The uncertainty of today’s job market and the bleak predictions of tomorrow’s job market have special emphasis for Black educators. Black institutions of higher learning, therefore, have an especial duty which has perhaps more importance today than ever before: we must prepare Black collegians in as many areas as possible so that they can offer to a potential employer more than others competing for the same position. Enter the foreign language course!
Akeem Williams (not his real name) decided not to wait until his senior year to get his papers in order at the placement center. In his junior year he petitioned professors for letters of recommendation, and he set up some “test” interviews (to get himself ready for the real thing, he said). In each of the “test” interviews he was told the same thing: acquire facility in one or more foreign languages. The college recruiters tipped him to the fact that the person who has knowledge of a foreign language has that advantage to his credentials, and that this advantage may determine who is ultimately hired or admitted.
Consider the scientist who has supplemented his training in science with intensive study in one or more languages. This individual could easily become a member of a team of specialists working with international organizations. A doctor with said study could practice medicine in any part of the world. A journalism graduate could look forward to assignments with foreign bureaus. A business graduate could look forward to a good-paying position with an export-import firm. I could go on and on.
The types of jobs requiring knowledge and skill in a foreign language include the area of travel and tourism with four main categories: hotel/motel (front desk, switchboard, reservationist, restaurants); airlines (steward/ess, pilot, ticket agent, ground host); tour conductor; travel agent. Also, other areas of service include law enforcement, travel companion, VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) volunteer, UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), World Health Organization, Peace Corps volunteer, missionary, and tutor. Additionally, there are the armed services, where knowledge of foreign languages helps you in working with ethnic trainees, overseas officers and enlisted men, advisory groups, missions, intelligence, and attachés. Finally, there are U.S. government uses for persons trained in foreign languages, such as government translator or interpreter, CIA specialist, U.S. travel service, immigration and customs inspectors, Radio Free Europe, foreign service officers, and the like.
The job applicant who has prepared him/herself only for his job preference cannot compete with the person who presents a broader preparation. Even a limited knowledge of a foreign language is extremely useful in many areas. The bottom line is this: for the person who has developed competencies in foreign languages, there are job opportunities in many fields.
Foreign language study liberates the mind. Study of a foreign language opens one’s eyes. More specifically, it opens one’s mind. The beginning learner discovers that the lips, the tongue, the organs of speech are not made to be moved in one way only, the American way of moving them to say the letters “r,” “s,” “j,” or the words “hello,” goodbye,” or any other sounds of the English language. The beginning learner discovers that the sounds that result when we move our lips this way, or that way, when we put the tongue here or there, are neither derisory nor unacceptable, and that aptness in habituating the speech organs to produce new and different sounds is praiseworthy.
The learner discovers that words naming such ordinary objects as a house or a loaf of bread refer to objects in different cultures quite unlike those he envisions; that speakers of English see a table as having a leg; the speaker of French sees its foot. A man has a leg and a foot, as does a dog or a cat; not so to the Spanish speaker who uses a completely different word for the leg of a man (pierna) and that of an animal (pata), the word for an animal’s leg including also the foot. Beginning with the first contact with a foreign language, students develop a new perception of reality. They begin to understand that what you experience determines what you can say, that what you can say limits what you think. Study of a foreign language enables the learner to escape the self-defeating provincialism, to look objectively at his world. Black students, through foreign language study, as by no other means, learn indelibly and irrefutably that minority status does not mean inferior, that different means neither better nor worse. Study of a foreign language can, as not other subject, develop self-confidence in the learner.
Finally, let me note that the benefits of knowing a second language include the following: children who receive early language instruction derive the benefits of improved overall school performance and superior problem-solving skills; students of foreign languages tend to score higher on standardized tests conducted in English. The 2003 results of the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) show that U. S. students who had studied a foreign language for 4 or more years outscored all other students on the verbal and math portions of the test (College Board, 2003).
Knowledge of a second language also seems to coincide with high academic achievement. A study in 2001 shows that students who were in “rigorous” programs in high school, which included 3 years of foreign language study, were likely to earn better grades in college and less likely to drop out.
Learning another language can enhance knowledge of English. Learning the vocabulary and structure of other languages can help learners to better understand the structure of English, and cognates can help with the learning of English words.
The benefits to society are many. Americans fluent in other languages improve global communication, enhance our economic competitiveness abroad, and maintain our political security.
Dr. Reginald A. Bess is the immediate past president of the College Language Association.
