In case you hadn’t noticed, language programs around the country are disappearing. They are being—in the parlance of the decision-making bean-counters—#removed and #discontinued.
In Australia, Universities have started cutting languages with seeming linguicidal fervour:
After proposing to cut 5 languages, Sydney’s Macquarie University has relented and will only cut four: It will ‘“revitalise” its language offerings by jettisoning almost half of them’1
In November 2024, The University of Wollongong announced its plans ‘to axe all of its language teaching - Spanish, French, Japanese, Mandarin, plus English linguistics’2
Cost-cutting measures caused Swinburne to cut all language programs during the pandemic.3
La Trobe University and the University of Western Sydney have cut their Indonesian Language programs.4
According to the following survey, only Spanish and Arabic have seen an uptick in enrolments.
Other Universities are doing what they love to call ‘following best practice’, in other words following their lead and making their own cuts. Have you noticed the same thing happening where you are?
Of course, you may not have noticed because you were probably doing ‘better’ things with your time:
You’re following the job market and concentrating on studying disciplines where there’s a greater chance of getting a job (artifical intelligence, cybersecurity, health).
You ‘know’ that you can get by just speaking English anyway, cos, it’s like, the global language.
You’re sating any interest you might have in a language by gaming your experience with Duolingo. Beats studying.
And all of these are valid reasons.
The 2022 Australian Youth Barometer showed worrying trends with financial security a common concern.
There’s no avoiding the fact that English is often the language of diplomacy and international business; and the dominant language in Hollywood movies, many TV shows, books, technology, pop music and video games.
Duolingo’s success shows that language-learning is still popular. In the last decade there has been a considerable surge in new users of digital learning platforms.
To save you the trouble of reading the research article yourself, here’s the conclusion that we all knew was coming:
Our review has shown that, in the commercial app space, there is a predominant focus on teaching language as isolated vocabulary words rather than contextualized usage. Most use drill-like mechanisms and offer very little explanatory corrective feedback, and there is little adaptation to the needs of individual learners. Despite advances in language teaching that have stressed the importance of communicative competence in language learning, MALL technology is still primarily utilized for vocabulary instruction rather than fluency-building.5
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/macquarie-finalises-plan-halve-language-programmes#:~:text=%E2%80%9CBringing%20together%20disciplines%20focused%20on,from%20the%20US%20and%20Japan.&text=Macquarie's%20spokeswoman%20said%20the%20abolition,by%20the%20University%20of%20Wollongong.
https://www.illawarramercury.com.au/story/8815182/uow-to-cut-language-subjects-spanish-japanese-mandarin-french/#:~:text=Outcry%20as%20UOW%20set%20to,Spanish%2C%20French%2C%20Japanese%20and%20Mandarin&text=The%20University%20of%20Wollongong%20plans,if%20languages%20aren't%20available.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/languages-out-cybersecurity-in-the-degrees-universities-have-axed-20230430-p5d4g3.html#:~:text=Swinburne%20scrapped%20all%20foreign%20language,in%20higher%20education%20in%20decades.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/languages-out-cybersecurity-in-the-degrees-universities-have-axed-20230430-p5d4g3.html
https://polipapers.upv.es/index.php/eurocall/article/view/6402/7212