a guest editorial: culture—a new frontier

A Guest Editorial: Culture-A New Frontier*

Nelson Brooks

DURING the past century foreign languages have been taught in American schools and colleges for a variety of reasons. Young men formerly took courses in He- brew and Greek in preparation for the ministry. Greek and Latin were studied in order to know classical literature and civilization at first hand, as well as to train the mind and to improve one’s English. When contemporary languages were introduced, it was understood that the ultimate goal was the reading of literary works-otherwise the learning of the skills had a merely func- tional purpose related to scientific studies, travel, commerce, or social prestige.

In the second half of the present century there has been a growing awareness of an additional dimension in foreign language study. Without denying the worth of for- mer purposes, we have come to realize that by learning to do with the foreign tongue what its native speakers do with it-that is, not merely dissect it and translate it but use it in its normal form-there opens up before us a wholly new way of understanding and appreciating the view of life held by another nation, and, along with this, a deeper insight into our own.

This realization lies at the core of what we call the Audiolingual Reform, which has consistently aimed at cultural understanding as one of its major concerns, the others being, as we know, language compe- tence and literary acquaintance. But just

* From an address given at the Convention of the Washington Association of Foreign Language Teachers, Tacoma, 20 March 1970.

what the cultural objective is and how to advance toward i t still perplexes us.

There appear to be two different ultimate sources of the patterns of thought and action, of belief and behavior according to which we lead our daily lives. One of these sources-and this I propose that we call Olympian-sheds its influence on the societal group from beyond and above. It speaks through the voice of the lawgiver and the prophet, the hero-statesman, the political leader, the founder of a great religion. The quality of this cultural influence, the high esteem in which it is held, the powerful effect it exerts and has exert- ed through the succeeding millenia of human history are unquestioned. Confucius, Hammurabi, Moses, Mahomet, and Bud- dha, and even in our own day Joseph Smith and Mahatma Gandhi, may all be cited as purveyors of Olympian culture.

It is to sources of this kind that Rent! Descartes refers in the second part of his Discourse on Method. He says: “I fancied that those nations which, starting from a semi-barbarous state, and advancing to civilization by slow degrees, have had their laws successively determined or forced upon them simply by experience of the hurtful- ness of particular cnimes and disputes, would by this process come to be possessed of less perfect institutions than those which, from the commencement of their association as communities, have followed the ap- pointments of some wise legislator. . . . The past preeminence of Sparta was not due to the goodness of each of its laws in particular, for many of these were very strange

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and even opposed to good morals, but to the circumstance that, originated by a single individual, they all tended to a single end. In the same way I thought that the sciences that are contained in books . . . composed as they are of the opinions of many different individuals massed together, are farther removed from truth than the simple inferences which a man of good sense using his natural and unprejudiced judgment draws respecting the matters of his experience.” The superiority that Des- cartes attributes to Olympian culture is clear.

A quite different view was held by a contemporary of Descartes, much less well known to us than he, an Italian named Giambattista Vico, and a man of great importance in the history of ideas. Vico stressed, in contrast, the source of culture patterning to which I am giving the name Hearthstone culture. Vico recognized the same two sources of cultural design as did Descartes: the insight of the inspired single individual on the one hand, and on the other the slow elaboration of values and practices that emerges from the activities of the social group reacting in its entirety.

Here are some sentences from Vico’s Au- tobiography, written in 1727. Vico, by the way, did not use the pronoun “I” in the story of his life, but refers to himself throughout in the third person. “Vico shows that the first stage and Lhe first language coincide with the time of the fami- lies, which certainly preceded the time of the cities among all nations and out of which it is agreed that cities arose . . . Then he shows that the second age and the second symbolic language coincide with the period of the first civil governments. These he shows were those of certain heroic kingdoms or ruling orders of nobles which the ancient Greeks called the Herculean races and held to be of divine origin. The first plebians, their subjects, on the other hand, were held to be of bestial origin . . . Finally he shows that the third age, that of common man and vernacular languages, co- incides with the times of the ideas of a hu-

man nature completely developed and hence recognized as identical in all men . . . The first law was divine, the second was heroic, and the third human, peculiar to human nature and recognized as alike in all men. Not until this last law already holds sway is it possible for philosophers to arise among nations and perfect it by reasoning from the maxims of an eternal justice.”

