Mary Snell-Hornby,
still, I believe, a Professor of Translation Studies at the University of
Vienna, was a ‚Lektor’ when she
wrote this classic article about the status of English language teaching in
German universities. Twenty years after its publication I fear that the
situation it describes will still be very recognisable – and not only in
Germany.
There are some
short quotations in German in the text and some longer passages in the footnotes,
but I trust that does not make the article inaccessible to those who do not
read German.
I have taken the
trouble to tidy up this scanned version because statistics provided by the
server that carries my homepage show that large numbers of people visit my site
to read this article
Dennis Newson,
Osnabück , 7th. May, 2002
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally published in Neusprachliche
Mitteilungen, Heft 2/1982© Mary Snell-Hornby
English language courses
at German universities: Cinderella or Sleeping Beauty?
Among the Proceedings of
the 13th Linguistic Colloquium in Ghent (1978) there is a contribution with an
unusual title: "Cinderella, or: English language courses at German
universities", a survey of courses taught in the Summer Semester 1978,
followed by a critical evaluation. Having given such courses in the 1960s, I
studied the article for a possible comparison of notes, and was amazed to
discover that my pre-reform reminiscences corresponded closely to the reality
of ten years later: the same complaint about the students' lack of fluency; low
performance in oral skills, a high dropout rate in listening/speaking courses,
and the tacit appraisal of spoken English as 'unimportant''; students seized by
panic before the finals, and the general lack of a unified and well-defined
conception of language teaching. Of crucial interest is the reason given by the
author of the article, Konrad Sprengel, for this unsatisfactory situation.1
The
answer, I think, has to do with attitudes towards language teaching. It does
not bestow particular prestige, or a good image, on anyone to be occupied in practical language
courses: it is nothing to be proud of, it does not carry status, and therefore
this business is left to people in the lower ranks of the hierarchy, mostly
,,Lektoren". 'while the staff tend to consider language courses a
necessary evil (...), a great part of the students even seem to regard them as
unnecessary. Classes will only be attended consistently if they are obligatory
or exactly geared to examination requirements.
It is the word
"attitudes" that touches the nerve of the problem of university
language teaching in German-speaking countries, and precisely because attitudes
are difficult to analyse and elude objective verification, they are often taken
for granted and exempted from critical scrutiny. My aim here is to take a step
in counteracting this deficiency, and to discuss the status accorded to
language courses at German-speaking universities as against their potential
within the framework of university studies and their function for the future
professional lives of the students.
An important point in
Sprengel's article is made with reference to the data published by university
English departments in Finkenstaedt 1978, such data "being complete only
for courses in linguistics and literature, not for language courses". This
is not Finkenstaedt's fault, since he only co-ordinates the data provided by
departments; and some, or in fact most departments do not consider practical
language courses important enough to be honoured by mention (p.35). This
observation is squarely borne out by the information for the present Summer
Semester in Finkenstaedt 1981. The 43 universities providing for degrees in
English language and literature fall, as regards their data on language
courses, into four clear groups2:
(1) 8 departments provide the same detailed
information on language courses as on lectures and seminars3;
(2)
3 departments specify the different types of language courses, but without
indicating the number of hours involved and/or without naming the lecturers4;
(3)
14 departments simply indicate the number of hours taken up by language
courses, typically in a postscript of the type: ,,Sprachpraktische Übungen 50
Stunden” [language practice exercises 50 hours]
(4)
18 departments, one must assume from the data, have ,,Lektoren" but no
language courses.
In other
words, of these 43 university departments, 32 do not consider language courses
worthy of specific mention. There is surely no more eloquent proof needed of
the status accorded to English language courses at German universities.
