Bullfights and Bilingualism

For this blog, I decided to read a little more into bullfights in California and bilingualism and biculturalism in Azorean immigrants. I also found for this entry that there are not many primary sources that pertain to my topic left that I haven’t covered myself, and the things that do exist, I do not have access to. But, I did the best I could with what I could find.

The first article I looked at was actually from the LA Times writing about the bullfights that can be found at the Central Valley festas. In “Tradition of the Azores Takes Root in Central Valley Bullrings,” author Diana Marcum looks at how the bullfights in California have preserved part of Azorean Portuguese culture, and how they have been changed by California. These bullfights have deep rooted tradition going all the way back to mainland Portugal, but mainly came to California from the bigger Azores Islands like Terceira. Bullfights are commonly found in the Central Valley festas, but not really in the Southern California or Bay Area festas. The author does not delve into this anomaly, but other sources have pointed to the fact that the smaller islands like Flores, Corvo, and Pico settled the Bay Area as fishermen and dairy workers, while the larger islands settled in the Central Valley as agriculturalists. Though keeping the tradition of bullfights alive in California is a distinct preservation of culture, the bullfights have also been changed by California. For example, in Portugal and the Azores, these bullfights would culminate in the death of the bull, but in California, the bullfights are bloodless. Instead of stabbing the bull with javelins, as is common in the Azores and Portugal, these California bullfights have the bullfighters using Velcro darts to hit the bulls at specific glued on pads. The bulls are also rewarded for the show they put on by being retired to a life of stud services to make more bullfight bulls.

There are several other factors that make these Californian Portuguese bullfights unique. First, California banned bullfighting in the 1950s, but these Portuguese bullfights were exempt, as long as they were for religious ceremonies. Because the bullfights are performed during the Holy Ghost festas, which are religious events, the bullfights were spared. Another point of uniqueness are the bullfighters themselves. The bullfighters talked about in this article alone have varied backgrounds, such as a 40 year-old, non-Portuguese Desert Storm veteran, a 22 year-old student at St. Mary’s College, and a San Francisco art school graduate. The fact that these bullfights allow people from many backgrounds to join is just another point where we can see the California culture rubbing off on the Azorean culture. These bullfights are a major example of cultural preservation, despite the distance from the home country and the amount of time that has passed since the first immigration waves.

The next article I looked at was a journal article by Frederick G. Williams. Williams’ article, “Portuguese Bilingualism Among Azoreans in California”, focuses on Portuguese cultural preservation in California through language preservation. Williams’ goal is to “treat the origin of the Portuguese community in California to the extent to which the Portuguese language and culture form a part of California’s heritage, the problems associated with Portuguese language maintenance, and finally, the successes and failures of bilingual education programs” (724). Williams seems to think that statistical evidence can take the place of actual, concise writing, so his article left a lot to be inferred by the reader. For Williams, language preservation is a primary way for any immigrant group to preserve their culture and heritage upon coming to America. In the case of the Portuguese people, he notes that language has often fallen prey to the common assimilation pattern—first generations are fluent in Portuguese, second generations are bilingual, and third generations are fluent only in English—but he also notes that Portuguese have taken several unique routes to preserve their language, and thus culture. Portuguese immigrants in California have preserved their culture by gaining leadership positions in the dairy (Central California) and tuna (San Diego area) industries, fraternal insurance companies, Holy Ghost Festas, establishing I.D.E.S Halls, and founding local Portuguese newspapers and radio programs. While these do sound like great ways to preserve culture, it seems to me that these examples do not ensure the future of the Portuguese language among California Azoreans. Instead, it seems like a way to ensure that the language dies with the older generation. I’ll use my experience as an example. My grandparents and father’s oldest brother (my uncle) were born in the Azores, with my dad and his other older brother being born in California (so, depending on your definition, my dad is either first or second generation American, making me either second or third generation). All of these people speak Portuguese fluently, but a more broken, uneducated Portuguese, which makes it difficult for my father to communicate with people who aren’t family members from the same area as his family. I, on the other hand, speak pretty much no Portuguese at all, except for little words I have picked up here and there, typically consisting of greetings and curse words. I can tell you to close the door, kiss me, kiss my butt, ask if you speak Portuguese, ask what’s going on, and that’s about all. Because of this, there is a very prominent cultural divide between my dad and grandparent’s generation and mine. So walking into a festa, filled with old school Portuguese people, all speaking Portuguese to each other, is about the last thing I want to do. Even at family parties I constantly have to ask someone to translate for me and I usually just feel bad that I don’t understand anyone. To me, it seems like this act of keeping the language alive by holding events together and speaking the language as often as possible would only make younger generations who don’t know the language angry and kill off any desire to learn the language. I personally would like to learn, but my dad makes the worst teacher (any time I ask him “what’s ___ in Portuguese?” he just gives me the English word back), and all Portuguese conversations I have seen revolve around the same topics—where your family is from, who you are related to/who you know, and what food you like to eat.

