The Writings of Harold E. Palmer An Overview Richard C. Smith Hon-no-Tomosha 1999 Published by Hon-no-Tomosha Publishers Minami-Aoyama 7-10-3 Minato-ku, 107 Tokyo Japan Copyright Richard C. Smith First published 1999 as a companion volume to The Selected Writings of Harold E. Palmer, ed. IRLT, Tokyo: Hon-no-Tomosha, 2nd edition, 1999. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the author. Contents Acknowledgments vi Foreword by A. P. R. Howatt vii SynopsisofHaroldE.Palmer’slife, career and major publications x List of photographs xii Introduction 1 Why Palmer? . 1 / Previous Palmer studies . 4 / Scope of the present study . 14 / Notes . 17 / Bibliographical considerations . 18 1 Early years (1877–1901) 21 (1877Ð92) . 22 / (1892Ð7) . 24 / (1897Ð1901) . 26 / Notes . 29 2 Verviers (1902–14) 31 (1902Ð3) . 32 / (1904) . 33 / (1905Ð6). 35 / (1907) . 38 / (1908Ð10) . 42 / (1911) . 45 / (1912) . 46 / (1913) . 47 / (1914) . 49 / Notes . 51 3 London (1915–22) 55 (1915) . 56 / (1916) . 57 / (1917) . 59 / (1918Ð20) . 61 / (1921). 63 / (1922) . 64 / Notes . 67 4 Tokyo I (1922–7) 69 (1922 contd.) . 70 / (1923) . 72 / (1924) . 78 / (1925) . 83 / (1926) . 88 / (1927) . 94 / Notes . 101 5 Tokyo II (1928–36) 105 (1928) . 106 / (1929) . 112 / (1930) . 115 / (1931) . 119 / (1932) . 124 / (1933) . 131 / (1934) . 135 / (1935) . 142 / (1936) . 146 / Notes . 149 6 Felbridge (1936–49) 155 (1936 contd.) . 156 / (1937) . 156 / (1938) . 159 / (1939) . 162 / (1940) . 164 / (1941Ð2) . 168 / (1943) . 170 / (1944) . 172 / (1945Ð6) . 173 / (1947) . 176 / (1948Ð9) . 177 / Posthumous publications . 179 / Notes . 179 Appendix(Japaneseworksin‘SelectedWritings’) 183 References 207 Acknowledgments I am very grateful to Victoria Angela for her generous permission to examinepapersrelatingtohergreat-grandfather’slifeandcareerandto reproduce the photographs listed on p. xii, to Denise Rayner (Hythe CivicSociety)forinformationonPalmer’searlyyears,andtoPaul Bertholet(SociétéVerviétoised’archéologieetd’histoire)fordetail relatingtoPalmer’sworkinVerviers.MydebttoJapanesescholars,in particular Imura Motomichi and Ozasa Toshiaki, for information on Palmer’sworkinJapanisacknowledgedinthetextbutdeservesa special mention here. I am grateful also to my colleagues at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies for enabling me to take sabbatical leave during 1998Ð9 and so complete the research for this study. I would also like especially to thank Tony Howatt and Imura Motomichi for their encouragement of and feedback on my research, and to express my appreciation for their interest to Beverley Collins, Tony Cowie, John Joseph, Paul Meara, John Trim, Wakabayashi Shunsuke and Ron White. To Inoue Reiko, Umino Tae and Wada Tomoko go my thanks for invaluable assistance in interpreting documents in Japanese; I also appreciate the editorial advice and assistance provided by Ishimura Takeshi and Rudy Smet of Hon-no-Tomosha. Any errors, omissions or misunderstandings remain my own, and I would be very grateful for these to be pointed out to me so that I can incorporate corrections into future work. Please contact me via email at: [email protected] or [email protected]. Richard C. Smith Tokyo University of Foreign Studies Japan Foreword Harold E. Palmer did more than any other single individual to establish English language teaching (ELT) as an autonomous branch of language education in the first half of the twentieth century and to give it the ‘appliedlinguistic’directiontowhichithasremainedloyaleversince. The main aim in publishing his Selected Writings (IRLT 1995/1999) and this accompanying volume is to preserve this legacy and to ensure that it is available for study by future generations. The importance of identifying roots and sources in Êfostering a strong sense of professionalism Ð in this case among language teachers worldwide Ð cannot be overstated. Palmer was a prolific writer but one or two of his works stand out as being of special significance. The first would have to be The Scientific Study and Teaching of Languages (1917), which offered a theoretically motivated but eminently practical model of language teaching drawn from many years of personal experience. Secondly there was his Principles of Language-Study (1921), which successfully married the needs of the language classroom to principles of learning theory derived from contemporarypsychology.Inaddition,weshouldmentionPalmer’s great work of linguistic description A Grammar of Spoken English (1924), which applied his research and that of former colleagues at London University (in particular Daniel Jones) to pedagogical needs, and finally his most influential practical teaching manual English through Actions (1925), which