Rich’s post below is rich in italics, which reminds me of a conversation I had with my brother about italics. When does a word stop having to be italicized? We say fillet, and not fillet, and we talk about genre, and not genre. It’s still quid pro quo (or is it quid pro quo?) and it’s definitely je ne sais quoi (even though je certainly sais what that phrase means).

So what’s the point? Consider another question: when does a person stop being a foreigner? When does a family assimilate? Are those italicized words part of English or not? In some sense, their inclusion is a fait accompli. Just by being here, they must be part of the language. Grammar is the only gatekeeper, and grammar has found a place for the italicized phrase. Does immigration law serve the same function for people? Or is something else the gatekeeper? Perhaps there are multiple gatekeepers, each one sui generis.

Visually, italics serve to make a phrase stand out. In speech, one is not expected to emphasize a foreign phrase, but in writing, that phrase might as well be highlighted, set at the angle as it is against all the other prose.

Another note, more a typographical accident than anything - italics lean to the right in comparison with other text. There’s this perception that recent immigrants, if they want to "make it," have to have even more conservative values than the mainstream. Their children have to study harder, they have to believe even more in the value of hardwork, they have to embrace conformity. So in other words, the successful immigrant also has to lean right. Coincidence?