In Make English Our Official Language by Newt Gingrich and Michael Ciamarra, their established main claim is to make English language the only primary official language used in the united states. However, Gingrich and Ciamarra provided little to no evidence to back up their claim. In addition, they also gave sub-claims such as “In the united states the language of success is English” (Gingrich and Ciamarra. Par. 7). Gingrich and Ciamarra proceeded to add other claims like speaking and understanding English “provides the basis for American cultural unity” (Gingrich and Ciamarra. Par. 8). These sub-claims are one of the few they argue in the article but all together they aggregate to support the main claim.
Although. Gingrich and Ciamarra provided no evidence why English should be the main official language, they used rhetorical appeals such as logos and pathos to persuade their audience. An example of logos being used to convince their audience is when they provided information on how many immigrants illegally migrate to the united states with no legal documents to stay. Further down on the second page, Gingrich and Ciamarra used pathos to persuade their readers by creating a connection between the downside of large numbers of illegal immigrants migrating to the united to how Americans feel about how the more people to get in easily, the more they feel like they don’t have to comprehend and appreciate American culture, which will expediently end up in American losing their cultural values.
An example of Gingrich and Ciamarra using the logos to convince their audience by providing information on how many immigrants illegally migrate to the united states with no legal documents is when they wrote “The debate over how to address continued illegal migration to this country and the presence of millions of people living here illegally continues unabated across the nation” (Gingrich and Ciamarra. Par. 9) This strategy of persuasion introduced here is most likely to wake up most Americans who cares about their nation, it’s well being and protection of the values they have worked to establish, to support their claim without even giving them any chance to be skeptical about his claim. Giving facts and logical reasons have been proved to be the most convincing strategy of persuasion because facts are permanent truth that cannot be changed, and human being tend to believe in actuality.
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Furthermore, Gingrich and Ciamarra, using pathos, appealed to the emotion of legal immigrants who are trying to gain the access of an American passport or citizenship to also be supporters of their claim by stating “we should continue to strongly encourage legal immigrants to become citizens, but it is important that those seeking citizenship embrace American values and the culture which bind us together . In order to preserve that bond, a common language is imperative” (Gingrich and Ciamarra. Par. 6). This means Gingrich and Ciamarra knew they had to bring out sentimental thoughts out of the legal immigrants who might be reading this, so they stir up the thought of being a citizen.
Citizens are known to have more job opportunity, scholarships opportunity, less rick of deportation, petition for more family members, easier foreign trips, vote and also run for most public offices. All these advantages listed can bring up some emotions in legal immigrants to support the claim of English language being our official languages because they start thinking since having English has our official language is imperative and we can finally have citizenship by agreeing to making English the official language, we might as well give the Americans the language they think preserves their unity and bond.
Gingrich and Ciamarra also used pathos to convince their audience by stating “First, the failure of large number of immigrants to assimilate into our culture is leading many to fear that we are expecting the disintegration of American values” (Gingrich and Ciamarra. Par. 13). This sentence is appealing to the emotions of Americans which means, Gingrich and Ciamarra already brought up the common problem in the population of Americans which is high amount of illegal immigrants in the united states but also the fact that “The vast Americans can trace their heritage to a distant land” (Gingrich and Ciamarra. Par. 13), now they are adding what the damages of not only illegal immigrants but the more Immigrants in general who fails to “assimilate” into American culture the more American values will experience fast “disintegrating”.
In conclusion, Gingrich and Ciamarra uses pathos and logos to convince not just American, but also immigrants that making English language the official language in the united states will uphold the unity, bond and “maintain and strengthen the American’s civic culture” (Gingrich and Ciamarra 20). However, even though Gingrich and Ciamarra main claim is to make English the only primary official language in the united states, they also must understand that language is a communication system. It is true that we use language to communicate with others.
However, language is much more than a communication system. The most recent thinking about the nature of language suggests that language is first and foremost a representational system; a system which provides us with the symbols we need to model for ourselves, to ourselves, inside our heads, the universe around us. This means making English our official language will increase the level of public disgrace for people who speak other language and prohibit non-English speakers who work in local stores or just migrated from communicating freely to their relatives or co-workers in public space. In general, Making English our only primary official language in the united states is a bad decision and has no evidence to back up why is needed.
