Making the argument for Russian

Wed Mar 5 03:21:44 UTC 2003

Dear SEELANGers:

To help enrollments in Russian, here is some information you might
find useful. My apologies to Slavists not in the US, as this might be
irrelevant for you, and to Slavists in the US who focus on languages
other than Russian.  I'm sure there are things I've left out and
things I could have said better, but I'm trying to provide something
to anyone who wants to use it.  I've drawn on sources of information
I know about and have easily available to me.  I encourage those who
wish to use it to simply take this document and shape it to their own
needs, changing information to reflect the latest updates or the
specifics of their own institutions and contexts (including for
example, the names of students who have studied Russian and gone on
to interesting careers with it.)

With best wishes to all,

Ben Rifkin

****

Russian is great for training students to think clearly, organize their work:
The Russian language curriculum is challenging but managable -- we
train our students to think things through, plan their work, so they
learn language processing and study skills applicable to other
classes and to professional lives after they graduate.

Russian is marketable for students' careers:

US Government Needs for Russian Language Expertise
70 Federal agencies report significant shortfall in staff with
advanced-language skills in Arabic, Chinese, Russian, and Turkic
languages.  Congressional GAO reports 29% of all State Dept. jobs
require such language expertise.
Federal jobs pay 5-15% more for language expertise.
70% of all US Dept. of Commerce Foreign Service Officer Positions in
Russian are budgeted, but not filled due to lack of qualified
applicants!
US Military eager to recruit linguists / up to $60,000 towards college tuition!
Sample Federal Employers include:  NASA, FBI, Coast Guard, USAID,
Energy Dept., Broadcasting Board of Governors, NSA/CIA, Commerce
Dept., Dept. of Defense, Nuclear Reg. Commission, Dept. of
Agriculture, International Trade Commission, US Dept. of State.

Private Sector Employers with Language Needs
Sample Private Sector Employers for Russian with Offices in Russia:
Morgan Stanley, Microsoft, General Motors, Otis Elevator, Reebok,
Hewlett Packard, Delta Airlines, Price Waterhouse, Citibank, 3M,
AT&T, Ford, Honeywell, Avon, Exxon/Mobil, Gillette.  For more
information, see www.bisnis.doc.gov
Private sector employers pay more for employees with language
expertise and when those employees are posted abroad, they typically
are given greater responsibilities than their peers posted in the US;
when foreign-based employees transfer back to the US, they generally
transfer in with higher pay and higher level of responsibilities than
US-based peers

Sample Non-Profit Employers for People with Language Expertise
US on-Profits in Russia Include:  AA, Amnesty International, Citizens
Watch, Nonviolence International, Green Cross, International
Resettlement Agencies, IREX, ACTR/ACCELS, Mother & Child, Church
Missions, Women's Crisis Center of St. Petersburg

The Russian economy is booming:  expect increased trade with the US
and investment from US firms in the Russian economy.  See
www.amcham.ru.  Note Russian plans, reported recently in NY Times, to
build an oil pipeline to Nakhodka.   Russia is the largest or one of
the largest producers of numerous natural resources and raw materials
including petroleum, diamonds, gold, copper, manganese, uranium,
silver, graphite, and platinum.  Russia is the second largest steel
producer in the world, after Japan and has an enormous timber
reserve.  Russia is the world's largest producer of natural gas,
third largest producer of oil and fourth largest in terms of the
mining of coal.  Russia has an estimated 40% of the world's total
reserves of natural gas, and Russia's proven oil reserves are second
only to Saudi Arabia's and Russia is the TOP oil producer in the
world. Russia is a tremendous potential market for US goods and
services. Experts expect an increase in demand for American made
equipment related to the energy sector, timber, and food processing
equipment, as well as aircraft, air traffic control equipment, among
other economic sectors.   American companies have been quick to
realize the potential of the Russian market; some of these are listed
at www.bisnis.doc.gov.  In the year 2000, the Russian government held
currency reserves valued at $30 billion and the Russian trade balance
was in surplus to the tune of $50 billion:  BUSINESS IS BOOMING!

