Language Acquisition and Language Learning: A Plea for Syncretism

Language Acquisition and Language Learning: A Plea for SyncretismAuthor(s): Theodore V. HiggsSource: The Modern Language Journal, Vol. 69, No. 1 (Spring, 1985), pp. 8-14Published by: Wiley on behalf of the National Federation of Modern Language Teachers AssociationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/327874 .

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Language Acquisition and Language Learning: A Plea for Syncretism THEODORE V HIGGS

HOW COMFORTABLE IT MUST HAVE BEEN TEACH-

ing foreign languages in the United States dur- ing the first half of this century! Few prolonged controversies over goals, methods, materials, or assessment procedures disturbed the professional calm. The later audiolingual revolution served only to replace one variety of homo- geneity with another. Its principal change was the intellectual superimposition of a theory of learning (behaviorism) onto a theory of language (structuralism), which provided the profession a comforting aura of certainty and right- ness. In retrospect, it seemed to matter little that audiolingualism rarely if ever delivered on its promises. Its theories and techniques were so pat that it was to take decades for our dogma to be run over by our karma.

Beginning, perhaps, in 1959 with Chomsky's review of Skinner's Verbal Behavior, a distin- guishing feature of our professional discussions has been controversy and polemic.' Contem- porary professional literature offers a broad selection of opposing positions in all areas of foreign-language teaching and learning that purport to account for perceived success or failure. Is instrumental motivation sufficient to allow for success, or is integrative motivation necessary?2 Do we declare success when students can put across some kind of message, whether they control the language or not?3 Or do we recognize that at all developmental stages of adult foreign-language study linguistic accuracy is an indispensable enabling objective?4 Should we appeal to students' affective or cognitive side?5 Should the approach be active or passive; receptive or productive? And finally, whatever are we to do with the language learning versus language acquisition controversy?

If Kuhn's theory of scientific revolutions is correct, such acrimonious division within a dis- cipline may be a necessary part of establishing a new paradigm.6 For when a widely accepted model fails to account for significant observable data, as both behaviorism and structuralism have been shown to do, other hypotheses are developed to fill the gap. This process often leads to what Kuhn has called "talking through each other," a situation in which adversaries apparently debate salient issues, but in ways that are mutually misunderstood.' Chomsky faults, for example, structuralism's concern with discovery procedures because they entail too strong a claim for any linguistic model. Yet, he invests his language acquisition device with precisely that capability.8 The principal dif- ference between Chomsky's discovery procedures and those of the structuralists is that his are innate, implicit, and abstract, while theirs were learned, explicit, and concrete.

Fortunately, leaders in our profession have recently recognized that the dichotomies sketched briefly above are more apparent than real. Stevick presents the following "riddle": "In the field of language teaching, Method A is the logical contradiction of Method B; if the as- sumptions from which A claims to be derived are correct, then B cannot work, and vice versa. Yet one colleague is getting excellent results with A and another is getting comparable results with B. How is this possible?"9 He con- cludes that "each method, when used well, ful- fills in its own way a set of requirements which

go beneath and beyond any one of them" (p. 105). Finocchiaro states that we "should not be impressed by slogans or climb on the band-

wagon of the dichotomies and oppositions that spring up periodically in journals or texts. There should never be an either/or decision about educational or linguistic theories or

strategies. ... The two [competing positions]

The Modern Language Journal, 69, i (1985) 0026-7901/85/0001/008 $1.50/0 ?1985 The Modern Language Journal



Syncretism in Language Learning 9

are extensions of one another, and both are necessary."10 Omaggio, in recommending that global considerations of language proficiency be accepted as the principle by which our think- ing should be organized, notes that it makes sense to differentiate methods in terms of priorities rather than make binary oppositions between and among them."

Because of the overriding conceptual impor- tance of the distinction between language learning and language acquisition, in the remainder of this article I will discuss this apparent oppo- sition in the context of adult second language study. I hope to demonstrate that it is not only possible to integrate the implications of learning versus acquisition into a communicative, proficiency oriented classroom, but that it may be impossible not to do so. We will see that these two constructs are--and must be-not mutually exclusive, but mutually supportive.

