Spanish-Speaking Latinos in London

Abstract

Carlos, a Colombian man in his early 40s, is responding to a question posed about the existence of a Spanish-speaking Latino (hereafter SSL) community in London. What he says here is consistent with what I have observed since I first moved to London in autumn 1996. Whether it is riding on the bus or a tube train, or simply walking on Tottenham Court Road, I will inevitably hear Spanish spoken on at least one occasion during my journey to and from work. And, if I go to one of the ‘specific areas’ referred to by Carlos, such as The Elephant and Castle in South London, I will surely hear even more Spanish spoken. Spanish, therefore, seems to have joined an ever-lengthening list of languages spoken regularly by more than 50,000 people in London and, indeed, it likely ranks ahead of more established languages such as Cantonese and even Greek. However, as of 2005, it is a grossly under-documented language: as I explain below, it barely merits a mention in the literature on multilingualism in Britain and there have been, to my knowledge, just two publications of note on SSLs.