become stunningly elastic. It has recalibrated itself by learning from the past. It is essential that it continues to do so. Don’t give up your accent! Don’t lose your immigrant verbal heritage! As an immigrant myself, I find joy in hearing accents, particularly those by people who have mastered American English yet retain a beautiful trace of their native tongue.
It’s important to note that speaking English hasn’t always been a choice for some. Immigrants are sometimes made to feel that they have to suppress their language in order to belong. Throughout history, children have been physically disciplined or discriminated against for speaking their native language.