Much of the current debate about the distinction between language learning and language acquisition revolves around positions attributed to Stephen D. Krashen. I am now convinced that much of the acrimony in this debate derives from two observations: 1) in his writings, Krashen very naturally argues for the strong form of his hypotheses, and so his clear and honest concessions to counterpositions, which can always be found in his exposition, whether in text or in chapter notes, are not mentioned in his summary statements; and 2) many who debate acquisition versus learning often attribute to Krashen positions that do not fairly represent him. One might even suspect that more people quote Krashen than read him. For the record, the most extensive statement on the fundamental contrast between language learning and language acquisition is found in Krashen's Principles and Practice in Second Language Acquisition.12 The page references below are from this work, and are placed in my text for the reader's convenience. In summary: 1) second language acquisition is a "process

similar, if not identical, to the way children develop ability in their first language. Lan- guage acquisition is a subconscious process.

?. The result of language acquisition, ac-

quired competence, is also subconscious" (p. 10);

2) language learning refers to "conscious knowledge of a second language, knowing the

rules, being aware of them, and being able to talk about them" (p. 10);

3) "conscious knowledge of rules is ... not re- sponsible for our fluency. . . ." (p. 84);

4) "conscious learning is not necessary for language acquisition .. ." (p. 85);

5) " 'grammar' [is] a term I will use as a syno- nym for conscious learning . ." (p. 89).

Based on many commentaries I have heard in classes, at inservice sessions, and at major con- ferences, one conclusion that has been popu- larly drawn from these pronouncements is that for Krashen, "learning" is uniformly useless and even counterproductive; only "acquisition" is of any value at all. Such a conclusion can only be drawn from listening to statements about Krashen's conclusions, however, for he has other things to say on the subject. To the preceding summary we must also add the following: 6) "one of our goals in pedagogy is to encourage

optimal Monitor use" (p. 89);13 7) ". .. a small sub-set of conversational man-

agement tools can be directly taught, either as rules or as memorized routines..." (p. 79);

8) "we certainly 'learn' small parts of our first language in school .. ." (p. 11). In a later publication, Krashen and Terrell

make allowance for "learning exercises [for] older students. ...

.". They also point out that

many adult second-language learners feel better when they can study structure more overtly, even though the "help from the study of grammar is probably more psychological than linguistic."'5 This concession sounds as though activities that are only psychologically helpful are somehow not really helpful (as though some- one who has a psychological illness isn't really sick). Yet, the Affective Filter Hypothesis argues that anything that contributes to psychological well-being contributes to acquisition.16

When we take these observations into account, we note that although Krashen apparently sees language learning as a product (a collection of rules) rather than as a process, which learning is conventionally understood to be, he sees no necessary relationship of mutual exclusion between language acquisition and language learning. Both account for certain aspects of native- and foreign-language use, although they play different roles and have different priorities."7 If this reading of Krashen's



10 Theodore V Higgs

hypotheses is correct, i.e., both acquisition and learning contribute to competence, we can reasonably infer the relationships shown in Fig- ure 1.

We see that, at worst, Krashen may be underemphasizing the possible roles that conscious learning can play in child L1 and adult L2 acquisition. Such underemphasis is probably justifiable, given much of the profession's perception of what "teaching grammar" entails. However, for those of us whose daily business is to promote adult second-language acquisition, some practical accommodation of the learning/acquisition controversy is crucial. For, when we accept that, however it happens, acquisition leads to accurate and spontaneous use of a language, we must also agree that the best language classes will be those that nourish and promote acquisition. How can we reasonably hope to do this?

Perhaps the best place to begin is by recon- sidering some terms. As we have just seen (point 1, above), Krashen's model leaves the process of L2 acquisition fundamentally undefined, beyond claiming that it is "similar if not identical" to L1 acquisition. This problem is not uniquely Krashen's, however. The most widely posited postbehaviorist mechanism of L1 acquisition devices is "input in" followed by "output out." About all we know of the process is that fairly early on acquirers somehow associate meaning with speech, they perceive significant structural generalizations, and they then over- generalize them. Subsequently, some kind of "learning" then accounts for nonsystematic forms, e.g., "teeth" rather than "*tooths" or "schemata" rather than "*schemas," which are then reincorporated into the underlying, i.e., acquired competence of the language user. Whether the latter types of forms are "taught and learned" or are "recognized and incor- porated" is moot. Undoubtedly, both processes are at work. The former dyad assumes external

FIGURE 1

Native Language Competence

Foreign Language Competence

Acquisition

bD

E Acquisition

b

Cld v 14 __:i

intervention of some kind; the latter we can call "self-learning," but both involve learning. Cog- nitively, in either case, the user's attention is drawn to some aspect of the internalized grammar (in the sense defined below), which is then modified. This brief recapitulation of "acquisition" does not provide a definition of the term; rather, it makes explicit the reality that it is at present necessarily undefined.

