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  1. #1

    VIDEO: In Louisiana, Cajuns are keen to preserve their identity



    Tl;dr: The Cajun and Creoles of Louisiana are reclaiming usage of the French language, some through having older, first language, French-speakers pass it on to their grandchildren, and others learning Louisiana dialect of French.

  2. #2
    Interesting post, I like it.
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  3. #3
    Preserving diversity is always a good thing.

    The more people reconnect with their regional/state/tribal/ethnic roots the faster we can get rid of this whole "protestant Anglo Saxon" bullshit.

    I'm Hungarian-Greek American from New York. I grew up speaking Hungarian and Greek. My Greek is terrible, but I am fluent in Hungarian.

    If I end up having kids, I'll make sure they'll speak both English and Spanish natively and will be able to speak Hungarian and at the bare minimum some Greek.
    Last edited by Mihalik; 2021-05-30 at 07:37 PM.

  4. #4
    Scarab Lord downnola's Avatar
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    My father's side of my family is Cajun but we relocated to SE PA decades ago. We've retained the food and music of south Louisiana but haven't held on to the language. I wish I had the time (and language partner) to invest in learning French and Spanish. I mess around with Duolingo and similar apps but I feel like I'd be better off going with Rosetta Stone or something.
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  5. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by Mihalik View Post
    Preserving diversity is always a good thing.

    The more people reconnect with their regional/state/tribal/ethnic roots the faster we can get rid of this whole "protestant Anglo Saxon" bullshit.

    I'm Hungarian-Greek American from New York. I grew up speaking Hungarian and Greek. My Greek is terrible, but I am fluent in Hungarian.

    If I end up having kids, I'll make sure they'll speak both English and Spanish natively and will be able to speak Hungarian and at the bare minimum some Greek.
    Yeah, I like the US having strong regional identities like this. There are a treasure trove of Indigenous, Creole and Immigrant languages that have all but died out in the US due to concerted efforts to assimilate, ostracize or eradicate them.



    This is why I really don't mind people speaking Spanish in America, especially in the Southwest like New Mexico, Texas and Cali. Ignoring the fact that Latin American immigrants actually assimilate much faster than common perception, I see Spain as one of the "founding nations" of the United States along with France.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by ScipioMoroder View Post
    This is why I really don't mind people speaking Spanish in America, especially in the Southwest like New Mexico, Texas and Cali. Ignoring the fact that Latin American immigrants actually assimilate much faster than common perception, I see Spain as one of the "founding nations" of the United States along with France.
    Half the place names outside New England are all Spanish. Especially in the Southern and Western States. And a good chunk are French like Detroit, which just means "straight" in French. The straight of lake Eire. Fucking Cadillac the car company is named after the French dude who named Detroit.

  7. #7
    In the modern world, it is very important to preserve your identity. This approach gives a broader outlook, but in my opinion, it is important not to get hung up on your identity, but to be able to accept some external manifestations of others.

  8. #8
    The Insane draynay's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by ScipioMoroder View Post
    This is why I really don't mind people speaking Spanish in America
    There's no official language, so nobody should mind anybody speaking anything.

    I wish I had a gift for languages, they don't come easily for me. I'm half Mexican, half Cajun and both my Spanish and French are pretty poor.

    Been a long time since I've been to Louisiana, I'm dying to get back when things are closer to normal.
    /s

  9. #9
    The Undying Lochton's Avatar
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    *shrugs*

    The United States of America is a huge connection of people, so of course, the development will tell, some will wish to embrace heritage.

    I don't really care. Most of the US feels disconnected from each other..
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  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by Mihalik View Post
    Preserving diversity is always a good thing.

    The more people reconnect with their regional/state/tribal/ethnic roots the faster we can get rid of this whole "protestant Anglo Saxon" bullshit.

    I'm Hungarian-Greek American from New York. I grew up speaking Hungarian and Greek. My Greek is terrible, but I am fluent in Hungarian.

    If I end up having kids, I'll make sure they'll speak both English and Spanish natively and will be able to speak Hungarian and at the bare minimum some Greek.
    Yup... thats leftist for you. "I want diversity... except for Anglo Saxons" a country needs a common language to function and that language is American English. According to you there are 3 places you can go if you don't like the USA.

  11. #11
    I Don't Work Here Endus's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cruor View Post
    Yup... thats leftist for you. "I want diversity... except for Anglo Saxons"
    WASPs are not a disadvantaged minority group, however much you want to rage about that.

    a country needs a common language to function and that language is American English.
    That premise is demonstrably false, as demonstrated by the many, many nations where there are two or more major languages.

    Including the USA, where the secondary language is Spanish. If we're talking about practical use, at least, since the USA doesn't have any official languages, in the first place.


  12. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by Mihalik View Post
    Preserving diversity is always a good thing.

    The more people reconnect with their regional/state/tribal/ethnic roots the faster we can get rid of this whole "protestant Anglo Saxon" bullshit.

    I'm Hungarian-Greek American from New York. I grew up speaking Hungarian and Greek. My Greek is terrible, but I am fluent in Hungarian.

    If I end up having kids, I'll make sure they'll speak both English and Spanish natively and will be able to speak Hungarian and at the bare minimum some Greek.
    I absolutely SUCK at languages...