Vico did not come all by himself upon this idea of a culture and its civilization arising from the people. Max Fisch writes in his Introduction to Vico’s Autobiog- raphy as follows: “Grotius, Pufendorf, and above all Hobbes taught Vico further that the first founders of civil society were not philosophers filled with recondite wisdom as he had hitherto thought, but men-beasts devoid of culture or humanity who were guided by an obscure instinct of self-preser- vation that in time would draw them into social compact and lay the foundation stone of civilization.”

As you see, I am using the words Olym- pian and Hearthstone to designate these two different sources of what we today call a societal group’s culture. The word Olym- pian suggests heavenly origin and divine inspiration, Hearthstone suggests something primitive, intimate, elemental, close to the heart yet ancient and traditional, vulgar in the sense of universal, common in the sense of being indispensable in the emotional well-being of every creature that ever walked the earth and presumed to call himself a member of the human family. Whether or not an individual can eventu- ally aspire to an understanding of and participation in Olympian culture, the mold of Hearthstone culture has always been as necessary a factor in forming one’s emotional and intellectual career as is the art- ist’s brush in putting a picture on canvas or the potter’s finger in shaping a bowl of clay.

If this analysis is valid, and given the value system that obtains in America today, it is not hard to see why Olympian culture has a strong appeal for the humanists whereas it is Hearthstone culture that has invited sympathetic study and interpreta-

56 A Guest Editorial: Culture-A New Frontier

tion by the scientists. Now, what are we who teach foreign languages and who wish to give to cultural matters a central and meaningful place in our work to make of these two species of culture? First of all, must we choose between them? And, having chosen, must we feel obligated to discount, discredit, and denigrate the one that we have passed over? The likelihood of there being such a separation, choice, and rejec- tion is very real.

Ten years ago the Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, meeting in Atlantic City, New Jersey, de- voted its reports to the consideration of culture in language teaching. How far apart and how unmixable the two points of view were for those who addressed this conference was painfully apparent. More re- cently, Alvin Kernan, a professor of En- glish at Yale, writing just a few months ago in Ventures, a magazine published by the Yale Graduate School, speaks of “an extreme attitude toward the study of literature” that “is still buried deep in the literary curricula of most colleges and uni- versities.” He identifies this attitude thus: “. . . the Humanities are threatened . . . whenever it is assumed that an adequate account of their objects can be obtained by methods of research and interpretation bor- rowed from the natural or social sciences.” He continues: “Basically the hostility to scientific method and the subject-matter of the social sciences is as absolute as is the faith that the work of art, literature in- cluded, is both in origin and method a unique expression of ‘spirit,’ unrelated to and therefore unilluminated by any other aspect of life, human or natural . . . Litera- ture has become identified in the minds of many, both its supporters and its detractors, with finer feelings and loftier thoughts than are possible for ordinary men, . . . with a love for the past and a hatred for the present . . . with a carefully cultivated melan- choly about all things modern . . . and with an antiquarian desire to cultivate and re- cover the past simply because it is the past.” Kernan concludes with a quotation

from R. H. Tawney: “Culture is not an as- sortment of aesthetic sugar-plums for fas- tidious palates, but an energy of soul” whose standards of excellence “it is necessary to broaden and enrich by contact with an ever-widening range of emotional expe- riences and intellectual interests.”

Fortunately, we who teach languages are not required to make a selection between these two kinds of culture. Our work in its beginning phases is obviously dependent upon science, yet as the student advances to higher levels, it becomes related to and dependent upon the humanities. However, though we are spared making the choice, we have a professional obligation to be fully aware of the dual source of what we call culture, of the origin, character, and importance of each contributing element, and of incorporating both of them adequately into the work that we do.

I t does not seem to me that emphasis upon Olympian culture in our advanced language classes is at all difficult. Once we admit that literature and culture, though closely interwoven, are by no means the same thing, and that one is quite as important as the other, the rest follows easily. I t is much more challenging to deal with Hearthstone culture, first to recognize what it is, second, to assign to it the value that it merits, and third, to incorporate it into our programs of language instruction from the very beginning. Furthermore, we must not expect that acquaintance with Hearthstone culture will result merely from exposure to Olympian culture, no matter how generous and frequent the contacts may be.

Historically speaking, Olympian culture resulted in the deification of the arts and crafts and of natural phenomena. It resulted in the deification of such ruling factors in thought and feeling as fear and love. It resulted in the professionalization of religion, medicine, law, and war. One has only to recall the names and the attributes of the principal characters in the Greek Pan- theon to see how true this is.

