This blog on Texas education contains posts on accountability, testing, K-12 education, postsecondary educational attainment, dropouts, bilingual education, immigration, school finance, environmental issues, Ethnic Studies at state and national levels. It also represents my digital footprint, of life and career, as a community-engaged scholar in the College of Education at the University of Texas at Austin.
Well, of course! Here's a great piece that suggests why language learning can and should be integral to Ethnic Studies. It helps promote the same positive outcomes.
Associate Professor of Applied Linguistics, University of South Florida
Disclosure statement
Amy Thompson does not work for, consult, own shares in
or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit
from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the
academic appointment above.
There are many benefits to knowing more than one language. For example, it has been shown that aging adults who speak more than one language have less likelihood of developing dementia.
Additionally, the bilingual brain becomes better at filtering out distractions, and learning multiple languages improves creativity. Evidence also shows that learning subsequent languages is easier than learning the first foreign language.
Unfortunately, not all American universities consider learning foreign languages a worthwhile investment.
Why is foreign language study important at the university level?
As an applied linguist,
I study how learning multiple languages can have cognitive and
emotional benefits. One of these benefits that’s not obvious is that
language learning improves tolerance.
This happens in two important ways.
The first is that it opens people’s eyes to a way of doing things in a
way that’s different from their own, which is called “cultural
competence.”
The second is related to the comfort level of a person when dealing with unfamiliar situations, or “tolerance of ambiguity.”
Gaining cross-cultural understanding
Cultural competence is key to thriving in our increasingly globalized
world. How specifically does language learning improve cultural
competence? The answer can be illuminated by examining different types
of intelligence.
Psychologist Robert Sternberg’sresearch on intelligence
describes different types of intelligence and how they are related to
adult language learning. What he refers to as “practical intelligence”
is similar to social intelligence in that it helps individuals learn
nonexplicit information from their environments, including meaningful
gestures or other social cues. Learning a foreign language reduces social anxiety.COD Newsroom, CC BY
Language learning inevitably involves learning about different
cultures. Students pick up clues about the culture both in language
classes and through meaningful immersion experiences.
Researchers Hanh Thi Nguyen and Guy Kellogg have shown that when students learn another language, they develop new ways of understanding culture through analyzing cultural stereotypes.
They explain that “learning a second language involves the acquisition
not only of linguistic forms but also ways of thinking and behaving.”
With the help of an instructor, students can critically think about
stereotypes of different cultures related to food, appearance and
conversation styles.
Dealing with the unknown
The second way that adult language learning increases tolerance is
related to the comfort level of a person when dealing with “tolerance of
ambiguity.”
Someone with a high tolerance of ambiguity finds unfamiliar situations exciting, rather than frightening. My research on motivation, anxiety and beliefs
indicates that language learning improves people’s tolerance of
ambiguity, especially when more than one foreign language is involved.
It’s not difficult to see why this may be so. Conversations in a
foreign language will inevitably involve unknown words. It wouldn’t be a
successful conversation if one of the speakers constantly stopped to
say, “Hang on – I don’t know that word. Let me look it up in the
dictionary.” Those with a high tolerance of ambiguity would feel
comfortable maintaining the conversation despite the unfamiliar words
involved.
Applied linguists Jean-Marc Dewaele and Li Wei
also study tolerance of ambiguity and have indicated that those with
experience learning more than one foreign language in an instructed
setting have more tolerance of ambiguity.
What changes with this understanding
A high tolerance of ambiguity brings many advantages. It helps students become less anxious in social interactions and in subsequent language learning experiences. Not surprisingly, the more experience a person has with language learning, the more comfortable the person gets with this ambiguity.
And that’s not all.
Individuals with higher levels of tolerance of ambiguity have also been found to be more entrepreneurial (i.e., are more optimistic, innovative and don’t mind taking risks).
In the current climate, universities are frequently being judged by the salaries of their graduates.
Taking it one step further, based on the relationship of tolerance of
ambiguity and entrepreneurial intention, increased tolerance of
ambiguity could lead to higher salaries
for graduates, which in turn, I believe, could help increase funding
for those universities that require foreign language study.
Those who have devoted their lives to theorizing about and the teaching of languages would say, “It’s not about the money.” But perhaps it is.
Language learning in higher ed
Most American universities have a minimal language requirement that
often varies depending on the student’s major. However, students can
typically opt out of the requirement by taking a placement test or
providing some other proof of competency. Why more universities should teach a foreign language.sarspri, CC BY-NC
In contrast to this trend, Princeton recently announced that all students, regardless of their competency when entering the university, would be required to study an additional language.
I’d argue that more universities should follow Princeton’s lead, as
language study at the university level could lead to an increased
tolerance of the different cultural norms represented in American
society, which is desperately needed in the current political climate
with the wave of hate crimes sweeping university campuses nationwide.
Knowledge of different languages is crucial to becoming global citizens. As former Secretary of Education Arne Duncan noted,
“Our country needs to create a future in which all Americans
understand that by speaking more than one language, they are enabling
our country to compete successfully and work collaboratively with
partners across the globe.”
Considering the evidence that studying languages as adults increases
tolerance in two important ways, the question shouldn’t be “Why should
universities require foreign language study?” but rather “Why in the
world wouldn’t they?”
There are many ways to overcome tolerance but learning languages is something new if you have any case studies please do share with us at http://www.makariosschool.com/ we are very much interested init.
There are many ways to overcome tolerance but learning languages is something new if you have any case studies please do share with us at http://www.makariosschool.com/ we are very much interested init.
ReplyDeleteWill let you know if I come across anything. Hopefully, others will see your query and post suggestions, as well.
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