Sunday, July 24, 2016

¿Hispanics Para Trump?

I am not going to second guess the genetic origin of these two delegates to last week's Republican convention, or of any of the others waving "Hispanics para Trump" signs. For all I know, their parents were bankers from Havana until 1959, or lost their government jobs upon the death of Generalissimo Francisco Franco.

And, as someone with only a rudimentary grasp of Spanish, I have difficulty myself knowing when to use "para" and when to use "por," so I'm only taking someone else's word that "para" is the wrong preposition.

(A tweet cited on HuffPo states that "Hispanics con Trump" would be more correct — although I'd suggest that "Trump cons Hispanics" would be better still.)

I'm reminded of a campaign at my alma mater in which a foreign exchange student ran for student government president. The slogan on his campaign literature may have sounded good in the original Ghanaian, but "A vote for [the candidate] is a vote for [his running mate] and a vote for you all" just sounded silly in English.

Returning to the present day, I do know that "Hispanics" is an English word, not a Spanish one.

It took me three seconds on Google Translate to get "los hispanos."

No comments:

Post a Comment