Spanglish Acceptance

Spanglish, as I said in my last entry, is quite alive and will keep growing. More and more is it actually being not only accepted but used as a means of communication with no shame whatsoever of it being a "hybrid" speech.
Various communication mediums have begun to implement Spanglish as part of their identities, and, I dare say, of their marketing strategies. Latina Magazine prides itself in using Spanglish. Though primarily in English, one finds through its articles and advertisements the mix the Spanish and English. Articles with headlines reading What to do with your hombre, and Welcome to nuestra familia! are its trademark. A simple visit to its website will reveal even more of this innovative practice. KJLA gives itself credit for being "the first bilingual station in Los Angeles". LaTV, on this station, has nightly broadcasts completely in Spanglish, the discourse being similar to that sample conversation in my last entry. NBC's Telemundo Network had a sitcom named Los Teens which also utilized Spanglish. Semantic Compositions lists the example used by the U.S. Army in its Spanish ads: Yo soy el Army. He says that the Spanish word for army could have been used, ejército, but that here, army is treated as if it were a proper name, referring to the U.S. Army, which are usually not translated. I agree with him. And here, for the word Army, in the commercials, the English pronunciation is kept. All of this caters to the Hispanic audience who uses Spanglish everyday. There is truly a market for it. These companies are seizing that opportunity and not only making money in the process, but also giving this audience something to which they relate; that which they speak and hear everyday: Spanglish.

Language Log wonders if such constructions as Le gars que je te parle de found in some varieties of Canadian French, are also found in Spanglish. To that I answer, no. El muchacho que te hablo de* would be unheard of in Spanglish. Probably a person with very little knowledge of Spanish would say it; someone who does not feel the internal grammar of the language, but that's not what we're talking about here. I have heard, however, some utterances from Mexican people in the media which somewhat resemble that "preposition stranding" found in English. I have heard in interviews, people say, for instance: Siempre es triste cuando algo malo te pasa... o que la gente hable de. This seems to be a recent phenomena, whether it is or not influenced by English, I am not sure. It is a use similar to the French en. For example, saying o que la gente hable de, in French, it would be, ou que les gens en parlent. However, I have witnessed that this is not limited to de, it has happened also with other prepositions such as con. It seems to be done by the old principle that the least one can get away with saying, for the sake of using less energy, one will do so. That sentence above could completed by adding a simple eso, giving us de eso. This use is not widespread, used rather scarcely, usually when giving alternatives to things, like in the example above. I have heard this only a couple of times from young people in Central Mexico, from its capital. If it at all catches on, it is sure to spread to the rest of the country.
In the same entry, Language Log tells a story of how Vick's Vapor Rub came to be bibaparú in the Caribbean. I have been aware of this as well, of which I have heard the variant bibaporú. In Mexico, I know that this product is known as baporú, with the same 'etymology' behind it. In many Hispanic countries, and in other nations I would imagine, a new product will sometimes be known by its brand name. For example, kleenex [klineks] for tissue and coca (cola) for soda, and, of course, the case with the Vapor Rub.