The deeper reason for this
is of course traditional and historical. It lies in what Finkenstaedt
(1974: 26) euphemistically describes as ,,das unsichere Verhaeltnis der
deutschen Wissenschaft, vor allem der Philosophischen Fakultat zur Praxis, zu
allem, was direkt berufsbezogen ist und nur Fertigkeit, ,Handwerkliches' zu
sein scheint, dem Geist entgegengesetzt". And this is in my opinion the nucleus of the
entire malaise, the position of the term praktisch on the negative side
of a double dichotomy, as the antonym, not only of theoretisch, but also
- and this is the fatal thing - of wissenschafilich7. This
rigid dichotomization emerges clearly from the writings on the reform proposals
of around 1970, as for example in Standop's model, which divides a course of
studies into a Grundstufe consisting of the ,,sprachpraktische
Ausbildung" beside a ,,wissenschaftliche Sprachdidaktik" and
,,Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft", and a Hauptstudium that
offers a choice between a ,,didaktischen Studiengang" and a ,,neutralen
(rein-wissenschaftlichen) Studiengang" (Standop 1970: 116ff.). At the time
of course it was a welcome novelty for language teaching to be accorded any
serious interest at all, but in retrospect one must wonder whether labels like sprachpraktisch
(as against sprachwissenschaftlich), the correlation of language
study with language didactics (a discipline which, despite Standop's
classification, has spent much time fretting over whether or not it can be
called a Wissenschaft)8, and
above all the segregation, and even isolation of language teaching from the
rest of the course of studies, have not been rather harmful than salutary9.
The rigid distinction between praktisch and wissenschaftlich is
in fact arbitrarily drawn and artificially maintained. It is an academic construct
which paralyses any finer differentiation, a mere reflection of attitudes which
acts in solid confirmation of the Whorfian hypothesis. This assertion is not
new: Finkenstaedt (1974: 26) expresses similar views'0, and no less
a scholar than J. R. Firth formulated (with reference to phonetics) the
following caustic comment11:
I think the emphasis on "practical"
is a constant feature of the work of the English School, certainly during the
nineteenth century, and we do not take offence when Germans refer to our work
with pejorative intent, as ganz praktisch, because we know that when
they have borrowed its ideas, the result is wissenschaftlich.
If we study
the topics of lectures, seminars and wissenschaftliche Übungen included
in Finkenstaedt 1981, we see ample evidence for the theory that the concepts praktisch
and wissenschaftlich are not antonymous, but rather represent
complementary facets of an integrated whole. Many of the seminar topics in
particular are basically inseparable from material covered in
"practical" language courses. In Hanover, for example, there is a
Proseminar conducted by a German-speaking professor, with the title:
"Problems in German-English Translation". This is precisely what the
present writer has been concerned with over the past few years in a course with
the humble name "Translation (Intermediate)". In fact, the course
even goes as far as to deal with ,,Linguistische Probleme der Übersetzung"
(Pro-seminar in Paderborn). Similarly, there is a Hauptseminar in Duisburg with
the title "Cohesion and Coherence in Spoken and Written English
Discourse", a topic painfully relevant (as Halliday and Hasan themselves
point out in their book on the subject12) to composition and writing
courses, as well as to courses in conversation and discussion. This list could
be continued much further. In fact, the general picture of linguistic seminars
offered in Germany during the current semester shows a predominance of topics
(such as semantics and grammar) which are inseparable from the study of language
in its concrete realization. For example, there are no less than eight seminars
on tense and aspect13, a particularly tricky subject in English
grammar, and one which (as written Staatsexarnen papers show in
abundance) many future teachers have not understood even at the end of their
university studies.
The actual material covered
in the seminars and the "practical" language courses therefore
frequently coincides: the difference lies in the approach and the method of
teaching it. The "practical" language course will be based on
concrete phenomena, on texts, structures, on varied chosen topics, it is
empirical in approach and offers practice in the active use of the language.
The seminar will tend to be abstract in approach and will concentrate, not so
much on the concrete realisation of language as on the theories that have been
developed about it, on the writings of relevant linguists; hence it will depend
on a copious bibliography, while the "practical" course need not have
a bibliography at all. The seminar requires the writing of one lengthy paper
for that ambiguous process of Scheinerwerb; "practical"
language courses (at least those furthering writing skills) rather depend on
shorter weekly or fortnightly assignments. The seminar is based on a process of
intellectual analysis, the "practical" language course is
unfortunately often assumed to exist on untrained intuition. And the most basic
distinction of all: the seminar is about language (language
description), the "practical' language course provides training in the command
of language (language skills)'5. What seems to be overlooked is
the fact that between the two extremes of abstract theorising and mechanical
pattern practice there is an infinite variety of shading, whereby aspects of
theory and practice can be integrated. I am not suggesting that everything
should be taught at once, and I do not deny the need both for courses training
the active use of language and for seminars concentrating on furthering
academic research: but I would maintain that we are concerned, not with an
asymmetrical dichotomy, but with the problem of where to place the focus.
