Why should we learn and teach languages, and whose languages?

​

This initiative was born out of frustration with how the so-called "language industry" and educational institutions at all levels have promoted language-learning across borders. Instead of devising and advancing their own narratives for learning languages, some languages professionals have adopted the politicians' and security contractors' adage that language-teaching and -learning are handmaidens of national security. Others have fallen back on the neoliberal eat-your-vegetables approach, which champions language-learning for its cognitive, health, and market advantages to individuals.

 

Neither has benefited civic life, diverting funds and attention from the linguistic infrastructures that could serve society at large. And neither has done much to shore up language-learning and language-teaching in education. Departments and entire institutes continue to be shuttered or remain at the mercy of fickle political winds.
 

Touting languages under the banner of national interest pits school and university language programs against each other, often at the expense of Indigenous, minority, immigrant, and sign languages. Privatizing linguistic “assets” and “dividends,” for its part, mostly validates the multilingualism of the elites. Linguistic diversity suffers. As does the civic imagination: the stance that language-teaching and -learning benefit first and foremost the human bonds that strengthen neighborhoods and communities across dividing lines. These bonds are at the heart of a healthy democracy and a peaceful world.

​

To foster the civic imagination and the solidary narratives and practices that it affords, we are interested in forming broad alliances with language-learners, language rights and preservation activists, and language professionals from all walks of life. No change is too small. We have begun this work with reference to the U.S. and to college campuses in particular. However, the issue is not endemic to any one country or any one type of an institution. If you would like to collaborate or join the effort, please reach out by clicking on the next tab in this menu column or write to us at politicallang@gmail.com.