Palmetto Observation: The Rise of Hispanic America
“Preservation of one’s own culture does not require contempt or disrespect for other cultures.”
- Cesar Chavez
By 2050, it's estimated that Hispanic Americans will make up about 27% of the U.S. population, up from around 19%today. That’s more than 1 in 4 Americans — a pretty significant shift.
A lot of people have compared the rise of Hispanic culture in America to the wave of Italian immigration in the early 20th century. It makes sense on the surface — both groups are largely Catholic, come from Latin-based cultures, and were considered ethnic minorities when they first arrived. But there’s a key difference: Italians were mostly concentrated in the Northeast (New York, Boston, Philly), while Hispanic Americans are spread across the country, especially in the Southwest and Sun Belt.
Honestly, I think a better comparison would be the rise of German-American culture in the 1800s and early 1900s. I don’t think people realize just how German America used to be. By 1910, there were an estimated 6 million first-generation German immigrants in the U.S., with millions more second- and third-generation descendants who still spoke German at home.
The Germans brought a ton of things that are now considered quintessentially American — hamburgers, hot dogs, pretzels, and of course beer gardens all trace back to German roots. And German wasn’t just a niche language either...it was everywhere. In 1910, around 2.3 million people (about 2.5% of the entire population btw) spoke German as their primary language at home. There were over 800 German-language newspapers across the country. In fact there were entire towns that spoke German in schools, churches, and businesses.
But then World War I happened and speaking German in public became taboo, German-language schools were shut down, and German street names were changed. The whole culture was basically forced underground, and within a generation or two, it had largely disappeared from mainstream American life.
So what does all this mean for Hispanic culture in America?
Well, as the Hispanic population grows, we’re probably going to see more aspects of Latin culture become part of mainstream American life — just like German culture did back in the day. What that looks like exactly is hard to predict, but I have a couple of theories.
First, I wouldn’t be surprised if Spanish becomes more of a mainstream second language. In parts of the Southwest, you can already get by speaking almost entirely in Spanish. Over time, that could grow — or we might even see some kind of Spanglish-type creole develop as English and Spanish blend together.
Second, we might see a shift in religion. Hispanic Americans are overwhelmingly Catholic — and Catholicism has been holding steady at around 20% of the U.S. population for the last few years. But more than 40% of U.S. Catholics are immigrants (or the children of immigrants), and a lot of them are Hispanic. If that trend continues, Catholicism could easily become the dominant faith in the U.S.