MEXICO: Vachacarro!

Revolution and a new national consciousness made Mexicans defensive about their language. They did not put their street signs in Aztec (the Irish went back to Gaelic), but they became sensitive about encroachments on their Spanish. In 1924, rugged old President Plutarco Elías Calles forbade use of any other language on storefronts, on signs or in advertising. All over Mexico municipalities put his decrees into local law. So Blue Bars became Cantinas Azules, Fashion Shops became Salones de Modas. After a postmaster refused to deliver mail to Chapultepec Heights, Mexico City’s fashionable suburb came to be known as “Lomas de Chapultepec.”

But there was no stopping language infiltrations, especially from the north. Proud Mexicans ground their teeth to hear 10 centavos called a daime, and the mercado the marketa. Baseball brought the streik and the jonron. The name for the man who watched automobiles parked in the street was vachacarro.

Last week, even the Supreme Court deserted the purists. Under a local law, the Monterrey firm of Guadelupe Gonzalez S.A. had been convicted of using the French phrase Modes comme il faut in its advertising. The court not only reversed this judgment but ordered the local authorities to let the firm alone henceforth. The Spanish language, said the court, had not been harmed, and besides, the firm had printed under the French phrase the Spanish words Modes como deben de ser.

The nationalists were unmoved. Said Dr. Alejandro Quijano, president of the Academia Mexicana de la Lengua: “My heart grieves at these dangers. New words, new ideas we welcome. But we want no bastard words from beyond our borders.”