If you look closely at the story of the United States, you'll see that multilingualism wasn't something that appeared later. It was baked in from the start, shaped by treaties, invasions, migrations, and expansions that brought hundreds of languages into contact.
This is a story about voices. Some were heard. Others were silenced. And many are still waiting to be recognized.
Long before the United States existed, hundreds of Indigenous nations lived on this land, each with its own languages, traditions, and governance structures. These were not "minority languages." They were the original linguistic map of North America, the first voices of this continent.
Then came a series of geopolitical events that reshaped the continent's linguistic landscape:
Spanish colonization brought Spanish, Indigenous-Spanish bilingualism, and new administrative structures across the Southwest and California.
French settlement and the Louisiana Purchase expanded French-speaking communities from the Great Lakes to the Gulf Coast.
The annexation of Texas and the Mexican–American War transformed entire Spanish-speaking regions into US territory overnight. Families who had never crossed a border suddenly found the border had crossed them.
The forced displacement of Indigenous nations, including the Trail of Tears, uprooted communities and languages across state lines, severing people from the land where their languages were born.
Waves of migration from Germany, Ireland, China, Eastern Europe, and Scandinavia added even more linguistic diversity to towns, cities, and rural enclaves. People arrived carrying their languages like precious cargo, holding onto the words that connected them to home.
For much of the 18th and 19th centuries, newspapers, churches, and even public schools operated in multiple languages. German-language curricula were common. Norwegian and Czech newspapers thrived. Spanish continued to be used in local courts and civic life across the Southwest.
Sources: Paperless Archives, Aneta Pavlenko, Max Kade Institute of German-American Studies, Digital Repository.
Multilingualism was not the exception. It was the norm. It was how communities survived, how they built new lives, how they held onto who they were.
Yet as the nation expanded, policymakers began pushing toward a unified "American" identity, one that increasingly centered English. This shift didn't erase multilingual communities, but it changed how systems treated them. Languages that had built this country were gradually moved to the margins, setting the stage for today's language access requirements.
This is why the EITLA course spends time on this history. Understanding how the US became multilingual helps explain today's language access laws and why they remain essential. Because this isn't ancient history. These are living consequences.
While working on this edition, Carol's conversation with Dr. Lorella Viola brought something into sharp focus:
The US became multilingual through history. But many of its institutions became monolingual through design.
Dr. Viola described something that connects directly back to this historical arc:
Multilingualism describes people. Language access describes power.
Think about what this means. A society can be multilingual, yet its public services (courts, hospitals, digital systems, government portals) can operate in one dominant language. When a parent can't understand their child's diagnosis, when a worker can't file for benefits they've earned, when a resident can't navigate the system meant to serve them, that disconnect is not accidental. It reflects whose presence was historically acknowledged in the shaping of laws, territory, and institutions.
In other words, the US inherited multilingual people but built monolingual systems.
Europe shows a similar pattern. Even with an official commitment to linguistic diversity, everyday interactions (tax forms, residency applications, healthcare interfaces) default to national languages or English. Dr. Viola emphasized that multilingualism alone does not guarantee access. The question is not "How many languages do people speak?" but "Which languages do systems allow?"
And more importantly: whose participation do we value enough to make room for?
One of the most powerful ideas in the conversation was Dr. Viola's distinction:
Translation is a tool. Language access is a design choice.
Translation steps in at the end. Language access begins at the foundation.
This matters because design choices, whether in government portals or hospital workflows, determine who is visible from the start. They determine whose knowledge gets represented, whose participation counts, and whose identities are recognized. Every form that exists in only one language is a choice. Every website, every hotline, every intake process. These are choices about who belongs, who matters, who gets to be seen.
History shows how languages entered the US. Language access shows how they function within it, or how they're locked out of it.
This is not just a linguistic question. It's a question of dignity. Of equity. Of whether systems serve all the people they were built for, or just some of them.
When we weave together the multilingual foundations of the US, the geopolitical events that expanded and displaced language communities, the rise of English-centered national identity, and modern systems built without multilingual design, we see the full picture of why language access is not optional.
It is a corrective measure, necessary because systems never evolved alongside the people they served. It's how we honor the linguistic diversity that built this nation. It's how we ensure that the grandmother who speaks Cantonese, the farmworker who speaks K'iche', the refugee who speaks Pashto, can access the same justice, the same care, the same opportunities as everyone else.
This is why my conversation with Dr. Viola resonates so strongly with the mission of EALS. We are not just filling gaps. We are helping reshape systems that were never designed with multilingual communities in mind. We are building bridges back to what was always true: this has always been a multilingual nation. Our systems just need to catch up.
Listen to the full conversation. Carol and Dr. Lorella Viola explore multilingualism, power, and linguistic justice in the latest episode of Language Access Matters. Hear the ideas that are reshaping how we think about language and belonging.
Learn why language access exists. If you want your staff or interpreters to develop a deeper understanding of the foundations of language access, start with the EITLA course chapter on the history of US multilingualism. This is where change begins: with understanding.