But what does Olympian culture mean in the present day? When we read in news-

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papers and magazines of cultural exchanges between nations we usually find that what is referred to is the contents of museums, exhibits of pictures, and displays of statues. Referred to also are orchestras, musical en- sembles, theatrical productions, ballet dancing, lectures on literature and the arts. Olympian culture always seems ready for immediate export, and is composed of the kinds of things that a nation thinks of first in reply to the friendly invitation: “Please tell us what kind of people you are.”

What are the elements of Hearthstone culture that distinguish it from the Olym- pian? The first and most basic and all-per- vasive one is control of the native language, a group possession and an individual possession as unique and as deeply attached to the personality as the fingers are to the hand or the arms to the body. Next, there are the do’s and don’t’s of personal behavior, from life situations of the most mun- dane and trivial sort all the way to points of honor in personal conduct when one has become an adulit. There is also the pecking order, the giving way to others (with and without insistence), extending from the simple scenes of childhood to the highest refinement of manners in later life. There is the distinction one must learn to make between truth and falsehood, a discipline to be learned about keeping a promise, respect to be developed toward others and toward oneself, knowledge of how to work, how to save, how to play fair, how to win approval, how to maintain one’s emotional balance. We are not born with the knowledge of the two-table: this we must learn. Neither are we born with the knowledge of how to be honest; this, too, we must learn, as anyone who has brought u p or taught young children can testify.

This, then, is what comprises our new frontier: Hearthstone culture. It should oc- casion no surprise that this unexplored ter- ritory is not far to seek. In intensely personal and intimate matters this is frequently the case. Blood has been flowing through human veins for more than a million years, but it was only some three centuries ago

that a doctor, William Harvey, first discov- ered how this happens. The fact that Hearthstone culture is close at hand and readily available should not win for it a snobbish dismissal as something babyish and trivial. The only known way, so far, of becoming an adult is first to have been a child.

I t would appear that there are three pe- riods in an individual’s life when Hearth- stone culture is of central and sustained importance. The first, of course, is infancy and childhood, the time when culture puts its indelible stamp on every person. The second period is the time of marriage and the establishment of the new home. Now the individual again turns his attention to the problems of life’s beginnings, but as a parent rather than as a child, as a teacher rather than as a pupil. The final period of importance is retirement and old age, when for the third time the details of Hearthstone culture attract and retain the individual’s attention. At this point he is neither child nor parent, but for the most part a sympathetic and concerned observ- er whose privilege it is to reconstitute the profiles and dimensions of human life and make what he can of their meaning.

We could wish it were possible to identi- fy an optimum time to begin the study of a new language in formal education and start all our students at that point. We could then consider the maturity of the learner in connection with the content of what is to be learned. But since this Utopia is beyond our reach, it is probably best for us to think first of content, then adapt this as best we can to the chronological age and psycho- logical development of the learner, though we know that these will vary while content remains the same.

The obvious beginning point is the new language, viewed not only for itself but as a segment of and a bearer of culture. Lan- guage then takes on a new and virile tlimen- sion. This will be true, of course, only if our learners try to do with the new language what its native speakers do with it, which rarely means to take it apart, analyze


it, set up rules for its operation, and even translate it into some other tongue. Rather, it means to use it, with little thought of itself as an intricate system, but with concern instead for the message which the language bears. Up to now, we have in our language classes considered language chiefly linguistically and philologically. As we advance into the new frontier we must also learn to treat language culturally, and we shall quickly find that this is by no means the same thing. Consider these examples. Lin- guistically, the difference between the expressions “I’d better shut up” and “You’d better shut up” is a shift in the subject pronoun from the first person singular to the second person plural. But culturally the first expression is an apology and the second is an insult. Or compare these two expressions: “Do you love me?” and “Lovest thou me?” Looked at linguistically, even philologically, these present little more than an interesting contrast in interroga- tion and a shift from plural to singular, with a flavor of the archaic. But considered culturally, one is an intimate personal question and the other sounds like the voice of God.

After language proper come the basic life situations in which the ego of the individual and the ethos of the surrounding society interact. Generally speaking, human beings come in two different models, Model A- Masculine, and Model B-Feminine. Awareness of this difference manifests itself at the age of three or four, and it deep- ens as the years go by. Consider what this difference means culturally. It means little in terms of what we eat, or the kind of houses we live in, or the books we read and the music we enjoy. But what a difference there is in terms of what we wear, what organizations we can belong to, the careers that are open to us, and the language forms we must or must not use according to whether we are Model A or Model B. You cannot say of your brother’s car: “That’s hers.” And no French woman can ever say that she is “franqais.”

