[EDLING:213] U.S. Defense Language Institute Teaches Culture, Linguistics

[Francis M. Hult]

USINFO Current Issues

Monterey, California – Language education for thousands of U.S. troops now 
involves teaching cultural sensitivity as well as the languages needed for a 
widening array of global missions.

Since 1941, the U.S. Defense Language Institute (DLI) has trained tens of 
thousands of military and civilian students, and "we have found that culture 
and language are inseparable," says U.S. Army Colonel Tucker Mansager.

The commandant recently spoke to USINFO after hosting the annual “Language Day" 
at the DLI Foreign Language Center in Monterey.  The event featured 
international cuisine as well as dancing and theatrical performances 
representing the cultures of the 24 languages currently being taught there.

Mansager, a West Point graduate, studied Polish and Russian at DLI in 1993 and 
was the first U.S. officer to attend the Polish Command and Staff College in 
Rembertow, Poland, in 1994.  From 2003 to 2004, he served as political-military 
division chief of the Combined Forces Command in Afghanistan.

Full text:
http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/display.html?p=washfile-
english&y=2007&m=June&x=200706111649241EJrehsiF0.8034021