MIAMI -- Maria Burford lives in the United States but it doesn't feel that way to her. In shops and restaurants, the clerks speak to her in Spanish, although she doesn't understand a word. Her neighbors all speak Spanish, too, and they make her feel like a foreigner. It's not simply that she has trouble communicating; it's how they treat her. ''They come up to me, and when I don't speak Spanish, they give me a little attitude," she says.
Burford can't wait to leave Miami, which she, her husband, and their 13-month-old son plan on doing in a few years as soon as their condominium appreciates in value. They won't be alone. More than 100,000 whites have left in the past decade and continue to leave.
This is the reality of life in Miami for many whites, who are referred to by the city's dominant Hispanic population -- and increasingly by themselves -- as Anglos. It is a Miami where business is conducted in Spanish, menus are in Spanish, the most popular radio and television stations are broadcast in Spanish, and the dominant political class speaks Spanish. It is a Miami with more than one multimillionaire who doesn't speak a word of English. And it is spreading its influence throughout the state as many Hispanics migrate north.
It is also a Miami that Harvard professor Samuel Huntington thinks is a harbinger of things to come in America. In his book ''Who Are We?" Huntington portrays Miami, which is 60 percent Hispanic, as a city that has been Hispanicized ''without precedent in the history of major American cities." Other cities could follow suit, he warns, and will form a kind of parallel America, one ''with economic and political resources sufficient to sustain its own Hispanic identity apart from the national identity of other Americans and also able to influence significantly American politics, government, and society."
Huntington says he thinks Hispanics are different from previous waves of immigrants. They are not assimilating, he says, in part because of their large numbers and their proximity to their native countries. He worries that they have a dramatically different culture and values that will erode America's core identity, which he sees as based on Anglo-Protestant values. He foresees an America that is bilingual and bicultural, a loose confederation with little to unify it.
Not surprisingly, Huntington's views have angered many in Miami's Hispanic population. ''It's sophisticated racism," said Joe Garcia, a leader in the Cuban-American community. Hispanics are assimilating, both culturally and linguistically, Garcia asserts. A prime example, he says, is that he does not speak Spanish as well as his father, and his daughter does not speak it as well as he does.
Some historians note that previous waves of immigrants to the United States, including Italians and Eastern European Jews, have provoked similar fears, and they turned out to be unfounded. In 1751, worried about German immigration, Benjamin Franklin wrote, ''Why should Pennsylvania . . . become a Colony of Aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to Germanize us instead of our Anglifying them, and will never adopt our language or customs, any more than they can acquire our complexion."
In fact, says Thomas Boswell, a professor of geography at the University of Miami, the city's Hispanics are assimilating, just as German immigrants did in the 1700s. In a recent study examining six indicators of assimilation, including migrants' rate of citizenship, whether they lived in a mixed neighborhood, language, and marriage, he found that Hispanics are acculturating.
Boswell found, for example, that second-generation Hispanics are more comfortable speaking English than Spanish. More importantly, Boswell found what he described as a ''fair amount" of marriage between Hispanics and non-Hispanics. ''Some say that's the acid test of assimilation," he said.
Victoria Rovirosa, 23, has passed that test, then. Born to a Cuban father and American mother, she grew up surrounded by Cuban family and friends, but she is also more comfortable speaking English than Spanish. She attended the University of Georgia, married an Anglo, and now lives in Atlanta.
''I don't think I've ever even dated a Hispanic. I never wanted to," she said. ''Hispanic men have this attitude that a woman's place is in the kitchen. That kind of bothers me."
There is little chance that she will move with her husband to Miami because he doesn't think he could get a good job here. ''He knows he would be kind of an underdog because most people speak two languages," she said.
Miami continues to experience successive waves of new immigrants, particularly from Latin American countries other than Cuba. More than two-thirds of Hispanics in Miami are foreign-born, compared with a national average of one-third. These new immigrants will determine how much the city of Miami assimilates, says Alex Stepick, director of the Immigration and Ethnicity Institute at Florida International University. ''The speed of immigration will be what keeps the differences alive," he said.
And what does that mean for Miami's Anglo minority? Stepick says their only option is to embrace the changes and the language, what he calls ''acculturation in reverse."
Most Anglo Miamians have opted to flee instead, heading north to Broward and Palm Beach counties, or leaving South Florida altogether. From 1990 through 2000, Miami-Dade County had a net loss of 119,000 whites, and they're still leaving, specialists say.
The exodus is futile, Garcia says. ''If you moved to Broward 10 ten years ago, guess what? We're there, too," he said. ''If you moved to Palm Beach County five years ago, guess what? We're there now, too." As for the non-Hispanics who remain in Miami, they still refuse, for the most part, to learn Spanish. ''There is resistance to learning it and resentment at having to learn it," said Marvin Dunn, a community psychologist who has tried in particular to encourage African-Americans to learn Spanish to improve their job prospects.
Then there are those like Jim Hoover, a 27-year resident of Miami who has made peace with his decision to stay. He does not speak much Spanish but is not bothered by hearing it around him. He likes the flavor of life here. ''Miami fits into my diversity plan," he said. ''I get sick of meat and potatoes."
The struggle over Miami's identity might best be summed up by dueling bumper stickers. As the Hispanic, in particular Cuban, population soared in the 1980s and '90s, some cars began to sport this slogan: ''Will the last American to leave Miami please bring the flag."
Since then, someone came up with a response and printed it on another bumper sticker. That one says, ''Don't worry, the flag and your job will still be here when you get back."