|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
IT IS COMMON for the foreign language profession to find fault with whatever teaching movement is in vogue. The language educators who see the merits of current theories and methods often feat that this tendency to criticize might result in throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I argue in this paper that because innovation is a valued sign of progress in American culture, we are wont to throw the baby out with the bath simply to have new babies to wash.
Rivers considers the ever-present controversies and the ever-changing ideas and proposals in language teaching both revitalizing and confusing and asks what we can “sift from these conflicting claims, assertions, and proposals from leaders in the profession.” Asserting that in the midst of all the controversy and change, oral communication obviously “remains our central goal,” she proposes that “interactive language teaching” will enable the profession to unify its efforts toward the achievement of this goal (xiii–xiv). I agree that communication is our basic goal, but I suggest other reasons for our many “dances around the act,” Rivers's term for our babies in the bath (xiii).
As reasons for the continual alteration of approaches to language study, Strasheim lists world events: “Two World Wars, Sputnik and the space race, and now global interdependence.” She argues that “[k]eeping informed on national and world events is as much a part of our professional preparation as inservice workshops” (30). It is true that our directions have often been determined by important world affairs. But I would like to propose that many of the fluctuations in methodology and focus in the language-teaching community result from a normal adherence to some fundamental American cultural values and beliefs.
Anthropologists and sociologists devote most of their time to studying how the values and attitudes of a culture are linked to its institutions. Hall stresses the close connection between culture and education in this simple statement: “How one learns is culturally determined, as is what one learns” ( Beyond Culture 190 ). By extension we might add that how one teaches is culturally determined, as is what one considers important to teach. In “The Influence of the American Value System on ESL Pedagogy,” Rawley shows that “culture-based values do shape the methodology of the American ESL classroom,” that “American ESL teachers perceive their teaching in a way that is consistent with American values,” and that “international students studying in the U.S. perceive differences between classroom practices in their countries and in the U.S.” (8–9). For example, a list of effective teaching practices in this country would include encouraging students to ask questions, express personal opinions, think critically, and practice through experimentation and creative projects. The list would be quite different in countries like South Vietnam, Ethiopia, and Japan, where rote memorization is the standard learning style and where students are expected to be more passive in the classroom.
What are the cultural values behind American foreign language pedagogy and to what extent are they present? Stewart and Williams have identified a number of values associated with middle-class Americans, whom I will henceforth refer to as “we.” In what follows I borrow heavily from the works of these authors.
First we value change, which we equate with progress. Change is “good” because to us it represents an improvement on the present and a step toward the future, which is our predominant time orientation (Williams 432–33). Change is also good because it gives us something to do; it keeps us active and busy. “Keeping busy” and “getting things done” are signs of worth and importance (Stewart 36). Going from the “new-key” approach in foreign language teaching to the “cognitive code” approach was a sign of evolution, growth, and progress.
Americans are not, however, satisfied merely with change for change's sake and with activity simply as a substitute for idleness. It is very important for us to know how well we are doing and if the change is making a difference. We need constant, visible signs of achievement. We are compulsive seekers of feedback and measurers of outcome. We quantify and use statistics as standards of success (Stewart 41–42). After a decade of audio-lingualism, for example, we calculated enrollment figures and attrition rates and solicited feedback from students and teachers. Dwindling numbers and the Pennsylvania Study indicated that audio-lingualism did not make a difference (Grittner 22). Lower numbers and no difference mean “failure.” “Bigger,” “more,” and “significant difference mean success.” This focus on accumulation and increase is often viewed as a manifestation of our materialism, especially by outsiders.
The decrease in enrollments during the declining years of the audio-lingual era indicated failure and, consequently, problems. But, then, our approach to problems is basically optimistic. According to Stewart, “the Americans concept of the world is rational in the sense that he believes the events of the world can be explained and the reasons for particular occurrences can be determined” (35). Reasons for the lower enrollments meant that there were solutions to the problems. Hard work and good problem-solving skills can provide explanations. With answers to our problems we can establish a new course of action (a new methodology). Here Stewart sees a connection between our “conceptualization of the world in terms of problems” and our orientation to action (35). When there are problems that need to be solved, we can engage in purposeful activity.