When we look for the impact of culture

on language, we find i t not only in matters of gender, which affect nouns, pronouns, adjectives, sometimes even verbs. We find it also in distinctions in personal address which we may call intimate or polite. We find it in the titles we use in addressing people in speech or writing. We find it in the style of language we use according to the situation in which we are, the relation- ship between the people involved, and the emotional tone of what is exchanged between them. How does a mother speak to a naughty child? How does a son who is away from home ask his father for more money? How does a salesman make his pitch in a television commercial? How does a student explain to his teacher why he has not done his assignment or why he is late to class? Once we have begun to see things culturally we find new dimensions of meaning and of interest in the stories we read and in the situations we observe. And not only this, but also a different coloring, a new justification in the quirks and configurations of the new language that our students must learn.

What will be the most productive situations for us to study as we start to develop our notion of Hearthstone culture into ma- terials usable for instruction in the class- room? These are, I think, the family table, the schoolroom, the playground, the church school, homework, chores, letters, games, parties, parades, and holidays. What is said, thought, and done at these times, if authentically represented, cannot fail to il- luminate what I have called the “-ness” of the individual person and of the social group: the Frenchness of the French, the Germanness of the Germans, the Spanish- ness of the Spanish-speaking people, the Rus- sionness of the Russians. “The family,” writes John Leonard in the New York Times, “is the beginning of culture. The first dependency and the first commitment, the initiation into consequences, the prototype of subsequent complications, responsibili- ties, ways of coping and forms of expression.”

But we must speak not only of beginnings. A curriculum worthy of the name

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has a solid and discernible structure or framework upon which its various details and integrated parts are arrayed, and a continuity that leads to desired ends. Can we see the totality of our language courses in these terms and still respect the obliga- tions implied in our three objectives? I believe we can, and that the model to be en- visaged is that of the triple helix-a barber pole entwined with three bands of color, each maintaining its identity while pro- ceeding upward parallel to the others. Along with the dialogues of Level I, taking the dialogue as a norm of spoken communi- cation, we need to have scenarios to ac- company the verbal part of what is to be learned. The nonlinguistic accompaniment indicates where people are, the manner in which they speak, the gestures that go with what they say, the “properties” that may be brought into play as the exchange progresses -in a word the stage directions that will expand the dialogue into something not only symbolic but enactive as well. Our students can learn about culture not only by listening to the teacher, by reading, and by looking at pictures, but also by themselves going through motions, gestures, intona- tions, and facial expressions appropriate to the situation and the language being exchanged .

In Level I1 we may speak of “Close-ups of Thought and Action.” Two types of ma- terials suggest themselves. In the first we may turn to proverbs and sayings, known and used by everyone and representative and important in the culture being studied. We can all think of many of these. For example: “It’s an ill wind that blows no- body good,” or “Like father, like son,” or “There’s no use crying over spilt milk,” or “One must not be more royalist than the king.” These are of unknown origin, while others, well worth memorizing, such as: “A little learning is a dangerous thing,” or “The mass of men lead lives of quiet des- peration” can be attributed to their au- thors. The point is that the equivalent of sayings such as these are interesting linguistically and when looked at culturally

can be seen to reflect an observant wisdom that is at times unique to a given culture and at other times shows a penetrating insight into the human predicament that is valid everywhere. References to the flood and to the tower of Babel apparently occur in all cultures, but “Ladies first” is by no means a universal formula.

The second part of “Close-ups of Thought and Action” might be composed of pictures and paragraphs setting forth characteristic and typical situations not unlike those chosen for dialogue practice but now more ample, more varied, and approached culturally, in a way that involves not only participation but also questions, criticisms, evaluation, and com- parison with the home culture.

For the third level we may adopt the title: “Anatomy of Culture-A Candid View.” In what is now selected for cultural comment and study there can be a dimension of honest realism that integrity demands and that our students will welcome. If there is a report of an accident in the streets, let there be an ambulance and a stretcher. If we have a description of dueling among students, let the blood flow, as it does in Mark Twain’s remarkable report of dueling in Germany in A Trump Abroad. The fact that life has a seamy side is something faced up to by our students more readily and courageously than by our- selves. Seeing things culturally demands some reference to the regrettable and the tragic in order that the desirable and the refined may be better understood and ap- preciated.