And in practice, ironically
enough, this insight already emerges from the academic programmes published by
German universities, as is mainly seen in the uncertainty and arbitrariness
with which "practical" topics are classified16. Cologne,
for example, includes a course in "Advanced Pronunciation: Reading Aloud
and Discussion of Texts" as well as ,,Übungen zur Staatsexamens Übersetzungsklausur"
(Finkenstaedt 1981), but no other language courses. May it be that the advanced
character of the two courses concerned qualifies them for entry into scholarly
society? The question is by no means irrelevant. It is bound up with a factor
that is consistently overlooked in discussions on university language teaching:
that its declared ultimate aim is "nearnativeness"17, and
the more closely a course tries to approach this ideal, the less it will be
concerned with the didactic methods of basic language teaching, and the more it
will be involved with the scientific study of language.
There is an abundance of
literature on teaching English as a foreign language (EFL), but it does not
normally focus on a level beyond that of the Cambridge Proficiency Examination18,
which, generally speaking, the university student should have reached at the Zwischenprufung.
And while research is far advanced on language acquisition (both of native
and foreign languages), very little attention has to my knowledge been devoted
to the cognitive and psychological process of "perfecting" language
competence; in fact, in the case of foreign languages, contrastive linguistics
has not yet progressed far enough to provide a basis for such study. In other
words, we are concerned with an area which probably few people know much about
except those engaged in teaching in it. This vacuum of knowledge has led to the
blurring of some important distinctions: while agreeing that university
departments should aim at the perfecting (Vervollkomnung) of language
competence to the level of near-nativeness (niuttersprachenänhliche
Beherrschung), reformers of the early 1970s still expressed themselves in
terms of ,,Sprachvermittlung" and ,,Fertigkeiten", whereby the
student is ,,rezeptiv" or ,,produktiv"19. This terminology
suggests that the student is largely a passive recipient, or that when he is
active, he is engaged in a purely mechanical process. I would rather maintain
that advanced language teaching begins at a stage when the four basic skills
have already merged into an overall competence, and that it is concerned, not
merely with ,,Vermittlung", but rather with a complex process of guided
activity involving constant revision and refinement, whereby the student is
required to be at the same time critical and creative. At all events it is a
process no less intellectual than that involved in acquiring academic skills,
and it can by no means be described as purely practical.20.
At present however near-nativeness
remains largely an illusion, although (supported by evidence produced below) I
would dispute the contention that it is a hopelessly unrealistic aim21. The language competence of the normal
student, especially in oral skills, is rather a direct product of his own
attitudes and the attitude of the universities. In both cases this is often
ambivalent and highly complicated: on the one hand the university still sees
itself as an ,,Ort der Wissenschaft" where "practical" language
work is peripheral and inferior, but on the other hand it makes the new student
aware that his language competence is inadequate. The student is soon overcome
by complexes and inhibitions, which however he can happily repress by
concentrating on his "real" studies (reinforced by time-pressure and
the interests of his academic teachers), whereby his language skills continue
to retrogress and his motivation to decrease; and, as Speight (1973: 21)
observes of PHs, the more help a student needs, the less likely he is to look for
it, for fear of showing how weak his English is. The next step is to dismiss
language skills as unimportant, and it is not far to the conclusion that
perfection is a hopeless aim anyway, so why not adjust one's expectations to
reality (Toth 1979)? This last argument is applied to language work only (for
academic papers the standards remain exacting and unchanged), and already there
is a suspiciously high tolerance threshold for language errors (whereby the
corrector of Staatsexamen papers cannot help wondering what would happen
to future doctors, for example, if they made as many basic errors as future
teachers do). The tendency is clear: if expectations are further adjusted to
reality, competence levels will only continue to spiral downwards.
