[EDLING:1916] EducationGuardian.co.uk: Monolingual slobs

[fmhult at DOLPHIN.UPENN.EDU]

Francis Hult spotted this on the EducationGuardian.co.uk site and thought you should see it.

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Note from Francis Hult:

Monolingual slobs
Academics may suffer if we don't learn the lingo
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To see this story with its related links on the EducationGuardian.co.uk site, go to http://education.guardian.co.uk

Monolingual slobs
Academics may suffer if we don't learn the lingo
Patrick Tomlin
Tuesday October 03 2006
The Guardian


Among the photographs of beaming 16-year-olds ripping open envelopes stuffed with A*s, and the now-traditional hand-wringing over whether they're brighter, harder-working or spottier than last year's cohort, there was another story that caught my eye in this year's exam results season. This was the news that the teaching of modern languages in secondary schools may be "beyond the point of no return".

With modern languages added to the list of former curriculum stalwarts that nobody studies any more, such as physics and chemistry, I am tempted to ask what on earth people are actually studying these days. I could find out for you, I suppose, but I keep reading about the blurring of news and comment, so I think it's best if you find out for yourselves.

The UK is already way behind other European nations when it comes to foreign language skills - less than a third of British people can take part in a conversation in a foreign language, compared with 80% in other parts of the EU. Since compulsory study at GCSE level was dropped two years ago, that number may well plummet further.

I would like to spend the rest of the article lamenting the UK's paucity in foreign language skills by berating the two-thirds of you unable to converse in a foreign tongue in a lesser-known dialect of Mongolian. But I won't. Largely because I can't.

In fact, I wouldn't be able to complete the article in the one foreign language - French - that I was schooled in, unless this piece took a bizarre twist and suddenly focused on directions to the station and requests for Orangina. Yes, I am one of the monolingual slobs. I'm reminded of this every day as well, because She Who Earns The Money is half-German and therefore bilingual.

"I don't care about snot-filled oiks and how they fill their days," I hear you cry. "I come to the Higher pages for the thrill of cutting-edge research." Well, stick with it, because I'm getting there.

Academic papers and texts are composed in many different languages, and unless we have people able to cross those linguistic borders, to find innovative ideas and techniques developed in other countries and bring them back to the debates taking place in English-speaking journals, then our academic life will be all the poorer for it. The major monographs will wind their way into other languages eventually, but those wanting to keep a finger on the pulse of academic discourse around the planet are extremely advantaged by being able to read academic texts in other languages.

And if schools are no longer going to provide foreign languages, it may be time that universities took to ensuring students receive language training. Usually when a story that makes the UK look a bit insular crops up, we can take a look at the US and feel better about ourselves. But this is one area in which we lag behind the US.

A few years ago, after I had graduated with my first degree, I thought I'd apply for a PhD in the US. I chose Princeton and sent off a half-baked application. Needless to say, I got the standard rejection letter - unusually high number of extremely qualified applicants blah blah blah (this could mean: any other year, you'd have got in. Or it could mean: loads of very qualified people applied; so imagine how funny it was when we got your application!). But one thing I noticed is how many US doctoral programmes have a foreign language requirement. This is because they recognise, to quote Yale, "that ability to converse and read in a language other than one's native tongue is important in carrying out research".

It's too early for me to say whether my monolingualism will harm my research, but it worries me that other institutions see a second language as so fundamental. With fewer and fewer UK students learning foreign languages in schools, if universities are to ensure that their research students are able to link into debates and theories emerging elsewhere, they may have to consider whether language provision should be a central element of doctoral study, or at the very least ensure that courses are available. 

· Patrick Tomlin is researching a doctorate in political theory at Oxford University. His column will appear monthly

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