alarm

[Stephen Bobick]

  Benjamin Rifkin writes:
  >I understand Mr. Bobick's point and agree with him in many ways.  However,
  >I disagree about the idea that Russian language enrollments exceed the
  >country's need for speakers of Russian.  (See Brecht et al.'s report, for
  >instance, or the classified ads in magazines like the Economist or the
  >newspaper Moscow Times.)  Our students of Russian get jobs ... they get
  >numerous job offers.

But, are the jobs attractive to students selecting a major in college?  If
not, then perhaps the supply of jobs does exceed the demand.  Or is the
arguement that the students simply don't know about the (attractive) jobs
that are available to them?

  >Our responsibility is to track this better so we can
  >attract students who will fill these jobs.

Has there been any tracking of the supply of jobs for students of other Slavic
Languages?  Poland and Ukraine are significantly large countries with fledging
economies and a huge potential (for success or failure).  Are there not
opportunities in these (and other) countries for students of these non-Russian
Slavic languages?

  >I also want to make it clear that while I heartily support the teaching of
  >all the languages and cultures of Central and Eastern Europe, many of us in
  >AATSEEL are faculty members in Slavic Departments in which the bulk of
  >appointments are in Russian language and literature.  We may, in time,
  >change this state by training and hiring tenure track faculty in other
  >Slavic languages and cultures, but as presently configured, many of the
  >departments are simply not prepared to teach full programs in some of the
  >languages.  Our own department offers Serbo-Croatian and Polish and Czech,
  >but offerings are limited on both the undergraduate and graduate level
  >because each of these languages/cultures is represented by one (Polish and
  >Czech) or two (Serbo-Croatian) faculty members who teach a variety of
  >courses beyond the language itself.  Given the current state of funding for
  >higher education, we are not likely going to be allowed to hire another
  >faculty member in Polish (even though our Polish enrollments are robust)
  >anytime soon.  (The film program, for instance, has 300 majors, but the
  >same number of full time teaching employees:  the program has been
  >requesting additional hires for years, but the budget has not allowed this.
  >Our program, with declining enrollments, is in no position to ask for more
  >positions.)

Yes I understand the situation is complex.  But isn't it possible to hire
lecturers on a year-by-year basis (with maybe only MS or BS degrees) to
support instruction in other Slavic Languages that seem to be enjoying robust,
increasing enrollments.  Conceivably, programs could be incrementally
developed and expanded for those languages which enjoy consistent enrollments.

  >My argument is simply that we MUST work together, all of us, Russianists
  >and non-Russianists, to increase enrollments in our field.

I'm speaking as an outsider to the field.  I have a personal interest and
desire to develop fluency in *both* Ukrainian and Russian.  I have plenty of
opportunities in the latter, but few for the former.  As a graduate student
in Computer Science at the University of Washington, I would have gladly
embraced an opportunity to study Ukrainian during my two years there as
an "enrichment class".  It was never offered.  I also would have taken
extension courses in Ukrainian through the University if they existed.  They
do not.  So, I pay for private tutoring with 6-7 other fellow students from
the Seattle area.  Some would probably be adverse to a rigorous "academic"
type course, but some probably would consider taking an extension course,
if it existed at a reasonable cost.  I'm fairly sure. there is *some* demand
here in Seattle for Ukrainian language studies, but could not accurately say
how much.  I can only say that the University of Washington lost the potential
of one Ukrainian-language student for 2+ years.

-- Stephen Bobick