Malleability in World Language Departments: One Case Study

The study of foreign languages in the United States has experienced a significant decline over the past few decades. According to the Modern Language Association (MLA), enrollment in college-level foreign-language courses dropped 9.2 percent from 2013 to 2016.¹ The trend worsened between 2016 and 2021, which saw enrollment in language courses plummet an unprecedented 16.6 percent, the largest drop in the history of the census.² This decline far outstripped the general student enrollment decrease of 8 percent during the same period. World Languages programs have been left reeling.

In his article, “Robustness and Plasticity in Christian Higher Education,” blog contributor Dr. Clayton D. Carlson makes the argument that universities might find inspiration in biological science:

A recurring principle in biology is the balance between robustness and plasticity. Plasticity, or responsiveness, is a required trait of all biological entities from cells to ecosystems. Each system must have sufficient plasticity to respond to changes in the environment. At the same time, each system needs the robustness to maintain its identity in the face of change.

While often robust, higher education—I submit—could certainly learn something of biology’s plasticity. Professors are often resistant to change, committees slow to process, and curricular revisions cumbersome to accomplish. More often than not, we continue to do what we’ve always done: maintain the status quo.

The result, in World Languages, has been the loss of nearly 1000 foreign language departments since 2016.

In light of Dr. Carlson’s analogy, how might foreign language departments adapt or respond to the changes in the university ecosystem? How might we fill seats and enthuse students while still maintaining robust programs? The following, outlining efforts undertaken at my home institution of Whitworth, represents but one possibility.

From its height in 2009, our French major witnessed a slow decline. The trend was exacerbated by COVID: online instruction, the inability to study abroad, and the consequent deceleration of enthusiasm for the language and cultures. By 2023, we were unable to assure that courses above the (then general education required) first year language courses could reach the mandatory eight student minimum. In order to save the French major, it needed to be reconceived.

I proposed the creation of a new French and Francophone Studies major and minor. This included only a bare minimum of language courses. The remaining credits would be comprised of electives from the disciplines of English, history, art, and political science. These existing offerings were then supplemented by a handful of previously upper-division French courses that I translated into English, courses that could also satisfy other general education requirements. To ensure ample experience with the language as well as the cultural osmosis enacted by close exposure, majors would still be required to participate in a study abroad program or exchange. French and Francophone Studies became the first interdisciplinary major in Whitworth’s College of Arts and Sciences.

In addition to the required language course, then, students choose from an assortment of electives. They can earn credit for such English offerings as Arthurian Legends and the Story of the Grail (in which we read the romances of Chrétien de Troyes); Medieval Women Writers (which includes the writings of Marie de France and Christine de Pizan), Francophone African Literature and Film, French Cinema, French Women Writers, and the survey courses French Literature Before 1800 and French Literature After 1800. Students can take the following history offerings: French Culture and Civilization, Medieval Europe, and the French Revolution. Students can earn credit for the political science course, International Studies, the faculty led study abroad program, Art in France, and the newly-created and wildly popular, Food Culture in France, which I discussed in a previous post.

This is not at all the same language program in which I taught for 23 years. It is, instead, a patchwork program comprised of history and culture, literature and politics. I am, again, a novice instructor of a handful of new courses. And my “retired courses” folder contains 22 classes that I will likely never teach again. (Alas.) But—as of today—we have been able to maintain French on the books at Whitworth thanks to plasticity, a willingness to “respond to changes in the environment.”

Many programs might find such sweeping changes unnecessary. But we all should be responsive to this era of higher course caps. The “feedback loops” of biology described by Dr. Carlson evidence tightening enrollments and shrinking budgets. For an organism—for an institution—to survive, it must adapt.

And while such challenges are not exclusive to Christian institutions, the changes to my teaching load have generated some sacred fruit. Now conducting the vast majority of courses in English, I am better able to engage students in conversation about the Christian faith. How do the writings of Chrétien de Troyes reflect his faith commitments? How does Hildegard of Bingen articulate her theory of complementarianism—and what is your take on it? And why do you think that Christine de Pizan chose Mary, the mother of Jesus, to be the Queen of her City of Ladies? First and second and sometimes third year language courses in which students struggled with vocabulary and verb conjugations didn’t always lend themselves well to such weighty matters. It has been a blessing to be able to dig deeper—and more easily—into questions of faith with my students.

One final grace: these new offerings have also contributed to a shift in the direction of my scholarship—from language and cultural studies to literature and theology. I get to study literature and God? Yes, please!

This experience has certainly pruned away some of my pride, cultivated some needed humility, and engrafted me more securely to the wisdom of the Lord and his people. So perhaps, not unlike our journey toward Christ-likeness, malleability does have its rewards.