gave English teachers workable activities and exercises to developtheirpupils’oralproficiency. The emphasis in all these works is on the teaching of the spoken language,reflectingthe‘paradigmshift’intwentiethcenturylinguistics viii away from studying the written language (especially in the context of ‘greatliterature’)andtowardsresearchandteachingbasedonthe everyday speech of ordinary people. This speaking/writing contrast was importantinPalmer’sownwork,butheextendedtheargumentmuch further by pointing to a fundamental distinction between (a) learning to speakaforeignlanguagebyusingwhathecalled‘spontaneous’ language acquisition capacities, and (b) learning foreign language literacyskillsthroughtheuseof‘studial’capacitiesdevelopedthrough formal education. This distinction has been echoed in recent times by the (narrower)‘acquisition’/’learning’distinctiondevelopedintheUSA. Another Palmerian idea born before its time, so to speak, was the use of graded listening tasks in the early stages of language learning (‘imperativedrill’wasPalmer’sterm–TotalPhysicalResponse(TPR),as developed in the late 1960s, involves very similar procedures). Palmer’scontributiontoELTconsistedofmuchmorethanafew isolated ideas. With his detailed and theory-based models of syllabus and course design and his principled but practical approach to classroom methodology, he laid the essential groundwork on which the profession could build a strong and flexible structure. InamorenarrowlyappliedlinguisticconnectionPalmer’sbest-known work was in the field of lexicology, and the research he undertook at the Tokyo Institute for Research in English Teaching (IRET) in the 1920s and 30s eventually bore fruit in major publications which appeared in the UK after World War II, often completed by other writers. For example, there was the General Service List of English Words (Longman, 1953, edited by Michael West) and successive editions of the (Advanced)Learner’s Dictionary of Current English (Oxford University Press, 1948 onwards, edited by A.S. Hornby et al.), both foundation stones of modern ELT and Foreword ix bothowingmuchtoPalmer’spre-warresearch. ItisequallyimportanttorecognizePalmer’scontributiontoapplied linguistics in Japan. While most of his energies were devoted to the improvement of English teaching there, he also found time to deal with topics of even more specific relevance such as The Principles of Romanization (1930). For this and other works he was awarded a D.Litt. by Tokyo University before he finally returned to England in 1936. ThetenvolumesofPalmer’s Selected Writings comprise more than five and a half thousand pages and contain no fewer than fifty-two separate works. Some, like the Scientific Study and the Principles, are well-known but most of the studies included have previously been unfamiliar to readers outside Japan. The collection shows that Palmer could work comfortablyinmorethanone‘register’;hiswritingencompassesnot only scholarly books and articles but also pamphlets and books for a wider audience (for example, This Language Learning Business (1932)) which provide evidence of his considerable sense of humour. (He had been a journalist before becoming a teacher and his versatility may owe somethingtothisexperience.)TheIRLTcompilationofPalmer’smost significant publications Ð all of which are currently out of print in the UK Ð is a detailed and timely reminder of the debt we owe both to the man himself and to his far-sighted Japanese sponsors. In spite of its breadth of coverage, the set does not pretend to offer more than a selection of Palmer’swritings–the‘essentialPalmer’infact.Thiscompanion volume by Richard Smith succeeds admirably in placing the writings which are included in context, and in indicating the full extent of Palmer’sachievement. A. P. R. Howatt Department of Applied Linguistics University of Edinburgh, Scotland Synopsis of Harold E. Palmer’s life, career and major publications 1877 6 March: born in London. Family moves to Hythe, Kent, around 1883. Educated in the local elementary school, and by his father. 1890 Enters Prospect House School, a small private school in Hythe. 1892 Leaves school. Goes on six-month exchange visit to Boulogne. On return, pursues interests in geology and works for his father’sstationery,printing, bookbinding and newspaper publishing business. 1897 Beginsseriousworkasajournalistonhisfather’snewspaper, the Hythe Reporter. 1899 Becomes editor of the Hythe Reporter. 1902 Starts work as an English teacher in a language school in Verviers, Belgium, where he gains his first exposure to the ‘BerlitzMethod’. 1903 Sets up his own small language school in Verviers, later to be knownasthe‘InstitutPalmer’.Experimentstodevelophisown