Abstract
This paper argues for a place for linguistics within the UK Modern Languages curriculum as part of a more pluralistic approach to languages study. Based on an intervention involving over 300 A-level students of French, German and Spanish, we demonstrate: 1) that it is feasible and appropriate to include linguistics topics on the A-level Modern Foreign Languages (MFL) curriculum; 2) that many of these topics are inherently interesting for A-level language students; and 3) that pupils report increased confidence in their language skills after having been exposed to a short linguistics course (four hours). In light of our further finding that there is already considerable untapped scope for linguistics within the current formal framework of the A-level MFL qualification, we recommend that linguistics topics should be included in MFL A-levels as a matter of priority. This is the case not least because linguistics has the potential to attract new pupils to the study of MFL, while also providing a crucial bridge between language skills and cultural content, which are so often kept apart in existing MFL curricula. Lastly, we argue that the introduction of linguistics into languages teaching raises awareness of the harmfulness of deeply entrenched prescriptive and standard-language-ideological beliefs in schools, and this will lead to a more inclusive discipline.
Highlights
Inaccurate answers often amounted to a definition of linguistics as the study of or competence in foreign languages (7%), probably due to the inherent ambiguity of the word ‘linguist’ (e.g. “A linguist is someone who can speak more than one language”; “someone who is good at speaking a foreign language well”)
We began this paper by examining the field of “modern” languages—and what it means for students to study and learn them—in the UK context
Noting the so-called languages crisis and the favouring of language as instrument rather than language as discipline in UK schools’ curricular approaches to languages study, we have examined the viability of including linguistics as an element of Modern Foreign Languages (MFL) at Key Stage 5 (KS5), and argue in favour of the intellectual rewards of the interdisciplinary field of linguistics
Summary
The discipline of “modern” languages— referred to as “foreign” and, more recently, “world” languages—has long been noted to differ markedly from other academic disciplines. In the UK today, languages themselves are viewed as skills by both the general public and employers, creating a tension with the conceptualisation of the study of languages—under the guise of Modern Foreign Languages (MFL)—as an academic subject (Canning; Evans; Kenny).. In the UK today, languages themselves are viewed as skills by both the general public and employers, creating a tension with the conceptualisation of the study of languages—under the guise of Modern Foreign Languages (MFL)—as an academic subject (Canning; Evans; Kenny).1 Perhaps for this reason, the UK secondary school curriculum has become increasingly dedicated to the acquisition of core language skills (speaking, listening, reading and writing), while moving away from cultural content (see Pountain in “The Three Ls of Modern Foreign Languages” and “Modern Languages as an academic discipline”, who notes that the four skills go back at least as far as Sweet)..
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