We can come closer to redefining both "learning" and "grammar," however, which in the Krashen model are claimed to be virtually synonymous (see his points 2-5, above). Surely, learning means more than "knowing the rules and being able to talk about them," and grammar is more than formal statements of morphological and syntactic behavior. Let us take learning to mean "the modification of behavior through practice, training, or experi- ence," and grammar to mean "a system for converting meaning into language."18

Thus, by definition, only through the mediation of the grammar of a language can messages be either transmitted or received, whether in speaking/listening or in writing/ reading. The grammar of a language, then, must be understood as including at least its sound system, lexicon, morphology, syntax, and discourse structure, since all of these par- ticipate directly in the communication of meaning. Hence, the statement that "grammar use should be restricted to situations when it will not interfere with communication" is uninter- pretable.t9 There can be no communication without grammar. In a communicative, proficiency oriented approach, then, the fundamental mission of the foreign-language instructor must be to teach grammar.

To paraphrase Claiborne, the aim of language use is not simply to be understood but to make it impossible to be misunderstood.20 The only way for beginners to realize this aim is to conform as well as they can to the requirements of the grammar in the sense defined above. Beginning adult language students come to their task with a pre-existing, fully specified set of communicative needs. Their task consists of mapping these needs onto a necessarily limited set of target language structures. Their ability to express themselves is effectively con- trolled and circumscribed by the grammar they have learned or acquired. As these students progress, the set of available structures and the




set of communicative needs become increasingly isomorphic. At the end of the process, ad- vanced users and native speakers control the grammar, and make it conform to their communicative needs. As language instructors, we are expected to facilitate this type of progress by "teaching" the target language. But what are we to teach?

To say that we should teach only what is teachable is a tautology. This applies as well to teaching grammar as to teaching anything else. Krashen correctly observes that trying to teach all the rules that account for a language is a fool's mission. The vast majority of these rules, in whatever form, are unknown even to the most insightful theoretical linguists. We need not bother to speculate about what sub- sets of them foreign language instructors might present, and their students might in some sense learn. 21

Teaching, however, is not synonymous with explaining; it does not entail presenting "a rule." Whenever we draw our students' attention to something in the language, by whatever means, we are teaching. An ESL instructor who holds up a picture of an automobile and says to a class, "This is called a car in English. It's a new one, not an old one" is explicitly teaching vocabulary, and implicitly teaching the functions of naming and describing. The instructor is also providing a data base involv- ing at least anaphora, some noun phrase constructions, some of the morphology and syntax of copular constructions, and some elements of discourse structure. Thus, the crucial instructional decision is not "to teach or not to teach," but when - and whether - to teach through explanation or through exemplification. Assum- ing ceteris paribus that explanation is more in- terventionist than is exemplification, the latter is to be preferred, but the former is often helpful and even necessary.

I think it possible and desirable to establish a kind of "hierarchy of instructional tactics." The purpose of the hierarchy is to match certain perceived characteristics of linguistic elements - most especially the extent to which the relationship between their form and the meanings they communicate is transparent and explicit - with compatible instructor behaviors. Let me characterize the two extremes of the hierarchy first, and then focus attention on the middle.

At the top of the hierarchy we find linguistic

elements such as cognates and concrete content vocabulary, whose meaning so directly and transparently inheres to the forms that nothing is required of the instructor beyond presenting the data in context. A German student, for example, will understand der Professor immediately and intuitively. To associate der Schmet- terling with "butterfly," he will need a context or a visual aid but nothing more. We label the appropriate instructor behavior for this level "presentation"- a scrupulously noninterven- tionist approach.

At the bottom of the hierarchy we find elements that are virtually opaque. They are required by the grammar as conditions of being well-informed, but their relationship to deno- tative or connotative meaning is tenuous at best. Certain uses of en andy in French appear to fit this characterization, as does the "GO + verb" constraint in English.22 Because of their opacity these latter items are often best left alone; no amount of "explanation" will render them even translucent. At best they can be momentarily described, and their opacity ac- knowledged but neither explained nor other- wise accounted for. They will either be acquired at some future point or they will remain out- side of the competence of the language user. We can label instructor behavior at this level "description," although "concession" or even "apology" might be more accurate. We describe in this sense whenever we can say no more than: "The language does this because this is what the language does."

