The Double Responsibility of the Foreign-Language Teacher: Proficiency in the Language and Mastery of the Literature and Culture

Extract

It is with some misgiving that I consider the title of this address: all this in twenty minutes! The word responsibility too makes me a little nervous. I am one of those who, in our profession, find themselves handicapped in discussions concerning our aims, hopes, and interests, by the peculiar combination of pseudoscientific jargon and moralistic preachment which any allusion to methods seems to generate. Whoever fails to refer to “structured situations,” “feedback,” “triggered nonthoughtful responses,” “batteries of tests,” “standards” and “values” gives serious intimations of professional immorality. Nonetheless I should have preferred another word, privilege, strength, or even, yes, why not, pleasure. “No man can exist without pleasure,” said Aquinas, nor without it, it seems to me can he learn, mature, or teach well.