When the visible signs all point to success, we still like to find problems. According to Blair and Fieg, we continually question, criticize, and seek exceptions to our conclusions and to the actions they motivate (128). In this way, we keep the feedback flowing. So the poor baby with only one foot in the bath is already an object of critical scrutiny. Even during its heyday, audio-lingualism was under constant attack, as is the proficiency movement today. “Antihumanistic,” “mechanistic,” and “teacher- and testing-centered” are labels currently being pinned on the proficiency movement (Kramsch, “From Language Proficiency”; Schulz). Many of the same indictments were leveled at audio-lingualism (Smith 87). Is there a connection between these criticisms and other values to which these movements failed to respond?
The development of the individual is a sacred objective in our child-centered, student-centered educational system (Stewart 32). How can lockstep pacing, irrelevant mechanical practice, and strict adherence to impersonal guidelines and objectives foster independence and encourage self-expression? Any approach to language learning that limits the self-actualization process in any way is bound to meet with vociferous disapproval. Therefore, it is not surprising to find several periods in our pedagogical history devoted to individualization, personalization, and affective, humanistic education. Efforts to respond to the needs of the individual, however, constantly conflict with the values and the constraints of mass education. The ideal of equal opportunity for every individual is negatively affected by what Williams describes as the “necessity of ‘processing’ great numbers of students through standardized stages” (293).
Earlier in this paper I agreed with Rivers that, despite the bewildering array of methodologies vying for our endorsement during the past quarter of a century, oral communication has been our consistent goal. To what underlying cultural values can we ascribe this persistent focus? Barnlund observes that “[s]peech, to many Japanese, is not a highly regarded form of communication” (164). Suspicion surrounds the person who indulges in too much talk. This person may be regarded as foolish and even untrustworthy. Contrasting the Japanese preference for “intuitive communication” with the American reverence for talk, Barnlund makes this point:
… among Americans the ability to articulate ideas and feelings is highly respected. Speech is seen as not only the species-differentiating potential of human beings, but the source of their greatest accomplishment as well. The social system rests upon a deep commitment to discussion as the primary mode of inquiry, of learning, of negotiation, and of decision making…. Words are regarded as the principal vehicle for preserving human contact, the most sensitive and flexible means of transmitting experience. (164)
In our culture we admire the eloquent, articulate person and view with suspicion or discomfort the person who does not talk. At a party the silent guest is often asked what is wrong or if he or she is not feeling well. At the school dance, the retiring, uncommunicative bystander is considered retarded in the development of social skills. In the political arena the television debate helps us choose the “best” candidate. As language teachers, many of us have at times been guilty of personality manipulation, trying to transform the quiet and reserved student into a lively and facile conversationalist.
There is still another value behind the high priority we assign to oral communication. We view speaking as the most practical application of language learning: “What good is knowing a language if you can't speak it?” Speaking is the language function that most immediately and observably results in activity. Activity and utility are frequently equated. Students do not see a subject's worth if they cannot translate what they are learning into an immediate and observable activity.
Reasons for not learning to speak another language are connected to the practical as well. American students who do not see what use a second language could have in their future personal and professional lives are unlikely to pursue language study. “One of the blackest public curse-words we have is ‘impractical,’” says Williams, illustrating convincingly the high place our culture accords practicality (429). People wishing to gain national support for language study have learned that touting humanistic values to a public interested more in utilitarian outcomes is certain to keep the discipline in the “frills” category. Consequently, documents such as The National Interest and Foreign Languages (Parker) and Strength through Wisdom (President's Commission) have given significant impetus to our profession because they ascribe pragmatic and competitive values to language learning.
Finally the value that keeps us the busiest hopping from method to method is related to a certain moral orientation of Americans. Williams cites an impressive list of scholars who have observed this “ethical quality”:
Authoritative observers from Tocqueville, through Bryce, Siegfried, and others down to such recent studies as those of Vernon L. Parrington, Margaret Mead, Gunnar Myrdal, and Harold Laski, have agreed on at least one point: Americans tend “to see the world in moral terms.” They do not mean mere conformity to the detailed prescriptions of a particular moral code, but rather to a systematic moral orientation by which conduct is judged . It is asserted that the quasi-mythical figure, the “typical American,” thinks in terms of right or wrong, good or bad, ethical or unethical. (424)
This binary mode of thinking has led to a simplistic evaluation metric in which each pedagogical camp portrays its methods and those of similar camps as “good” and “right” and the views of opposing camps as “bad” and “wrong.” Our ethical search for the “true way” reinforces other values already mentioned. Our penchant for problem solving and our desire for change also keep the ephemeral bandwagons rolling.
