Testimony for
The
Public Hearing on Chapter 4
Christian W. Hallstein, Ph.D.
Associate Teaching
Professor of German
Department of Modern Languages
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
What is the point of the State of
The answer is obvious. We certainly cannot justify such a thing.
But the study of a world language is not such a thing.
For the very reason that most of our students will never visit another country or need to speak a world language here at home, world language study should be required. School may be their only opportunity for exposure to a different culture and a different vehicle of human expression. To not require world language study in our schools would be to cut off most of our students from the only source they will likely ever have to see beyond themselves.
I will not rehearse here the many professional benefits of knowing a world language and a world culture at a time when globalization is moving at a breathtaking pace. Others will do that more persuasively than I can. Rather, I would like to focus on the crucial but sometimes overlooked personal dimensions of world language learning. In a world that is shrinking rapidly, it is not simply a nice idea to understand firsthand how people in another culture express themselves, how they think, what they value and how they organize their society. It is absolutely essential to be able to do so.
-over-
It is essential for our citizens to understand
people and places outside themselves. This not only promotes peaceful coexistence and reduces the fear and hatred that often accompany
ignorance, but it also helps us see how others see us. There is no better vehicle for achieving these goals than the study of a world
language and culture.
Acquiring these comparative perspectives also enhances one’s self-awareness. Goethe said that one doesn’t really know his own language until he knows another language. And the same can be said for one’s own culture.
To bring this concept home to my students at Carnegie Mellon, I have invented a little fairytale that illustrates the point.
There once was a little green man who lived in a little green house in an extraordinary land where everything was green. Day after day, year after year, the little green man was surrounded by a most glorious sea of green.
When wise men from the land of many colors heard of the little green man, they quickly set out for the little green house in the land of green in order that they might discover from the little green man the long hidden essence of “greenness.”
Upon arriving at the little green house, the wise men said to the little green man: “Sir, it is indeed as we have been told. You, your house and everything in your land is green. You are doubtless the world’s foremost authority on green. Please tell us, what is the essence of ‘greenness?’ ” To which the puzzled little man replied: “Green? What is green?”
The wise men returned to their multi-colored world in dismay, for they realized that the little green man from the glorious land of green, who had never beheld blue or red or yellow or brown, actually knew nothing at all about green.
My goal as a teacher of a world language
and culture is to help my students see the “blues,” the “reds” and the “yellows” of another language and culture so that they may
better understand the “green” of their own. If we fail to open this door to all of our students in
