It’s no secret that I’m not the most structured when it comes to teaching bilingualism. We’ve talked about it before, in past blog posts. It’s not that fluency in English and Spanish for Edgar is not important to me. It is. For more reasons than I can explain, pero desde luego not the least of which is his own personal benefit in the future. I’ve read a lot of the statistics. I’ve heard and discussed the meticulous methods one can ensure a child becomes bilingual. They are great, believe me. But I wish I could be that disciplined and good about sticking to a plan.
The reality is I’m not. And the more time I’ve had to think about it the more I’ve come to the realization that I don’t want to be. The thing is the more we’ve stopped pushing and instead have let Edgar discover and learn Spanish on his own, as well as understand his own culture and identity, the more he seems to have embraced all of it. Of course, we do have the added benefit that a large part of our families only communicate with him in Spanish. And that certainly cannot be discounted as anything less than a HUGE HELP!
Still, whatever your method, I honestly believe there are not any right or wrong answers when it comes to teaching bilingualism and culture to our children. The important thing is to do it and to do it because it will help them out more than anyone else in their futures.
And speaking of that, here are some pretty cool statistics from Univision that I’ve been aching to find a reason to share for quite some time now:
- 62% of Hispanics between the ages of 18-34 have a high to medium cultural connection
- 66% self-identify as Hispanic
- 29% of the total Hispanic population are defined as Millennials (18-34)
- 1 out of every 5 Millennials today is Hispanic
- By 2020 that number will be closer to 1 in 4
This was also the main subject of discussion at last month’s Austin AdFed Hispanic Marketing Symposium, which I had the pleasure of attending and speaking in.
Their study carries a lot of other cool data, but the message that resonated the most with me was this one: That language and culture are less about defining what it means to be Latino and more about connecting and communicating with each other in authentic ways.
Who knows what that will mean for Edgar’s generation in the years ahead?
No, I was not compensated by Univision or anyone else. I’m just kind of a dork when it comes to statistics and data about Latino culture and identity.