in establishing language-study centers
The Center for Language Study at Yale will host a colloquium on Saturday and Sunday, March 25 and 26, for administrators and language teachers at colleges and universities interested in establishing their own language centers.
The facilities that will be the focus of this conference are not to be confused with language labs, which are sometimes called language resource centers or language technology centers, explains Nina Garrett, director of the Center for Language Study at Yale. Instead, they are administrative units that coordinate and strengthen an institution's language programs, whether they are housed in traditional language/literature departments, area studies councils or linguistics departments.
Proposals for such centers are often controversial, notes Garrett, since the assumption tends to be that they separate language teaching from literature departments. But, in fact, this is seldom the case, she says.
Some language centers focus primarily on teacher training, either in technology or in pedagogy, she explains, while others function largely as the departmental home for less-commonly taught, small-enrollment languages not traditionally connected to literature departments. The centers may administer courses designed for special purposes or fields (e.g., German for business students, Spanish for medical students) or courses given at untraditional hours for continuing-education students, she notes.
In many cases, adds Garrett, a center's primary responsibility is to strengthen the institution's understanding of, and support for, language learning as a major component of an international curriculum and to improve the status and the resources of language teachers.
During the colloquium, the directors of the language centers of eight major universities -- Berkeley, Brigham Young, Brown, Columbia, University of Pennsylvania, Rice, Stanford and Yale -- will discuss the opportunities and challenges language centers present, describing their centers' very different mandates and infrastructures and exploring the implications for foreign language study at the post-secondary level.
A website comparing existing centers, with links to their various websites, will be available to registered participants before the colloquium,which is supported by a grant from the Consortium for Language Teaching and Learning.
The registration fee is $100 per person, and institutions are encouraged to send two representatives -- one administrator and one language faculty member. For further information, contact Nina Garrett at (203) 432-8196 or nina.garrett@yale.edu.
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