Monolingual Americans: Why we can't learn foreign languages
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Preface This book is unapologetically subjective. But learning to perform in a second language is a very personal experience, and it is precisely my personal experience--over twenty years spent as a learner and teacher in academia--which forms the basis for my conclusion that our current system needs repair. Many fine academic publishers, including Harvard and Oxford, decided against publishing my book. In fact, I have been awarded with an impressive collection of stylish rejection letters from dozens of the finest institutions of higher learning in the U.S. and abroad, in addition to letters from top-notch trade publishers. Nearly all traditional publishers responded positively to the description of my manuscript, but added “it does not fit in with X Press.” Only two publishers hinted at a reason for rejection. One claimed the manuscript’s tone is too personal. Another concluded that since I include my perspective as a language learner and teacher, then it is not an academic text (despite the eight pages of academic sources cited), but rather a “memoir.” I thought that only old people on their deathbeds wrote memoirs. It is true, the hybrid nature of my text defies easy classification. It is both academic and personal. Also, I include political and economic analyses into my critique of language learning in the U.S. precisely because it is a very political industry. Recently, in response to my lack of success in higher education, a colleague good-naturedly suggested that I “just shut up and play the game.” It is precisely this character flaw, my inability to “just shut up and play the game,” that has led to the writing of this book. Since this book is, in large part, a critique of money’s corrupting influence on higher education, it is only fitting that I make no profit from its sale. Thus, all author proceeds will be donated to Maryknoll Missioners. Table of contents page Introduction 6 Chapter One: The Communicative Language Teaching "Revolution" 14 Chapter Two: Conversational Spanish and other myths 38 Chapter Three: The schoolteacher factories: colleges of education 56 Chapter Four: Language study in the Ivory Tower: the research universities 78 Chapter Five: Pretend University: grade inflation, entitlement, 102 and the bottom line Chapter Six: Low academic standards: a "leftist plot" to undermine 128 U.S. education? Chapter Seven: Legislating proficiency: the novice-high fiasco 148 Chapter Eight: Abandoning ship? The Drake University experiment 158 Chapter Nine: Conclusion: revaluing discipline 173 Works Cited 193
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About the Book
This book is a critical examination of the failure of the current foreign-language teaching model in the United States, based primarily on the author's first-hand experience as a language learner and teacher, and secondarily on interdisciplinary research. The target audience includes virtually anyone interested in the teaching or learning of foreign languages.
The need for this book has never been greater. Virtually every day we see on TV, in magazines, on the Internet, or even in academia, ads for quick and easy foreign language proficiency. This false advertising serves only to mask our linguistic incompetence and interferes with much needed progress in the struggle for increasing foreign language acquisition.About the Author
William Jiraffales is the author?s pen name. He earned a Master of Arts degree in ESL and a Ph.D. in Spanish, both from U.S. research universities. He has taught English and Spanish for twenty years in a variety of educational settings in the U.S. and abroad, including seven years at a U.S. university, where, despite having been promoted to Associate Professor and having been awarded tenure, he resigned his position in protest of the administration?s pressure to maintain low academic standards. At press time he is happy to be teaching in an excellent high school.