Lost Horizon

Students struggling through elementary language courses are in the unhappy position of poor relations at a family Christmas dinner. While their neighbors gorge themselves on meaty courses like English 1 and History 1, the language beginners nibble ruefully on lean and rather unappetizing fare. The main obstacle to an improvement in their educational diet is the blind insistence on "reading" as the sole basis and final end of a study of language. This insistence narrows potentially broad studies to mere intellectual workouts. Yet the College requirement of a reading knowledge forces most undergraduates to take this program.

Section men are only too familiar with the ways in which many students in these beginning language courses show their resentment. One instructor admits that "five or six rebels can almost ruin a whole section." But section men are bound closely to the framework of these primary courses, and have little freedom to spruce them up with a varied mixture of conversation, composition, and philology.

After passing the reading requirement, a student has a smattering of verbs and vocabulary, but little idea of what a study of language is for. And unless he goes on to higher courses--which he rarely does--he will have to find out on his own. Most other departments try to give their beginners a rough idea, at least, of the importance of their field as a whole, and how a particular course fits into it. But in the language program, a student plunges immediately into the mechanics of memorizing technical details. He reads Voltaire for exercise in reading French, and for little else. In this way, he loses sight of language as a means by which he can discover another culture.

Elementary language courses can be worthwhile; but in order for them to achieve their full usefulness, the emphasis must be shifted from technical skills to a broader base which includes cultural history, conversation, and writing, as well as reading. Since the majority of students never go beyond the first or second year in language studies, primary courses alone can supply a broad background that will give meaning to the process of learning details.

A revitalized language program can easily attract many undergraduates now fretting their way through narrow reading channels. But the benefits would not be for students alone. If language departments show their wares to Freshman beginners in a more favorable light, the thin ranks of their concentrators might grow along with a new student appreciation.