Former students of Russian are now working or have worked:  as
engineers at NASA's Johnson Space Center (with Russian cosmonauts
training for the Space Shuttle), at banks operating in international
markets, as professors of Russian literature at small colleges and
large universities, in the Peace Corps, in major accounting firms (in
Russia and in the US), in large corporations with Russian operations,
in large and small law firms, Europe and America, in the State
Department and Commerce Department of the federal government,
teaching English in Russian high schools, for American press
organizations (such as the New Yorker, NY Times, Washington Post, NBC
News, CNN) in the US and in Russia, for non-profit agencies such as
the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the National Foreign
Language Center, or the US-Russia Business Council, for ACTR/ACCELS
and IREX both in the US and in Russia.

Russian is a world language, the national language of Russia,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and it is spoken by many people throughout
the former Soviet Republics in the Caucasus and Central Asia.  The
Russian Federation has a population of just under 150 million people
which constitutes slightly more than 50% of the population of the
former Soviet Union.  Of those 150 million, slightly more than 120
million identify themselves as ethnic Russians.  (There are many more
ethnic Russians in other countries of the former Soviet.)  Russia
spans eleven time zones and covers about 1/8th of the world's land
surface.  It is the largest country in the world, almost twice the
size of the United States.   Put simply, Russia is huge.  And with
more and more emigres from Russia living in the US, you can speak
Russian in any large American city with native speakers delighted to
speak with you in THEIR language!

Russian is valuable for students' personal development and personal goals:

Students who study Russian in college usually participate in a small
program with great attention from their instructors; they don't get
lost in the crowd as much as students in bigger programs, such as
Spanish.

Students who study Russian may have higher rates of admission to the
graduate and professional school programs of their choice (this seems
to be the case at UW-Madison, but I can't prove it with hard data.)

Students who study Russian have special access to Russian culture:
Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Chekhov, Kandinsky and Chagall, Akhmatova,
Pasternak and Pushkin, Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky and Prokof'iev,
Stanislavsky and Tarkovsky (not to mention Sokurov and his latest
film to sweep the cinema world, "The Russian Ark") -- Russian arts
have changed the world!

Students who study Russian have special access to understanding
Russian history and Russia today:  the turbulence of revolution, the
tyranny of dictators, lack of freedom of expression and freedom of
religion, the liberation of the collapse of communism,
nationalization and privatization, democratization and the legacy of
authoritarianism.  All are important issues for understanding not
only Russia, but much of the world today!

Russians are generally a very welcoming and hospitable people who
place high value on their friendships, including friendships with
American students on study abroad.

The infrastructure of the Russian field is great:  there is support
for professionals teaching Russian in the US.

The Russian field is well supported professionally, with two
professional associations (ACTR & AATSEEL), a rich database of
information about learning outcomes (maintained by ACTR), excellent
summer immersion programs in the US and Russia (see the AATSEEL
website for a complete listing of options), and a steadily increasing
number and variety of instructional materials and curricular support
available from commercial publishers (e.g., Prentice Hall,
McGraw-Hill, Wiley & Sons, Kendall/Hunt, and others) and non-profit
organizations (www.russnet.org, maintained by ACTR).  The Russian
field is moving towards the implementation of an Advanced Placement
Exam, which may lead to a resurgence in high school programs and
therefore even greater demand on college enrollments.  The Russian
field has one major conference (AATSEEL) and two affiliated
conferences (AAASS and ACTFL) every year, giving professionals
opportunities to network and share with one another both in formal
and informal contexts.  SEELANGs, the AATSEEL Newsletter, ACTR
Letter, and SEEJ all contribute to the field's support for each
practicing teacher and scholar.

There are great study abroad programs in Russia for American
students, run by ACTR, CIEE, Boston University and others.

For more ideas:  AATSEEL & ACTR have a great video clip on the web:
"Why study Russian?":  http://www.russnet.org/why/index.html

--
=================
Benjamin Rifkin

Professor of Slavic Languages, Slavic Dept., UW-Madison
1432 Van Hise Hall, 1220 Linden Dr.
Madison, WI  53706 USA
voice: 608/262-1623; fax: 608/265-2814
http://polyglot.lss.wisc.edu/slavic/rifkin/

Director of the Russian School
Middlebury College, Middlebury, VT  05753
voice:  802/443-5533; fax: 802/443-5394
http://www.middlebury.edu/~ls/russian/

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