Recent discussions

[Robert Beard]

I am deeply impressed that in our discussions of employment in our field
someone has finally mentioned what our discipline is all about:  students.
I have noticed that the longer I remain at Bucknell, the more scarcely that
word occurs in our conversations here, lost among the repetitions of 'fairness
(to faculty)', 'excellence', and especially 'diversity'.

Still, Mr. Swensen's otherwise elegant and sensible thesis on our attitudes
toward students and the discipline seems to run aground on the same bar
that responses to my previous query as to why literary critics are qualified
to teach language.  Mr. Swensen concludes:

>Have we gone far afield?  Not for a moment.  What do we return for that
>tuition bill of perhaps $25,000?  How do we justify the maintenance of a
>position costing a university or college $50,000?  The answers lie in words
>such as wisdom, learning, comprehension, and analysis.  Will any student
>ever be able to make a dime by knowing the intricacies of metaphor in a
>Pushkin lyric?  None that I have taught will, and I have no illusions about
>that.  Yet a student who has composed an analysis of such a "system" gains
>something beneficial for the rest of their days; that student gains wisdom,
>judgment, discernment, comprehension.  Moreover, that student gains an
>appreciation for that which matters most to me, the aesthetic.

Students are supposed to give up a course in computer or internet technology,
a course in ethics or anthropology, in religion or production management for
what matters most to the instructor?  Is that what I'm hearing? What matters
most for the student account for. . . nothing?  This attitude will fill our
ranks
and classrooms?

If we want more students in our classrooms without dramatic changes, we have
to answer this question: what is the connection between the characters in
Pushkin's
lyrics and and the lives of our sophomores?  Our potential students are
asking that
question in a very serious manner.  Since they have received no more of an
answer
than we have heard so far this year on SEELANGS, they are heading elsewhere.

Of course, we should always keep in mind that language enrollments haven't
dropped.  The same number of students are taking languages this year as five
years ago.  The problem is that they are shifting dramatically into
Spanish.  We
have no alternative but to lure them back out of Spanish.  They are taking
Spanish
for two reasons:  THEY THINK (1) Spanish is more likely to help them get a
job
and (2) Spanish is easy.  These are the only two issues facing us.  Our
enrollments
will rise only when these issues are dealt with unless language enrollments
in general
surge  upwards dramatically or we find an new untapped pool of clients.

Final question: what addresses these issues?  The ineffable intracies of a
Pushkin lyric?
Maybe so, I'm not saying 'no'; I'm only asking 'How?'  I don't see how they
make Russian
easier or more likely to help US students in their postgraduate careers.
Or do we need more
new courses in business Russian?  Or some interest in the careers of our
students after
graduation?  New courses related to 20th (and 21st) century Russia, all
aspects of Russia,
in particular day-to-day life that would make living there more
comprehensible?  We keep
coming to different conclusions than our students.  Is it outrageous to
suggest we listen to
them and at least consider the possibility that we may be a step or two
behind the times?

Trying to explain why we do what we do one more time in a different way
isn't going to
work in the short run--it may well in the long.  In the short run we have
to think in terms
of providing what the society is asking of us.  Right now Russia offers
economic opportunity
which cannot be ignored and which, interestingly enough, does not conflict
with reading
Pushkin.  We can prepare students for jobs in the NIS and read Pushkin with
them, too.
The current issue is simply that we must do both now if we are to retain
(or regain) our
status as a serious academic discipline.

--Bob





----------------------------------------------------------
Robert Beard, Russian & Linguistics Programs
Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA 17837
rbeard at bucknell.edu
Russian Program http://www.bucknell.edu/departments/russian
Dictionaries   http://www.bucknell.edu/~rbeard/diction.html