The academic scorn for
language work is not limited to teacher training, and it is not irrelevant to
take our argument a stage further. Translating is an occupation subjected to
similar disdain, an attitude which can also be observed to extend generally to
language in its concrete realization, even in the writings of linguists
themselves. In other words, while language is respected in its function as
material for analysis and as a phenomenon for research, it meets with less
reverence as a concrete means of expression and communication. I am here not
only referring to the jargonistic fog through which linguists seem especially
prone to torturing themselves into expression, but more especially to the
disregard for idiom and other basic language principles found even in authoritative
writings on language24. That this can extend to conscious
indifference is shown in the following sentences introducing a collection of
essays on text-linguistics, which were written, mainly by non-native speakers,
in English25:
Responsibility for English style is with the
single authors, although I have introduced some corrections. But, in
distinction to other editors, I have not aimed at the task of complete
englishing. In the age of increasing computer-generated English texts and of
English becoming the major international language of linguistics, a volume
presumably written for a majority of non-English readers by a majority of
non-English authors does not need to contain only contributions in fully
idiomatic English, particularly because in certain countries it is rather
difficult to produce texts in such a perfect English (sic).
The
argument in the last few lines is hardly convincing: precisely because English
has come to be the lingua franca of linguistics, and in particular because linguistics
is concerned with extremely difficult subject-matter (which computers as yet
come nowhere near being able to express), the linguist may reasonably be
expected at least to take the trouble to achieve competence in English and to
express himself lucidly and idiomatically. Some of the essays in the collection
mentioned above indeed justify the warning made by the editor, and might earn
the very same comment frequently made of students' essays: they are literal
translations from the language of the author concerned, and the reader most
competent to unravel the meaning is the one who can first translate them back
into that language.
Here again we come up
against the familiar ambivalent attitude: on the one hand disdain for language
in its concrete realization, on the other capitulation in the face of the very
real difficulties which mastery of a language involves. At this point we may
ask if anything can be done about it. At the end of his article, Sprengel
suggests three concrete remedies for the grievances he has discussed:
1. An obligatory diagnostic test for all
beginners in English.
2.
A considerable increase in practical language courses; in particular, an
increase in listening/ speaking courses, and a regulation that makes them
obligatory.
3.
A changeover to English as the teaching language in all courses, seminars and
lectures.
(p.
354f.)
Already the horizon begins
to brighten, for a glance across the border into Swiss universities shows us
that there such remedies have long been in effect, except perhaps for a
regulation that makes listening/speaking courses obligatory, and that does not
appear to be necessary. After facing the same problems as those portrayed in
Sprengel's article, the English language teacher coming to a Swiss university
is struck by the high language competence of the students, although English is
in effect their third foreign language27, and most of them have had
only four years' English at school. This can of course be dismissed as a mere
subjective impression, but it is strong enough to invite empirical tests. Most
striking of all is the attitude of the Swiss students towards language
learning: they are in general highly motivated, and have a marked enthusiasm
above all for speaking foreign languages: English is the language used in
courses and many lectures and seminars (frequently even for writing seminar and
Lizentiat papers), while conversation with an English-speaking lecturer
naturally takes place in English - and in some cases one is hardly aware that
one is talking to a foreigner. This would indicate that near-nativeness is not
a hopelessly unrealistic ideal, but can be seen to represent a very high level
of language competence which, given intensive training and adequate motivation,
indeed lies within the reach of many university students.
With this basically
positive attitude towards the ultimate aim of near-nativeness. it is now easier
to make a few tentative suggestions as to how the ground might be prepared for
approaching it.
Firstly, the concept of
near-nativeness needs more precise and detailed definition than it has yet been
given28. The Saalbach proposals of 1969 are disappointing in this
respect, because in the long run they leave the criteria open29, and yet still name absolute ideals30; with such basic guidelines there is
small wonder that the concept of near-nativeness has been questioned. Moreover,
the experienced language teacher will notice that they leave serious
loop-holes; they leave room, for example, for what has been mentioned above as
a typical student failing: the habit of literal translation from the native
language, avoiding actual errors but yet ignoring the idiom and the structural
principles inherent in the foreign language.