Later in this article, Williams explores bilingual education, basically singing its praises. He points to the Chacon-Moscone Bilingual-Bicultural Education Act of 1976 as a key legislation that will keep Portuguese language, and therefore culture, alive in younger generations through state education. I think the author, writing in 1980, was somewhat confused by the concept of bilingual education. What Chcon-Moscone actually does is set up bilingual education as a necessity in education, but bilingual education basically helps children who are learning English as a second language by sheltering them in a bilingual classroom until they are ready for a full English education. Nowhere does the legislation state that teachers will teach in Portuguese and teach kids who want to learn the language as a second language. Instead, it is a program for immigrants to help them get up to speed with their grade level. Though Williams’ view seems slightly distorted, he does bring up a good point—Portuguese as a second language classes. These classes are few and far between in California. I have cousins who live in the Gustine area of the Central Valley, and apparently out there they offer Portuguese as a foreign language. This is probably due to the fact that there is such a huge Portuguese population in the Central Valley. But what about the Bay Area? San Leandro in particular still has a major Portuguese population, as does San Jose and Oakland, but Portuguese is not offered as a foreign language education course. My opinion is that, because these areas have been centers for more waves of immigration from other foreign countries, like India, Afghanistan, China, Japan, Vietnam, Korea, and many others, that these new groups have taken over the landscape of the ethnic identity of the areas.

Lastly, Williams, in his survey, explored the idea of language preservation as cultural identity preservation. Williams surveyed Portuguese born and Portuguese descent people, and in both cases those surveyed overwhelmingly agreed that the ability to speak Portuguese was essential to their ethnic identity. This shows that language is an important bearer of culture, even among second-generation immigrants, who traditionally become bilingual, and eventually have children who only speak English. These results are very interesting, but also very sad, because it doesn’t seem like the Portuguese community really does much to preserve language among later generations. In my own life, I have concluded that language is preserved and passed down by the mother. If your mother speaks Portuguese, you will speak Portuguese. As I said, I only have people I have met to go off of here, but in my experience the men do not teach their children the language, and the women do, so in my case, because my father speaks Portuguese and my mother doesn’t, I don’t speak Portuguese. However, I have cousins who are three and four generations away from the original immigrants (we’re getting into great-great-grandchildren here) and they all speak fluent Portuguese. I do have to agree with Williams that language is an important bearer of culture, because being on the outside and looking in on people who do speak Portuguese, I feel like I don’t have access to a special part of my heritage, and like I am missing out on a lot of relationships that could be enhanced if I knew Portuguese. If I had known Portuguese, I probably would have been able to actually talk to my grandparents, rather than sit in the same room with them and watch Jeopardy with them. 

In conclusion, Williams effectively showed that language is considered a very important bearer and keeper of culture, which is why it can be so distressing to older generations when newer generations lose that cultural connection by losing their language. In California, Williams states that this concern has lead to an increase in bilingual education, though he seems to misunderstand bilingual education. In Marcum’s article, she shows how an Azorean tradition made it to California and was also transformed by California. Bullfights, an important part of festas on larger islands like Terceira, came to California with the Azorean immigrants, but have changed to bloodless bullfights, showing a dedication to cultural traditions, and a respect for their surroundings (since California banned bullfighting in the 1950s, but let the Azorean bullfights remain because they were related to religious ceremonies, the bullfights evolved into bloodless fights). These are both important factors of cultural preservation after immigration and assimilation.