Omnidirectionally the course of empire takes its way

[Monte Davis]

And speaking of moral panics about immigration, here's M&D star Ben
Franklin -- previously unsuccessful publisher of the first German-language
newspaper in the colonies -- on those damn Germans overrunning Pennsylvania:

http://www.dialoginternational.com/dialog_international/2008/02/ben-franklin-on.html

The English-first brigade is very fond of the long-debunked "Muhlenberg
legend": that a 1794 request (failed) by German immigrants in Virginia for
a translation of a free Federal booklet of laws and regulations means that
German almost became our official language, so BEWARE!!! Dissected at

http://maxkade.iupui.edu/adams/chap7.html

On Tue, Jan 6, 2015 at 11:52 AM, Monte Davis <montedavis49 at gmail.com> wrote:

> ... as Bishop Berkeley almost noted in his M&D-esque "Verses on the
> Prospect of Planting Art and Learning in America." Check out the first
> network map at
>
>
> http://bigthink.com/strange-maps/chinese-whisperers-mapping-pathways-of-knowledge-and-rumor
>
> Larger version at
>
> http://news.sciencemag.org/sites/default/files/sn-languageH_2.jpg
>
> Now, of course, I want a more detailed map that breaks out the direction
> of translation. A-and one on movies and TV, with and without subtitles. My
> esteem for our own Max Nemtsov and Mike Jing continues to grow.
>
> Ten years ago I was taking a course in English as a second language in
> Temple's M.Ed program. Along the way I learned more about the English First
> Foundation and other organizations that are in a perpetual lather about All
> Those Immigrants Who Want Bilingual Accommodation And Will Bury Our Culture
> in Icky Foreignness Because They're Too Lazy to Learn the Way My
> Great-Grandparents Did.
>
> It's a classic moral panic, impervious to abundant evidence that (1)
> immigrants to the US today learn English faster than their predecessors,
> and (2) the poor beleaguered English language -- Mandarin and Hindi
> notwithstanding -- continues its 200-year roll as, global, uhh, lingua
> franca.
>
> Civis romanus sum and SPQR too, beyotches!
>
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