Finding U.S. Census Bureau
Data Relevant to Heritage
Language Education
Susie Bauckus, NHLRC
July 25, 2013
We’ll find:
1) aggregate #s: Total #/% residents
who speak a language other than
English (LOTE) at home + the
foreign born
2) # speakers of particular LOTEs
in a given area (nation, state, county,
city)
The American Community Survey*’s
questions re: language:
“Does this person speak a language other
than English at home*?
[if yes] What is this language? ______
How well does this person speak
English?
-- very well, well, not well, not at all.”
Aggregate #s: why important?
-shows importance of field
-geography matters
-general descriptor for an area
-???
Let’s get started:
To find aggregate #s:
www.census.gov >>
Quick Facts > choose a geography
Look for:
• “Speak a Language other than
English at Home”
• “Foreign Born”
Heritage language is a
family phenomenon
Relevant study findings:
“Children from immigrant families are
the fastest growing group of children in
the United States” (Urban Institute,
2010)
“Census Bureau Reports Foreign-Born
Households are Larger, Include More
Children and Grandparents” (U.S.
Census Bureau, 2013)
Survey of students studying HL ranked
“to communicate w/ family and
friends in the U.S.”
More highly than “to communicate
w/ family and friends abroad”
Even among Spanish speakers who
visit their country of origin often
(Carreira & Kagan, 2011, p. 48).
patterns
U.S.
California
Los Angeles Alhambra
County
City
20.3%
Speak a LOTE at Home
43.2%
56.6%
74.9%
12.8%
Foreign Born
27.2%
35.6%
53%
Source: Census Bureau’s American Community
Survey, 2006-11 5-year estimates
Finding Particular
Languages
Census Bureau lists 39 Languages/groups:
African languages
Arabic
Armenian
Chinese
French (incl. Patois, Cajun)
French Creole
German
Greek
Gujarati
Hebrew
Hindi
Hmong
Hungarian
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Laotian
Mon-Khmer, Cambodian
Navajo
Persian
Polish
Portuguese or Portuguese Creole
Russian
Scandinavian languages
Serbo-Croatian
Spanish or Spanish Creole
Speak only English
Tagalog
Thai
Urdu
Vietnamese
Yiddish
Other Asian languages
Other Indic languages
Other Indo-European languages
Other Native North American languages
Other Pacific Island languages
Let’s find the tables
start @ www.census.gov, find link to
American Fact Finder at bottom of page
In Table field, type “B16001”
(Language Spoken At Home By Ability To
Speak English For The Population 5 Years
And Over)
Then choose geography …
Geography matters: another example
Examples of Variation in a Large Urban Area: Most
Spoken LOTEs in Descending Order
Los Angeles County: English, Spanish, Chinese, Tagalog,
Korean, Armenian, Persian
Cities in Los Angeles County
• Alhambra – Chinese, Spanish, English, Vietnamese
• Bell – Spanish, English, Arabic, Pacific Island, Tagalog
• West Hollywood – English, Russian, Spanish, French
• Glendale – Armenian, English, Spanish, Korean
• Long Beach – English, Spanish, Khmer, Tagalog
• Beverly Hills – English, Persian, Spanish, Hebrew
(source: 2007-11 American Cmmty Survey 5-yr
estimates)
Advocacy/explaining:
arguing for teacher ed
collaboration across langs
persuading admin., colleagues,
parents, kids, gen’l population Connecting the dots:
family ties
Funding proposals
strengthening academic
skills
identity
HL as job skill
me > world
numbers
Publications:
academic and non-academic articles
public relations (brochures,
websites, etc.)
part of HL education
Informing, justifying
decisions on languages for
HLL classes/programs
What will “languages spoken” table not
tell us?
serbian versus croatian versus bosnian
french from canada versus from france
versus from Rwanda
mandarin versus cantonese versus
taiwanese
north versus south vietnamese (see Lam,
2006; Polinsky & Kagan, 2007)
moroccan arabic versus algerian versus lebanese
versus syrian versus egyptian versus mauritanian
etc. etc.
peninsular spanish versus puerto rican versus
argentinian versus mexican
western versus eastern armenian
relationship w/ home country
waves of emigration; historical event associated
w/ emigration
Find #s for your own area;
• Rank languages from most >
least spoken
• Compare over time
• Take your own census: collect
data from your students
including place of birth,
parents’ native language/s.
For Information and tutorials:
see NHLRC’s Demographics Page:
(search from nhlrc.ucla.edu)
has tutorials and links to U.S. Census Bureau pages,
Table numbers, and other information
References
Carreira, M. (2007). Spanish-for-native-speaker matters: narrowing the
Latino achievement gap through Spanish language instruction. Heritage
Language Journal, 5(1), 147-171. www.heritagelanguages.org
Census Bureau Reports Foreign-Born Households are Larger,
Include More Children and Grandparents (U.S. Census Bureau,
2010)
http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/foreignborn_population/cb12-79.html
Early Education Programs and Children of Immigrants:
Learning Each Other's Language. (2010).
http://www.urban.org/publications/412205.html
Walters & Trevelyan. (2011). The Newly Arrived Foreign-Born
Population of the United States: 2010 (2011), pp. 3-6.
http://www.census.gov/prod/2011pubs/ acsbr10-16.pdf
Please send questions, comments,
and feedback to
sbauckus@international.ucla.edu