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Courses in Arabic and Chinese Added

The University of Southern Indiana will begin offering Beginning Arabic and Beginning Chinese in fall 2009. This will bring the total number of languages offered by the University to seven, including French, German, Japanese, Latin, and Spanish.

Dr. Silvia Rode, chair of the Department of Modern and Classical Languages, said, “We live in a global community and by offering nonwestern and western language and culture courses we can help students to compete in the world market, to prepare them for graduate school, and to become better citizens of the world.”

There have been requests from students and the community for classes in Arabic and Chinese, as well as requests for translations. Coincidentally, the Alliance for Language Learning and Educational Exchange (ALLEX) from which the department received Japanese instructors recently began providing instructors in Chinese. Instructors in Japanese and Arabic have been hired for the fall.

Rode said, “With 10,000 students on campus there should be plenty of choices for all students to engage in language learning.”

In the future, Rode would like to offer four semesters of each language including a culture and civilization course taught in English. This course would encourage student interest in language through culture, and enhance the facilitation of cultural knowledge for students already taking the language.

Rode said that anyone, no matter your age, can learn a new language. “Language learning is very broad-based,” she said. “Some people are good at pronunciation, others at picking up the grammar, others at audio recognition. There is an aspect to language learning that applies to everyone.” Tutors in Academic Skills will assist students who need extra help.

For more information, contact Rode at 812/465-7026 or sarode@usi.edu.

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