As 'Latinx' struggles to catch on, a lesson for language police

Fellow Americans who now ask to be identified as Black previously wanted to be called black, African-American or, generations ago, Negro. Which is fine. Actually, better than fine. Our language should awaken to sensitivities and call people what they wish to be called. Anyone still stubbornly clinging to the comically antiquated term "Oriental," for instance, rather than calling Asian Americans by their preferred name, betrays their bias.

But not all linguistic evolutions are created equal. When terminology is contrived from on high to fix a problem that never existed, it rightly struggles to find acceptance. Which brings us to the story of a word that some interest groups and intellectuals insist upon forcing upon a large swath of the population: Latinx.

Over the years, demographers and the press and others have tended to refer to the endlessly diverse population of Americans who speak Spanish, who trace their roots either to Mexico or South America or elsewhere, as Hispanic. In recent years, that term has given way to Latino. Some now use the term "brown," as in "Black and brown," although that has the unfortunate consequence of including individuals of Middle Eastern and South Asian descent, lumping together people who have little culturally in common on the basis of skin color alone.

Then along came academics with a new term on which they were insistent, meant to encompass both Latinas and Latinos: Latinx. It is popular on Twitter and in academia. But it happens to be hard to say, perhaps especially in Spanish (oops!). And because it didn't bubble up organically, it has few advocates in the grass roots, where it counts.

Little wonder, according to a Gallup poll out last week, despite years of persistent advocacy, just 4% of those who consider themselves Hispanic or Latino prefer the term Latinx. About a quarter still like to be called Hispanic, and a bit fewer Latino.