Secondly, while one is
reluctant to add to the voices who try and put all the blame on the schools, a
glance in that direction is inevitable. I am referring to Sprengel's point that
the average German school-leaver "is sadly unable to speak the
language, to make himself understood". (p.353) This means that he arrives
at university, not only with handicaps difficult to remedy in an adult learner,
but worse still, with deeply rooted inhibitions which often prevent him from
even trying to develop oral skills. School teachers should be given more chance
to forget their fixation on error and put their marking books aside, and to let
their pupils express themselves freely in the foreign language on subjects of
their own choice, to experiment with the language without fear or inhibition,
and above all to enjoy doing so31; and here, as Finkenstaedt (1974:
33 f.) indicates, the most suitable teacher would be a young native speaker
assistant in the role still assumed to be occupied by the ,,Lektor" at
universities. In this way, the new student might at least be positively motivated,
with some enthusiasm for language and confidence in his own abilities.
Thirdly, university
language courses must be fully integrated into and coordinated with the
remaining academic programme32; they
should be given the same importance as the lecture or seminar, and the students
should be motivated to attend them - in the realization that here they will be
provided with the basic material crucial for their future profession.
University language teachers (mainly ,,Lektoren") must be given more scope
and responsibility in developing their sadly neglected field; and their
teaching load should leave them enough time to be able to do so. Such work
would involve both the vast amount of research there is to be done, and more
immediate concerns such as the development of a unified conception of language
teaching, from the initial remedial stage still necessary for the school-leaver
to the advanced stage approaching near-nativeness.
Finally, and most basic of
all: the universities must overcome their traditional prejudice against
language in its concrete realization as being a mere medium for expressing
"content", whereby the usage of language is ,,Handwerk", ,,dem
Geist entgegengesetzt". On the contrary, training in the subtleties of a
foreign language can be as intellectually challenging, as scientific and as
scholarly as training in literary criticism or theoretical linguistics. In
pleading for a change in attitudes towards language courses at the close of his
article, Sprengel uses similar arguments: "Language teaching must be
recognized for what it is: necessary, important, and just as prestigious as
research work done in linguistics or literature." (p.355) The adjective
"prestigious" represents the one point in his article with which I
would disagree: prestige comes from outside, irrespective of actual merit, and
it is something that has not yet been granted to university language courses -
but they are certainly worthy of it.
Notes
1 Cf.
Sprengel 1979: 352-354.
2 The list excludes PHs, also Bayreuth and Passau,
where relevant teaching posts are still vacant.
3 Aachen, Augsburg,
Berlin, Bielefeld, Oldenburg, Stuttgart, Tübingen, Wuppertal.
4 Bochum, Kassel,
Münster.
5 Braunschweig,
Darmstadt, Düsseldorf, Erlangen, Essen, Gießen, Göttingen, Hamburg, Heidelberg,
Kiel, Konstanz, Mannheim, Saarbrücken, Siegen.
6 Bamberg,
Bonn, Bremen, Cologne, Dortmund, Duisburg, Eichstatt, Frankfurt, Freiburg,
Hannover, Mainz, Marburg, Munich, Osnabrück, Paderborn, Regensburg, Trier,
Würzburg.
7 This division is pointed out explicitly by Leisi
(1974: 9), though with specific reference to the 195Os:
,,Damals litt die
kontinentale, zumal die deutschsprachige Anglistik, von wenigen Ausnahmen
abgesehen an einer Scheidung
zwischen historisch-wissenschaftlicher und gegenwartsbezogen-praktischer
Erschließung ihres Gegenstandes. An unseren Universitäten werderden
wissenschaftlich und durch wissenschaftliche Kräfte meist nur die älteren
Sprachstufen behandelt; das heutige Englisch überließ man den Lektoren. welche
gemäß ihrer Aufgabe nicht wissenschaftlich, sondern rein praktisch vorgingen.
So drohte der akademische Englischunterricht Weiterum zu zerfallen in einen
wissenschaftlich-unkpraktischen und einen praktisch-uzwissenschaftlichen Teil;
die vorhandene Literatur spiegelte diesen Bruch wider, indem sie zwar
vortreffliche geschichtliche Werke, aber fast nur auf einzelne Details
gerichtete oder unwissenschaftliche Gegenwartsdarstellungen anbot." With the growing interest in modern linguistics, scholarship is no
longer restricted to purely historical subjects, but the division into praktisch
and wissenschafilich has remained. Cf. Denninghaus/Bonnekamp 1970:151.