In her appeal for eclecticism in the future, Strasheim states that the idea of one true way of teaching foreign languages went out with the demise of audio-lingualism (39). It is unlikely that our culture will allow us to give up bandwagons for eclecticism. Certainly we will continue to have diversity, but there will be controversy and division into camps as our cultural values persist in driving us to innovate, question, criticize, identify problems, propose solutions, depend on technology and see it as a solution, search for the one right way, work feverishly to accommodate students who want immediate gratification for short-term investments, stress proficiency and the pragmatic side of our discipline (because we believe in the importance of such a side and the public demands it), and show impatience with the slow acquisition process and its few immediate, visible returns.
In her conclusion to an article on the proficiency movement, Claire Kramsch, in effect, challenges us to resist our cultural instincts:
The controversy surrounding the ACTFL Proficiency Guidelines revives once more the old tensions between professional pragmatism and critical humanism in education, between the short-term and the long-term goals of foreign language learning. Both are an integral part of American education, and both are necessary for establishing successful intercultural communication. But whereas pragmatic achievements can be tested in the usual manner, critical-thinking skills, conceptual development, and skills of empathy cannot be captured by the oral proficiency test, nor do the proficiency guidelines show how to integrate the functional pragmatic aspects of language and its analytic critical dimensions. Only such an integration should deserve the name “proficiency.” (“Proficiency” 24)
We are bound to our cultural values, which rule over us without our knowledge. In The Silent Language , Hall introduces his readers to the idea of their own ignorance by explaining that “culture controls behavior in deep and persisting ways, many of which are outside of awareness and therefore beyond conscious control of the individual” (25). We rarely think of our professional behavior as being closely connected to our cultural values. It is important to begin understanding this relation. When we realize that throwing the baby out with the bathwater is in keeping with the dictates of our value system, we take a step toward a greater awareness of our culture. If, as language teachers, we are in the business of teaching awareness of other cultures, it certainly behooves us to keep working at understanding our own.
The author is Professor of French and Foreign Language Education in the Department of Languages and Philosophy at Utah State University. This article is based on a paper presented at the ADFL Seminar West, 18–20 June 1987, in Park City, Utah.
Barnlund, Dean C. “Verbal Self-Disclosure: Topics, Target, Depth.” Toward Internationalism . Ed. E. C. Smith and L. F. Luce. Rowley: Newbury, 1987. 147–65.
Blair, J. G., and J. P Fieg. There Is a Difference . Washington: Meridan, 1975.
Grittner, Frank M. Teaching Foreign Languages . New York: Harper, 1977.
Hall, Edward T. Beyond Culture . Garden City: Anchor-Doubleday, 1977.
———. The Silent Language . Garden City: Anchor-Doubleday, 1973.
Kramsch, Claire. “From Language Proficiency to Interactional Competence.” Modern Language Journal 70 (1986): 366–72.
———. “Proficiency versus Achievement: Reflections on the Proficiency Movement.” ADFL Bulletin 18.1 (1986): 22–24. [Show Article]
Parker, William Riley. The National Interest and Foreign Languages . Washington: US Dept. of State, 1954.
President's Commission on Foreign Languages and International Studies. Strength through Wisdom: A Report to the President . Washington: USGPO, 1979.
Rawley, Lee Ann. “The Influence of the American Value System on ESL Pedagogy.” MA thesis. Utah State U, 1986.
Rivers, Wilga. Interactive Language Teaching . New York: Cambridge UP, 1987.
Schulz, Renate A. “From Achievement to Proficiency through Classroom Instruction: Some Caveats.” Modern Language Journal 70 (1986): 373–79.
Smith, A. N. “The Importance of Attitude in Foreign Language Learning.” Modern Language Journal 55(1971): 82–88.
Stewart, Edward C. American Cultural Patterns: A Cross-Cultural Perspective . Chicago: Intercultural, 1981.
Strasheim, Lorraine A. “Proficiency in the ‘Real World’ of the Professional Classroom Teacher.” Proficiency, Policy, and Professionalism in Foreign Language Education . Ed. Diane W. Birckbichler. Lincolnwood: Natl. Textbook, 1987.29–42.
Williams, Robin M., Jr. American Society: A Sociological Interpretation . New York: Knopf, 1966.
© 1988 by the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages. All Rights Reserved.
|
|---|
|
|
|
