Linguistic diversity keeps dwindling (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

Linguistic diversity keeps dwindling

Dorothy Illing
December 13, 2006
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20917380-12332,00.html

THE number of languages taught across Australian universities has
plummeted to 26, with some of those spoken by our nearest neighbours at
risk of disappearing.

Thai, Vietnamese and Hindi are among the languages languishing in
faculties that once enjoyed strong enrolments in these subjects. But it
is the decline of some Middle Eastern languages that has caused most
concern, with one leading academic warning of the implications for
Australia's security and business interests.

"We are not that well prepared in terms of having people who can learn a
language for, say, security reasons - possibly terrorism - and
business," said Anne Pauwels, dean of arts at the University of Western
Australia.

Professor Pauwels is leading an $800,000 languages study being carried
out by the Deans of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities.

Funded by the Department of Education, Science and Training, the study
is expected to present solutions to the crisis and suggest new ways of
delivering courses.

A national stocktake has so far revealed that in the past five years the
number of languages taught in universities has halved.

Although many institutions have various languages listed on their books,
they do not have anyone studying them.

Those still taught widely are Japanese, Mandarin, French, Italian,
Indonesian, German and Spanish. Enrolments have been surging in
Italian, Spanish and Mandarin. Less common but still available are
modern Greek, Korean, Latin (which is enjoying a resurgence), Russian,
ancient Greek and Arabic.

But at least 14 languages are now taught at only one or two
universities. Among these are Vietnamese, Urdu, Croatian, Hebrew,
Hindi, Turkish and Swedish.

Professor Pauwels said at least three Australian indigenous languages,
including Pitjantjatjara, are no longer taught.

She said there were now far more languages available in schools than in
universities, which meant students could not go on to study them at a
higher level.

Indonesian remains one of the more popular languages, but it too has
been in decline.

The head of the South-East Asia Centre at the Australian National
University in Canberra, George Quinn, said the subject remained
reasonably strong at ANU, where more than 100 students took Indonesian;
but he acknowledged a national decline. He attributed this to several
factors, including the Bali bombings, the Schapelle Corby affair and
the secessionist movement.

"That's all bound up with with an anti-Islamic sentiment in Australia,"
Dr Quinn said.

Another factor was that since the bombings, students no longer went on
field trips to Indonesia, so they missed out on direct contact with the
culture.

Despite the national trend, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
says it continues to receive a lot of job applications from people with
at least basic language skills across a range of areas. "For example,
among the 47 graduates due to start in February 2007, 40 have at least
social-level language skills, across 19 languages," a spokesman said.