8 See Jungblut 1974, and cf.
Schröder (1973: 9ff.), who (in my opinion rightly) considers language
didactics an ,,,angewandte' Wissenschaft" (1973:11). Walter (1973: 55) gives a
remarkable account of the conflict that can arise from the division between Wissenschafi
and Praxis: ,,Als sich die Padagogischen Rochschulen den wissenschaftlichen
Status erkämpften, ergab sich jedoch hinsichtlich der Einstellung zur
Schulpraxis eine merkwürdige Verschiebung: wollte man als wissenschaftlich
anerkannt werden, so mußte man sich möglichst ,wissenschaftlich' gebärden, das
war man seinem Selbstverständnis schuldig. Die Niederungen der Praxis paßten
schlecht zum neuen Status. So konnte es auch vorkommen, daß bei
Berufungsverfahren an Pädagogischen Hochschulen einem jüngeren Bewerber mit
Promotion und Schulerfahrung ,Wissenschaftsferneß vorgeworfen wurde, und zwar
von Leuten, deren Praxisferne außer Studenten niemanden störte."
9 This problem was already envisaged before the
founding of language centres. Cf. Finkenstaedt 1970 a:
93 f. It is of course aggravated by other factors:
"The existing centres are frequently hampered by conflicts of delimitation
with the departments, which have grown, at some places, into wars of attrition.
The issue at stake is the centres' claim to a substantial research activity of
their own, beyond a mere service function in teaching." (Sprengel 1979:
353) See also Voiti 1970: 30.
10 die gegenwärtigen, vielfach
unfruchtbaren, Auseinandersetzungen um anwendungsbezogene Studiengange
gegenüber den forschungsbezogenen sind nur die vorläufig letzte Formulierung
des alten Problems, und ganz der deutschen Hochschultradition entsprechend
nimmt man weiterhin an, daß es sich um einen natürlichen Gegensatz handelt,
(...), nicht aber um die Pole eines Kontinuums." (emphasis added)
11 Firth 1957: 94 f., from "The English
School of Phonetics", in Transactions of the Philological Society,1946.
12 Halliday and Hasan 1976:1.
13 Aachen SESD, Berlin,
Düsseldorf, Freiburg, Hannover, Mainz, Marburg, Tübingen.
14 This also extends to
literary material: hence in the WS 80/81 the topic "Shakespeare
Interpretation" was in Konstanz graded as a Sprachübung (Finkenstaedt
1980); on the other hand, "The Savoy operas of Gilbert &
Sullivan" (Paderborn, SS 81), material particularly suited for language
analysis, was the subject of a Hauptseminar.
15 This distinction is expressed in various ways, as
e.g. Kennen and Können (Standop 1970:117).
16 On
the positive side, "practical" topics seem particularly well
integrated into the programme where there is an English-speaking professor or
AOR in the department; e.g. Osnabrück-Vechta, under ,,Veranstaltungen zur
englischen Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft": "English Grammar
I", held jointly by a professor and a Lektor. (SS 81)
17 As formulated in the Saalbach proposals of
September 1969 (see Finkenstaedt 1970 b: 111 and our comment below).
18 Most of the discussions
aiming beyond this level (e.g. Channell 1981) are concerned in some way with
problems of linguistics, and hence support our observation.
19 Cf. Standop 1972: 7. In
Standop’s discussion however, language teaching focuses on the Grundstudium.
20 Cf. Strevens
1977: 7
21 Cf. Toth 1979: 339: ,,Das
Idealziel einer jeden fremdsprachlichen Ausbildung wird auf diese Weise mit dem
Ausbildungsziel unter realistischen Ausbildungsumstanden und mit eninem
realistischen Berufsziel vermengt; mit ganz wenigen Ausnahmen wird es von
keinem Studierenden erreicht." Toth is however
referring to nativeness (as against near-nativeness), and he
bases his argument on the lack of a ,,sorgfaltig konzipierten und begrundeten
Kriterienkatalog". Cf. our comment on the Saalbach proposals.
