November 17, 2000

The Status of Spanglish

To the Editor:

I am writing in response to the essay by Ilan Stavans on the history of the Spanish language and the future of Spanglish ("The Gravitas of Spanglish," The Review, October 13). I, too, am a professor of Spanish and was born in a Latin American country (Cuba). I feel I am as qualified as Mr. Stavans to speak on the subject.

First of all, there are a few inaccuracies in his article. The Reconquista did not begin in the 11th century but in the 8th, only 20 or 30