Wednesday, Dec. 4, 1985
University Daily Kansan
Campus/Area
Diverse languages' popularity rising
By John Williams Of the Kansan staff
A realization that Eastern European, Latin American and Middle Eastern countries are important in world affairs has drawn many students to pursue some of the lesser-known languages offered at the University.
Gerald Mikkelson, a professor of Soviet and East European studies, said that one reason many students took Eastern European languages was connected with a professional goal.
"Many of the students may want to live in the countries, go into translation or work in international business." he said.
One former KU student, who works for Levi Strauss & Co. in Europe, uses the language experience he received at KU to help in business matters with Poland and Russia, Mikkelsen said.
"Law and medical people also learn the languages of Eastern Europe because they might want to work there or work on exchanges." be said
"Also, a large amount of scientific literature is written in Russian. So knowing Russian would be advantageous for scientists because the Russian is not translated quickly."
Mikkelson said that nearly every
science and engineering department at KU had at least one faculty member who understood Russian or another east European language.
Eastern European language classes that are taught at KU are Russian, Polish and Serbo-Croatian, which is the principle language spoken in Yugoslavia.
Other languages that are offered periodically are Slovak, pronounced slow-vaak, which is spoken in eastern Czechoslovakia, Czech, spoken in western Czechoslovakia and Slovene, one of five languages spoken in Yugoslavia. Bulgarian and Macedonian, another Yugoslavian language, are also offered when enough interest is shown by the students, Mikkelson said.
He said that Ukrainian, spoken by the second largest nationality in the Soviet Union, and Old Church Slavonic, the "grandaddy" of the slavic languages, had also offered by the department in past semesters.
"Russian is the most popular and in greatest demand." he said.
The department of linguistics also offers some languages that are not heard in the U.S. every day: Arabic, Hebrew and Guarani.
Michael Henderson, associate professor and chairman of linguistics, said that the languages offered were taken mostly by undergraduates in
linguistics who needed to learn a non-European language because of their different language structure.
Arabic and Hebrew classes have about 15 to 20 students each this semester. Sometimes, if the students want more background, the department offers more than one year of classes.
"Some students use the language to go overseas to teach English, while others who study Hebrew may plan to go to Israel and just want to get a head start on the language," he said.
This semester about five students are studying Guariani, which is
spoken mostly in Paraguay, Hender-sen said.
The professors said that though the languages seemed obscure, they were often useful.
Mikkelson said he thought that more Americans should learn Russian and some of the lesser-known languages because they may help in the strained relations.
"These places are a part of the world, and learning their languages is a key to improving relations with the Soviet Union and East European countries," he said. "They study English."
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