22 It should be pointed out that the disdain for
language teaching is not limited to Germany; cf. Strevens 1977: 12: "For
two decades, language teachers have had their profession 'put down', either by
implication or directly, through invidious comparisons with linguistics and
psychology, disciplines which have undergone intense theoretical ferment during
the same period; in consequence, language teachers have often been made to feel
inferior to linguists and cognitive psychologists."
23 This emerges
clearly from a number of comments in Italiaander 1965, e.g.: ,,Aber warum halt
man das Übersetzen so oft für eine Beschäftigung, die nur an der Peripherie der
künstlerischen Sphäre kreist und gar an ihr parasitiert? (...) Woher kommt nun
diese bedauernswerte Übersetzerverachtung?" (Bösser
1965: 74)
24 Typical examples are often
English abstracts or summaries of dissertations, which may often be shown to a
native speaker, but at a stage when the sentences are fully formulated and the
structures are difficult to correct.
25 Dressier 1977: 4.
26 Lack of idiomatic expression even extends to the
overnominalized style of some English-speaking linguists, as has been taken
over from the technical language of the natural sciences and now forms the bulk
of linguists' jargon. It should however be pointed out that a nominalized style
is more suited to sciences focussing on concrete phenomena of the material
world, but less so for studies depending on argumentation.
27 Due to the special role of
dialect in German-speaking Switzerland (it is even the teaching language for
the first year at primary school), the first foreign language may be seen to be
Standard German, and French would then be the second.
28 It is based on proposals made by the Council of
Europe in Saalbach, Austria in September 1969, suggesting 5 criteria for
"near-nativeness"; see Finkenstaedt 1970b: 111.
28 As in 3. "A vocabulary adequate to
educated converse..." and 4. "A command of the formal and
colloquial registers." (emphasis added), whereby the words here underlined
are open to subjective interpretation.
30 As in 2. "Freedom from morphological
and syntactic errors in all classroom contexts and in writing." (emphasis added),
an ideal which seems far removed from present reality.
31 Cf. Speight (1973: 32):
"My favourite definition of good teaching has always been, 'a sharing of
enthusiasms'." Speight describes the motivating effect of "real
play" lessons on the pupils (1973: 37): "When we discussed the
reasons for this reaction afterwards, we decided that the children normally
kept the outside world and the world of school separate in their minds.
Actually being allowed to eat breakfast in school was a most exciting experience
for them." At the other end of the scale is Reuer's account of error
analysis (if versus when) as emerges from repetition drills based on the
sentence "He will be pleased if you can go to it" (referring to a
birthday party). (Heuer 1976:12 f.) The sentence is stilted and unrealistic for
children of that age (6th class), when the confusion of if and when is
minor compared to the loss of motivation risked in labouring it.
32 Judging from the data in Finkenstaedt 1981, a good
example of such integration seems to be Stuttgart. Cf. Prof. Ernst Leisi in an
interview with Zurich students: ,,Positiv gesagt suche ich immer noch nach
Möglichkeiten, die praktischen Sprachkurse der Lektoren und die
sprachwissenschaftlichen Vorlesungen der andern Dozenten starker aneinander
anzubinden'. Ich bemerke bei vielen Studenten, daß sie meinen, Englisch können
sie ja, und jetzt gehe es ihnen um die ’höhere’ Wissenschaft. In Wirklichkeit
hört man natürlich mit dem praktischen Sprachenlernen nie auf." (Anglisten-Kurier,
July 1979)
33 Cf. Finkenstaedt
1971: 53: ,,Wenn weiterhin das Englische in fast allen Schulen als erste
Fremdsprache gelehrt werden wird, dann ist damit bereits etwas über die
innerfachliche Struktur gesagt: Die Sprache muß im Mittelpunkt des Studiums
stehen. Sprache ist hier sowohl Gegenstand der Fertigkeit als auch Gegenstand
der Reflexion. Die Literatur ist in diesem System dann eine Erscheinungsform
der Sprache."
[ This article was scanned and the footnotes have been
a beast to proof read. I apologise for any mistakes that remain. D.J.N ]
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