Within the area bracketed by these two extremes instructor behavior is the most critical and also the most variable. Immediately below the transparently meaningful forms is a range of elements whose relationship to the message is easily made explicit. Many of the so-called "problem pairs" fit here, although perhaps not, e.g., ser and estar in Spanish (see below). Some instructors will prefer to handle such pairs ex- clusively by demonstration and exemplification, while others will make a brief statement as an attention pointer, e.g., "X means 'stock' in the sense of 'cattle,' and Y means 'stock' in the sense of'merchandise.' " In neither case is any kind of explanation indicated. The instructor simply directs the students' attention to the form in question and constrains its sense and scope. We can call such instructor behavior "de- limitation."

At the next lower level, we find the great ma-



12 Theodore V Higgs

jority of linguistic structures. What charac- terizes them is the relatively direct relationship they have to the meanings they convey, but also the frequent and often considerable dissimi- larity with comparable native language structures. Most types of anaphora appear at this level, e.g., direct and indirect object pronouns, pro-verbs, pro-adverbs, and in the case of Eng- lish at least, pro-predicates (e.g., "David [speaks Spanish, plays the piano, and enjoys sports]. [Does] Vicki?") At this level we also find many basic verb and noun inflections. These typically relate a meaning with a form fairly directly when viewed internally, but in ways that for native speakers of other languages may be prac- tically unknown. For many languages, inherent noun gender participates at this level as well. While little connection if any exists between the gender of most nouns and their meaning, gender is such an integral part of the structure of languages that have it that it is manifestly unfair not to bring it early on to students' attention. If Spanish students are to distinguish between la casa, "house," and el caso, "case," or between el libro, "book," and la libra, "pound," their ability to listen will be enhanced by knowing for what they are to listen. This level is the first at which instructor behavior approaching explanation may be indicated, although it is right on the border at which some instructors will still be able to demonstrate the phenomena while others will clarify them simply, but overtly. This level, then, can be called "clarification."

Sometimes it becomes important to make overt certain meanings or meaning relationships which, although they exist in the native language and hence are accessible to the students, are expressed so distinctly in the target language that students may not recognize them. For example, "verbs of suasion" which in English take "infinitive clause complements," e.g., "Fred ordered Martin to leave," take full clausal complements in the subjunctive mood in many other languages. In such cases, the relationship between meaning and form is overt and consistent within the target language, but must be made explicit if students are to profit from their exposure to them (but not with this terminology, please).

Even more opaque are those situations in which the target language marks formally distinctions in meaning that are not so marked in the native language. In such cases, students are

often quite unaware of the distinct meanings themselves. For example, Spanish requires the subjunctive mood in adverbial time clauses whenever the action of the dependent verb is yet to happen with respect to the time referred to by the main clause. When spoken in Span- ish, then, the "when-clauses" in the following English sentences will be different: "When I go to New York, I always eat at X restaurant." "When I go to New York, I'll probably eat at X restaurant." Certain uses of ser and estar in Spanish (both "be" in English) are also examples of this kind of semantic opacity. Students who do not see, for example, that "tired" and "intel- ligent" are different types of predicates that can take "John and I" as arguments will have diffi- culty understanding Juan y yo estamos cansados versusJuanyyo somos inteligentes. 23 Again, these differences in form are uniquely motivated by statable differences in meaning, but until students know that such differences exist and are salient, they will recognize neither the discrete meanings nor the formal distinctions that mark them in the target language. Such relationships between meaning and form are crucial in terms of being able to understand, being understood, and not being misunderstood. Furthermore, they are quite consonant with Krashen's dictum that "we acquire by 'going for meaning' first, and as a result, we acquire structure."24 Given the form, there is little hope of "going for the meaning" in Krashen's sense when the meaning itself is opaque. In such a case a brief but fairly detailed explanation is indicated.

We have seen that instructional tactics can range over the following: 1) presentation; 2) de- limitation; 3) clarification; 4) explanation; and 5) description. We have also seen that the choice of the most appropriate tactic is dictated by the extent to which apprehensible meanings can be overtly associated with the linguistic forms that manifest them. Clearly, the relative trans- parency (or opacity) of the relationship between meaning and form can vary enormously across languages. Therefore, forms that encode "the same meaning" (keeping the source language and culture as constants) will certainly fall within different ranges for different languages. Such considerations are vitally interesting, but are entirely separate from the hypothesized validity of any given instructional tactic, given a meaning/form relationship in some language. What does not vary is the goal of any instructional tactic, which must always be that of




enhancing the clarity of the message being transmitted, i.e., that of rendering the input increasingly comprehensible to the students.

