DOCUMENT RESUME ED 202 199 FL 012 119 AUTHOR Fishman,' A.; And Others - TITLE Non-EngliSh Language Resources of the United States (A Preliminary Return Visit). Final Report. INSTITUTION Yeshiva.Univ., New York, N.Y. Ferkauf Graduate School of Humanities 4na Social Sciences. SPONS AGENCY Office of International Education (ED), Washington, D.C. PUB DATE BO GRANT G007901816 - NOTE 249p.; Parts may not reproduce clearly due,to broken print. For related document, see ED 191 293. \N EDRS PRICE MF01/PC10 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS *Community Schools; Cultural Pluralism; lementary Secondary Education; *Ethnic Groups; Ethnography; 'Folk Schools; *Language Maintenance; Languasie-of Instruction; *Second Languages;. SociolinguisticS ABSTRACT A preliminary report is offered on schools that offer all or a greater part of their instruction in a language other than English. Emphasis is laid on instruction geared toward the language maintenance of ethnic communities. language reports include the approximate ritgbber of speakers and number, distribution, and basic characteristics of schools. Some detailed reports on ,individual schools-are included, along with a certain amount of more extensive statistical information. The language\ reports are supplemented by three essays:(1) "Cultural Pluraltsm\and the American School"; (2) "Whorfianism of the Third Kind: Ethnolinguistic Diversity as a Worldwide SOcietal Asset ";.and 43) "Why Do Some Ethnic Community Schools in the USA, Accomplish More than Others with Respect .to Ethnic Mother Tongue Instruction?"(j8) **************************14******************************************* * Reproductions supplied by EDRS,arr the best that can be made * * from the original document. * *********************************************************************** NON-ENGLISH LANGUAGE RESOURCES OF$THE UNITED STATES (A Preliminary Return Visit) Joshua A. Fishman, Ph.D. Yeshiva University New York Principal Investigator , . With the assistance of Maxine Diimond, AvroM Fishman, Dr. Michael Gertner, Esther G. Lowy, Barbara Markman, Dr. William Milgn, Judith Petardi and Ellen Rosenblatt Final Report to the Research Section, International Studies Branch, Department of Education, in connection with research supported under Grant G-00-79-01816 "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS U.S;DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH; MATERIAL- HAS BEEN GRANTED BY EDUCATION & WELFARE NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF EDUCATION - F141-, Nrs.1)-,Y1 S. THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRO- DUCED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED )'ROM THE PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIGIN- AT ING IT POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONS. STATED DO NOTNECESSARILY REPRE. SENT OFFICIAL NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES EDUCATION POSITION OR POLICY. INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)." 0. TABLE' OF CONTENTS Preface: It is Not Up to You to Finish theWork...(for) the Day is Short and the Task is Great Chapter 1:. Cultural Pluralism and the American School Chapter 2: Whorfianism of the Third Kind: Ethnglinguistic Diversity as a Worldwide Societal Asset Chapter 3: Non-English Language Resources of the United States: A Preliminary Reconnaissance (with Michael Gertner and Esther G. Lowy) Chapter 4: Language-Related Ethnic Community SChools in the USA;: A Catalog of School-in-Society Language Rlesobrces Chapter 5: Why Do Some Ethnic Community Schools in the USA Accomplish More than Others with Respect to-Ethnic Mother Tongue Instruction? (with Barbara Markman) PREFACE ."It is not up to you to finish thework...(for) the day is short and the task is great." (Sayings of the Fathers, Chapter 2, verses 20 and 211 In many respects much more has been. accomplishedin connection wit,b this Grant than.was anticipated. In some respects, however, cer- tain anticipated goals were not attained. It is my considered opinion that the former far outweigh. the latter and this Preface will attempt to present my-views in this connection, as well as some of myhopes for future research dealing with the non-English language resources of the United States My initial attempt to gauge the non=Englishlanguage Iresources of the United States was made some 20 years ago and is reported in my Language Loyalty in the United States (1966). At that time, although I was almost an unknown quantity and theentire area of exploration. dealing with'non- English language maintenance in the United States was generallyunappreciated, if not unheard of,I had the incredible good luck to be awarded a grant(and-, as fate would have it, to be awarded that grantby the direct predecessor agency* of the very agency that had, supported the research dealt within this report) to gauge "the.invisible continent" of the non-Englishlanguages