Spanglish: Miami's Official Language
Sometimes these interesting, sort-of-Miami-related stories end up in our e-mail inbox from newspapers in other parts of the country. Today, however, we got one from Malaysia. About Spanglish.
At any rate, it's written by a man in New York who marvels at fake words like "sheetrockero" and "chansa." But here's the part that interested us:
For example, in Chicago, New York City, and elsewhere, Mexicans and Central Americans have been trained by skilled Japanese sushi chefs. They are called susheros, a new word in both languages, and some of them now run their own sushi restaurants.
Have you ever heard the term sushero? It's possible that the word hasn't taken hold in South Florida kitchens yet. We tried to do a bit of research on other kitchen Spanglish terms, but we didn't find anything interesting. Have you heard any food-related new Spanglish terms lately?
And on another, non-food-related note, the author mentioned one word that he claims originated in Miami:
By 1961 in Miami, “wash” had already become juashanga and meant laundromat, and although Spanglish varies around the country, the verb watchar is common to many regions.Seriously? In our entire life mangling the Spanish language in La Saguesera, we never heard of "juashanga."
Spanglish and Nuyoricanspeak [The Star]