For the most part, the proposed "hierarchy of tactics" is self-individualizing, in that all instructors approach their mission with their own unique perspective, and determine their own choices accordingly. Instructors who are native speakers of the target language often feel better and have more success by extending "presentation" downward to encompass more target language structures, since natives typically feel better providing examples of their language than they do explaining it. Conversely, non- native instructors often feel better, i.e., less threatened, in the "clarification" and "explanation" ranges, as they may lack confidence in their own ability spontaneously to produce rele- vant, parallel examples, and so take refuge in "accounting for the data." Such individual vari- ables may help to solve in part Stevick's riddle, and they are manifestly important to teacher training programs. But again, they impinge only minimally on the putative utility of the hierarchy of tactics.

I have asserted that it is possible to identify when to "present the language" and when to "talk about it"- to what purpose, and to what extent. Within the guidelines of an "input model," I have outlined several ways that instructors can refine the quality of data their students receive. All of these ways depend on understanding "grammar" to be a system for converting meaning into language. The tactical recommendations are compatible with input models in general, although they are implicitly motivated by a desire to implement and adapt the Natural Approach advocated by Krashen and Terrell.

Space does not permit a thorough account of the non-linear nature of the relationship between linguistic forms and their meanings, most especially the obvious fact that a given meaning can often be expressed in a variety of forms, and a single linguistic construction can transmit a variety of meanings depending on indefinitely many considerations of context, speaker roles, mental set, etc. It is also impossible to speak here at length to the question of the use and utility of metalanguage in the classroom; but, since all of the recommended tactics entail relating target language data to cognitive constructs already possessed by students, it follows

that in general, metalanguage will be counterproductive.

I have hypothesized a hierarchy that at- tempts to match linguistic structures with instructional tactics within a strategy that values the minimum possible intervention by instructors, but which provides consistent criteria for justifying the nature and degree of intervention. The hierarchy depends on the following generalizations: 1) all instructor behavior counts as "teaching"; 2) no attempt is made to distinguish between automatic, non-conscious acquisition and apparent acquisition that may have resulted from "self-learning"; 3) "grammar" is defined as a system that converts meaning into language; 4) "teaching grammar" means making as clear as possible the relationships that link meaning and form by tying target language forms to meanings or other cognitive constructs the students already possess. Thus, it explicitly does not mean teaching formal rules, either of the sort associated with theoretical linguistics or with traditional grammar; 5) the instructional tactics are implicitly ordered as listed, in the sense that "presentation" should be attempted until it clearly fails or unless a priori the data require a more overt treatment. In short, "Do not explain where an example may suffice, but do not fail to delimit, clarify, explain, or describe when students do not understand." A corollary to this point is: "Do not attempt to explain the unexplainable."

A complete characterization of a communicative, proficiency-based model of foreign language instruction recognizes that the validity of any approach to instruction or assessment must depend on simultaneous considerations of "function," "content," and "accuracy." At the lowest levels of proficiency, i.e., ILR 0/0 + or ACTFL/ETS "Novice," mere intelligibility is the sole descriptor for accuracy.25 But our awareness that we are trying to help our students move beyond this level obligates us to provide a framework for continued progress.26 As Omaggio suggests, when we know what lies at the next higher level of proficiency, we are able to prepare our students for future progress.27 This awareness of what lies ahead is what motivates the need to value linguistic accuracy from the beginning of a program of instruction, and is also what establishes the ineluctable syncretism of language learning and language acquisition.



14 Theodore V Higgs

NOTES

1Noam Chomsky, Rev. of B. F. Skinner, Verbal Behavior, Language, 35 (1959), pp. 26-58.

2Robert C. Gardner & Wallace Lambert, Attitudes and Motivation in Second Language Learning (Rowley, MA: New- bury House, 1972).

3Sandra Savignon, Communicative Competence: An Experi- ment in Foreign Language Teaching (Philadelphia: Center for Curriculum Development, 1972).

