20, no. 1 (September 1988): 4-4
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An Anniversary Statement: The Battle Is Not Over
John H. Fisher
In an editorial entitled “Why an ADFL?” in volume 1, number 1, of the ADFL Bulletin ( Sept. 1969), John H. Fisher, executive secretary of the MLA from 1963 to 1971, discussed the reasons why college and university departments of foreign languages should be organized into an association to deal with pedagogical and administrative matters at the departmental level. Noting that the foreign language profession needed “the wisest, most unified, and most influential leadership” that could be mustered, he suggested that the ADFL “might become the catalyst which will produce such leadership” (4). In 1988, Fisher writes :
WHEN THE ADFL was founded in 1968 the situation of foreign language study in the United States was beginning to be critical. The nation emerged from the Second World War with a heightened sense of internationalism that resulted in sophisticated concern for increasing the foreign language proficiency of the population if America was to maintain its position of leadership in the world. This concern informed all segments of society, from FLES programs in local elementary schools to the improvement of foreign language teaching by the federal government through the National Defense Education Act. But by 1965 the increasing use of English as an international language and the shift of public concern from excellence to access—from improving the teaching of all subjects to the special problems of bringing the disadvantaged into the mainstream of American education—had begun to detract attention from the importance of foreign languages. The ADFL was founded, in part, to provide a forum for chairpersons in departments of foreign languages at the college and university level to counter the changing climate on their home campuses and in the nation at large.
Far be it from me, now eighteen years away from the MLA office, to hazard a statement as to how successful the campaign has been or what the terms are today. But I can tell from the MLA statistics and from what I read in the papers that the battle is not over. The rest of the world is learning English at a clip that makes our teaching of foreign languages seem apathetic, if not supine. Yet as the rest of the world learns English, the leadership of the United States appears to be declining and our trade balance to grow less favorable. It is hard not to believe that there must be some connection between our declining success abroad and the decline in the centrality of our foreign language education at home. The articles in this commemorative issue of the ADFL Bulletin celebrate what has been accomplished over the last two decades and explore what remains to be done. It is reassuring to see the ADFL continuing to take leadership. ADFL has provided a useful parliament for twenty years, and I hope that it will continue to do so until familiarity with a second language can be assumed of every educated American.
The author is John C. Hodges Professor of English at the University ofTennessee, Knoxville.
© 1988 by the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages. All Rights Reserved.
ADFL Bulletin 20, no. 1 (September 1988): 4-4 |
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