    Went to a private British English school in Malaysia (Garden International School, which costs $20k/year). The whole curriculum was in English, never speaking anything but in there and back home. There's a large body of American and English students there.

    Then when I moved to Ireland I skipped the final year of primary school jumping straight to secondary, which had me exempted from Irish. Struggled learning German at Ordinary level in secondary school...

    I got the skill levels of a tourist constantly referencing to a German-English dictionary...

    I am damn envious of people that are multilingual!!! Young kids are better at picking up on that when in an environment that constantly speaks the language, which I completely lacked exposure to...

  13. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by Cruor View Post
    Yup... thats leftist for you. "I want diversity... except for Anglo Saxons" a country needs a common language to function and that language is American English. According to you there are 3 places you can go if you don't like the USA.
    Nothing hurting Anglosphere culture in the US, the opposite actually, it dominates the country. If Cajun/Creoles want to speak their own dialect of French that came with them hundreds of years ago to Louisiana, then I see nothing wrong with them being able to preserve their language and cultural heritage. Same logic applies with the Pennsylvania Germans, Gullah/Geechee, Tejanos/Californios/Neuvomexicanos, and other other cultural minority group in America.

  14. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Endus View Post
    WASPs are not a disadvantaged minority group, however much you want to rage about that.



    That premise is demonstrably false, as demonstrated by the many, many nations where there are two or more major languages.

    Including the USA, where the secondary language is Spanish. If we're talking about practical use, at least, since the USA doesn't have any official languages, in the first place.
    Wrong. Take China, where there are 2 versions of Chinese, Mandarin is becoming the dominant type over Cantonese, and people are being encouraged to know Mandarin. Cantonese speakers are worried about it. English is official language of America, with or without a law. Let me know when the president, or even a senator cant speak English, I'll wait. Not thinking a common language unites people is just so wrong and not even worth arguing with you, its like saying stars aren't hot.

  15. #15
    I Don't Work Here Endus's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cruor View Post
    Wrong. Take China, where there are 2 versions of Chinese, Mandarin is becoming the dominant type over Cantonese, and people are being encouraged to know Mandarin. Cantonese speakers are worried about it. English is official language of America, with or without a law. Let me know when the president, or even a senator cant speak English, I'll wait. Not thinking a common language unites people is just so wrong and not even worth arguing with you, its like saying stars aren't hot.
    1) There's way more than 2 dialects of Chinese in China.
    2) Bilingual countries are pretty damned common, which debunks your nonsense claim.


  16. #16
    kind of weird how English is so dominant with a country as large as America. from the south west to the north east you have numerous different language speaking groups settling in pockets all over the place.

  17. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by Cruor View Post
    Yup... thats leftist for you. "I want diversity... except for Anglo Saxons" a country needs a common language to function and that language is American English. According to you there are 3 places you can go if you don't like the USA.
    As you can see, we're clearly failing to communicate, as one of us, namely you, somehow missed the part about speaking English.

    Is not being able to read English a defining feature of Anglo-Saxoness?

    People like you are fucking exhausting.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Cruor View Post
    bunch of idiotic nonsense.
    Multi lingual countries that seem to be doing just fine being multi lingual.

    Switzerland (no less than 4 fucking languages spoken).
    Belgium. (3 official languages)
    Spain. (8 languages spoken, 4 administrative, 4 semi official)
    The fucking United Kingdom (4 spoken languages)
    Singapore. (5 official languages)
    CANADA.

    I just threw out some developed economies.

    Being multi lingual only makes you or your country 1 of 2 things...better at learning languages (thus less moronic) and more interesting (diversity in foods, drinks, holidays, customs, party habits etc).

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Xjev View Post
    Speaking same language creates a sense of unity though. So I'm really not sure if France's approach to create a unified society where every one is just "French" good and differences are just personal traits or a nation which has separate cultural dominant neighborhoods. I personally like the unified society like what France is doing, but that's just personal opinion.
    The issue with the French approach is that it's really just something left over from France's colonial history.

    It's basically colonialism dressed up as Republicanism, and it has really wrecked havoc on France's culture as much or more than on anything else.

    French spoken today and the French cultural self image was imposed top down on its regions, it's just really Parisian French and Parisian culture imposed on everyone.

    100 or 150 years ago France had well over 10+ spoken languages, a lot of music, art, poetry, literature, folk tales etc was lost in the process of imposing Parisian French on everyone.

    There's some effort to preserve or revive some of it, but at this point it's really an archeological exercise than anything else.
    Last edited by Mihalik; 2021-06-01 at 12:42 AM.

  18. #18
    The Insane draynay's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Cruor View Post
    English is official language of America, with or without a law.
    You may want to better familiarize yourself with English, starting with the definition of "official".
    /s

  19. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by uuuhname View Post
    kind of weird how English is so dominant with a country as large as America. from the south west to the north east you have numerous different language speaking groups settling in pockets all over the place.
    Fun fact, outside Mexico, US has the second largest Spanish speaking population in the world. And in a generation US is expected to pass Mexico.
    Last edited by beanman12345; 2021-06-01 at 05:49 AM.

  20. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by draynay View Post
    You may want to better familiarize yourself with English, starting with the definition of "official".
    Again, point to a leader of the nation who can't speak English. I'll wait.

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