4Theodore V. Higgs & Ray Clifford, "The Push Toward Communication," Curriculum, Competence, and the Foreign Lan- guage Teacher, ed. Theodore V. Higgs (Lincolnwood, IL: National Textbook Co., 1982), pp. 57-79.

5Clay B. Christensen, "Affective Learning Activities," Foreign Language Annals, 8 (1975), pp. 211-19. See also his "Achieving Language Competence with Affective Learn- ing Activities," Foreign Language Annals, 10 (1977), pp. 153-67.

6Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1962).

7Kuhn (note 6 above), pp. 108-09. 8Noam Chomsky, "Topics in the Theory of Generative

Grammar," Current Trends in Linguistics, 3, ed. Thomas A. Sebeock (The Hague: Mouton, 1970). His remarks on the "intrinsic properties" an acquisition device must possess are from p. 10.

9Earl W. Stevick, Memory, Meaning, andMethod (Rowley, MA: Newbury House, 1976). The riddle and its following resolution are from pp. 104-05.

1oMary Finocchiaro, "A Look at our Profession: Com- mon Concerns, Common Dreams," The Foreign Language Classroom: New Techniques, ed. Alan Garfinkel (Lincolnwood, IL: National Textbook Co., 1983).

"Alice C. Omaggio, "Methodology in Transition: The New Focus on Proficiency," Modern Language Journal, 67 (1983), pp. 330-40.

12Stephen D. Krashen, Principles and Practice in Second Lan- guage Acquisition (New York: Pergamon, 1982).

"3Monitor use depends on conscious learning. "Learn- ing has only one function, and that is as a Monitor, or editor" (p. 15).

14Stephen D. Krashen & Tracy Terrell, The Natural Ap- proach (Hayward, CA: Alemany, 1983), p. 61.

15Krashen & Terrell (note 14 above), p. 92. 16Krashen (note 12 above), pp. 30-32. 17Conversely, traditional "grammarians" often say, "if you

don't understand this, be patient; sooner or later it'll make sense." In revised terms, they are saying, "this is not i + 1 for you yet. Be patient; when it is, it'll make sense, and become part of your acquired competence."

18The Random House College Dictionary, rev. ed., s.v. "learning."

19Krashen & Terrell (note 14 above), p. 57. 20Robert Claiborne, Our Marvelous English Tongue (New

York: New York Times, 1983), p. 297. 21Krashen (note 12 above), pp. 92-94. 22The "GO + verb" constraint allows no bound morpho-

logical material to intervene between auxiliary "go" and a following verb. Thus, e.g., "When I have time I go study" is fine, but "When he has time *he goes study" is not. Like- wise, "I did go study," but "*I went study."

23Theodore V. Higgs, "Ser or not Ser: That is the Ques- tion," Hispania, 68 (1985), forthcoming.

24Krashen (note 12 above), p. 21. 25SeeJudith Liskin-Gasparro, "The ACTFL Proficiency

Guidelines: A Historical Perspective," Teachingfor Proficiency: The Organizing Principle, ed. Theodore V. Higgs (Lincoln- wood, IL: National Textbook Co., 1983), and Appendices A and B in the same work.

26See, e.g., Krashen & Terrell (note 14 above), p. 1: The Natural Approach "is for beginners and is designed to help them become intermediates."

27 Omaggio (note 11 above), p. 332.

Forthcoming in the MLJ

FUTURE ISSUES OF THE MODERN LANGUAGE JOUR- nal will contain important articles of both current and historical interest. Effective with the summer, 1985, issue, a regular feature on com- puters and language teaching and research will be published. Authored by Dan Brink of Ari- zona State University, "MLJ Computer Corner" intends to provide straightforward advice for language teachers and scholars on integrating modem technology into their work.

In addition, MLJ readers can expect to see articles by: Susan Davila, "Cross-Cultural Training for Business: A Consultant's Primer";

Adolf Hieke, "Oral Fluency and its Evalua- tion"; Marianne Inman, "Language and Cross-Cultural Training in US Multinational Corporations"; Marlene Pilarcik, "Language and Choice: Using a Chinese Perspective"; Sandra Savignon, "Evaluation of Communi- cative Competence: The ACTFL Provisional Proficiency Guidelines"; Charles Stansfield, "A

History of Dictation in Foreign Language Classes"; Christine Uber Grosse, "A Survey of Foreign Languages for Business and the Pro- fessions at US Colleges and Universities."



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Language Acquisition and Language Learning: A Plea for Syncretism