of the country. I look back upon that attempt (now,retrospectively, referred to as Language Resources I) as a valiant effort to do theimpossible. *I-will never cease to acknowledge and to be everlastingly grateful to A. Bruce Gaarder, then Director of the Language ResearchSection of the Depart- ment of Health, Education and Welfare, for hiswillingness to ,"take a .chance" -on'me (as principal investigator) and forhis deep sympathy for the topic to be researched. His continued interest in this area - and not onlyin'reearch on it but in social policy and social action onbehalf of it - deserves special mention and makes him a model for others to emulate. I was unknown and my requestsfor information fell not only ondeaf ears, but also onsuspicious ears. In addition, it was not at-allclear how or where to obtain theinfOrmation that I sought on the magnitude of our non-English language resourcesas reflected by theperiodical press, radio broadcasting, ethnic /communityschools and ethnic community churches. Nevertheless, I succeeded in gatheringwhat seemed to be a 'huge amount of data of these fourkinds, as well as in systematizing United States Bureau of the Censusdata on non-English mother tongue claiming, and in doing so in historicalperspective; often going back to the beginning of the certury in order toshow trend lines. Now (1979-1980), on beinggiven "a rare opportunity to return to this topid And to update%our kno edge of the state of languagemain- tenance in the_USA, the entirecontext-of my efforts is appreciabledif- ferent than it was in 1960. First of all, NIE enabled me to spend a year (1978 - 1979)warming up for the currentendeavor via focusing solely On the ethnic community mothertongue'schools of the country (Language Resources II). Secondly, NSF has enabled me to gobeyond the current endeavor via content analyses (andlinguistic analyses) of interviews/ with community leaders and thepublished contents of ethnic community IV) it is hoped periodicals. Via these two probes (Language Resources that internal views of current andfuture prospects forlanguage main tenance in the USA will becomeclarified (at least for four ofthe six languages studied in depth in LanguageResources I: French, Spanish, German and Yiddish). However, the above additionalsupport is merely 3 symptomatic of the major differences between 1960-63 and 1979-82 insofar as studying the quantitativedimensions. of the non - English resources of the United States (Language Resources III)is concerned. The topic as such has much greater visibility and credibility now than it had/then; it is of interest to at least a goodhandful of researchers and granting agencies, as well as to a not-insignificant sector of the citizenryand of the legislative and executive branches of government. In addition, the nearly two decades that have elapsed between 1960-63 and 1979-80 have witnessed my own professional growth, precisely in this very area of endeavor, so that when I was given another-opportunity to gauge several of its quanititative dimensions, it was still a hugely. complicate. .charge, but ha y an unprecedented one. What data to seek, where to look for it and what volunteer aid to enlist were not onlyfar simpler tasks than they had been in the early 60's, but they were greeted with encouraging responses and truly heartening assistance from many of the very individuals, agencies, organizationsand communitieswithout whose active cooperation little if any exhaustive research could be accomplished on this topic. Looked at from one point of view, therefore, Language Resources III, herein being reported upon, has been a huge success. This success is reflected in the facts that more claimants of non-English ethnic commu- nity mother tongues and more non-English ethnic communityperiodical publications, broadcasts, churches and schools have been confirmed for 1979-1980 than were originally confirmed for 1960-63. The upward trend with respect to non-English'mcither tongue claiming per seis analyzed' in Chapter-3 of this report and seems to be reliablyattributable to the huge increase in the. rate of third generation(or native born. of native born parents) non-English mother tongue claiming asof 1970.*However, the .success of Language Resources IIIis primarily-reflected in the sharply in- creased numbers of units of the four kindswhoSe "discovery" was/strictly .speaking our own responsibility (ethnic community press,boradcasting, churches and schools using a language otherthan/in addition to English), units that neither government agencies nor privateagencies haVe been exhaustively locating. Nevertheless, this success has cost us heavily in our ability to examine certain substantive aspectsof these units that we had oriqinally agreed toexamine (particularly relative to their utility fot language teaching efforts under non-ethnicauspices at the eleMentary, secondary and post-secondary levels). The outpu.ring