Foreign Languages

The Foreign Language GER promotes critical thinking through a variety of linguistic methodologies and through multicultural course content that require students to compare and contrast diverse linguistic and cultural systems. Our GER courses accomplish this goal through communication skills instruction that promotes self-knowledge as well as appreciation for the expressive modalities of diverse international populations.

Foreign Language GER Outcomes

I. Global Diversity, Linguistic Diversity, and Multiculturalism

Although the student body reflects the rich mix and diversity found in our larger community, students are often unaware of the multicultural and multinational nature of the world. It is crucial that our GER courses expose our students to the co-existence of many value systems.

GER Foreign Language courses promote mutual understanding and appreciation of otherness and difference through instruction about global and linguistic diversity and multicultural course content. We compare and contrast different aspects of Western and non-Western civilizations, such as Afro-Caribbean cultures, indigenous Latin American religious and cultural belief systems, European-Latin American-African relations, and Asian cultures. The multicultural content of Foreign Language GER courses serves to complement and support topics offered through courses in anthropology, art history, English, history, non-Western Civilization, literature, music, philosophy, political science, and such programs as Women's Studies and Latin American Studies. By enhancing student awareness of the ways in which language shapes cultural perceptions and is in turn shaped by culture, Foreign Language GER courses reinforce work in all departments offering GER courses. Complementarily, GER courses offered in the above disciplines provide essential foundations to courses taken in our majors and minors.

II. New Awareness of Home Language

Through contrastive analyses of both native tongue and target language, the FL GER promotes self-awareness and self-knowledge. Foreign language study not only introduces students to communication without English, but also illuminates the complexity of their own language. The FL GER fosters an appreciation of the vast variety of our international world, and encourages students to participate in that world by learning a second language because understanding a language leads to understanding that speaker's culture.
We believe, as stated in the current GER objectives, that the aim of the GER's in part is to introduce students to the ideal of life-long learning, where they come to see themselves as participators in a culture that is continually seeking to understand and make sense of human reality.

III. Communication Skills

With respect to communication skills, the goals of FL GER's are precisely to teach the four skills-- reading, writing, speaking, and comprehension-- in a foreign tongue. Furthermore, the ability to think critically, to evaluate and analyze linguistic and cultural differences, and varying philosophies about time, mood, and gender, are promoted by the FL GER. The FL GER also enhances organization of cognitive and grammatical reality through comparative use of grammatical terminology. New textbook and web-based activities promote these skills, as well as the student's ability to conduct research, and to locate and assimilate information.

We concur with current GER objectives that stress the need to improve student skills in such areas as critical thinking, writing, and speaking. FL GER's teach students to write and speak clearly and effectively, to locate and process information, and to solve problems.

IV. Civic Community

FL GER courses are intrinsically interactive, and thus promote communication skills and types of engagement that are essential to a civic community. This outcome is consonant with the current GER objectives relating to the workplace and civic life.

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