In Level IV we might use the title: “Syn- thesis-the Wholeness of Culture.” What is now read, discussed, and written about should reflect the realization that the various elements and segments of culture must be related to a totality in order to be fully ex- plained and comprehended. In the cultures we study, life is highly organized. Individu- al acts, such as getting a driver’s license, or receiving an academic degree, or paying one’s taxes, or voting for a political candi- date, all have a way of relating individual


desires, abilities, and points of view to sys- tems, codes, and organizations that are intricate and demanding, and require study in depth to understand why people do what they do.

At some point in our sequence of levels, probably between the second and the third, we ought )to demonstrate to our students the manner in which we are proceed- ing in our cultural studies and the reasons why. One way to do this-and of course there are many-would be to make use of a book such as Pitcairn’s Island (the third volume of the Bounty Trilogy by Nordhoff and Hall). The books literary qualities are mini- mal, yet when looked at culturally we find that i t is quite an astonishing piece. I t is the story of what happened during a period of some two decades starting at the time of the French Revolution when two different cultures, English and Polynesian, were mixed on a tiny island in the south Pacific. A great many of the most important elements of Hearthstone culture are there for study and comment: languages, religion, property, marriage, friendship, alcohol, in- fidelity, suicide, slavery, murder, high- mindedness, motherhood, education, the battle of the sexes, morality, honor, nobil- ity. The story is largely true, and the des- cendants of these mutinous settlers are to be found there today.

But we do not have to go all the way to the South Sea Islands to find ready evi- dence of Hearthstone culture. A recent story that may be examined culturally is the Double Helix by James Watson, published two years ago. Recalling our list of essential items in Hearthstone culture, in what way do we find them represented in this candid and exciting tale? There is the chill of living quarters in the British home, there is the uninspired character of British food, there are many parties, gay and gloomy. Frequently mentioned are hair- cuts, accents, and speech mannerisms. Let- ters to colleagues and letters home play an important part. A brother-sister relation- ship of deep affection is frequently noted. There is no reference to religion, but a

profound faith in pure science is often as- serted, along with an occasional depreca- tory remark about the humanities. There is a constant concern about fair play, which obtrudes bluntly on the very first page. Throughout, interwoven with the story of Rosalind Franklin, there echoes the question, unanswered until the epilogue: Are women people?

You may wonder why I have gone to such lengths to explore the possible origins of the cultural matters we wish to intro- duce into our language courses. Why should I quote Descartes and Vico in order to justify instruction in how one addresses a teacher or how one keeps an appoint- ment? The answer is quite simple. I believe that we who are language teachers have a rich heritage and an assignment of trust. I believe that we need not only to improve the quality and efficiency of our work but also to dignify the discipline we profess. I believe that we shall not do this merely by listening to and then trying to follow the advice offered us by neighboring disciplines such as linguistics and psychology. We have been told with admirable candor by the linguist Noam Chomsky and by the psychologist Wallace Lambert that their re- spective disciplines are themselves far too unsettled and uncertain in their own basic positions to offer advice to language teachers that can be accepted uncritically. Our business is to do our own thinking, to work out our own theories and hypotheses, then apply them as best we can in a field of human behavior that offers as great a chal- lenge to talent and skill as any that can be found. There have been many criticisms of our efforts to improve language instruction during the past decade. We are accused by some of overemphasizing the refinements of phonology and by others of selling our soul to the diabolus of the Skinner box. I believe that our best answer to these irri- tations is to ignore them, and at the same time continue our search for an understanding of what a language is and what it means, and how we may teach the beginnings of a new language to learners who

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must for the time being remain in their mother culture. Learning to see things culturally can be one of the best possible end products of our language courses, and it can be a part of the learner’s experience from the very beginning. But in order for this to happen, the language teacher must first learn to see things culturally himself.

All that is meant by the English word “culture” is, in a way, as varied, expansive, and inclusive as a rose window in a Gothic cathedral. We do not forget that there is a grand design to which all parts are related.

But certain interwoven themes, especially the personal and intimate factors, have so far not been clearly perceived, and we have therefore not been able to include them satisfactorily in the early phases of our language course. As we attempt to examine these elements more closely under the ru- bric of Hearthstone culture, we are constant- ly mindful of the grand design. Rather than denying or minimizing the importance of any other areas, we reaffirm our respect for the totality that is signified by this remarkable word, culture.

a guest editorial: culture—a new frontier

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