"Year of Languages" radio series available.

"Year of Languages" Radio Series Available

As part of the "Year of Languages" (YOL) celebration, the College of Charleston and the National Museum of Language have jointly sponsored development and distribution of a series of fifty-two radio spots on languages and linguistics. The spots are five minutes long and address a wide range of questions that a general audience might have about language, such as: Which language is the oldest? How do babies learn to talk? Where did the southern dialect come from? Whatever happened to Esperanto? The materials were written by 48 language experts from 23 states and the United Kingdom under the direction of Dr. Rick Rickerson of the College of Charleston. Information about the series, including brief biographies of the authors, can be found at http: //www.cofc.edu/linguist.

The series has been aired on public radio stations in several states as well as on campus radio stations. It will soon be available for use by language professionals as part of a curriculum, a motivator in the spirit of the YOL, or in many other ways. High schools have played the spots through their intercom systems; a sixth grade teacher has used them as part of a Language Arts class; universities are using them to supplement courses that prepare new language teachers. Above all, their purpose is to raise awareness about languages and the language profession during this year of celebration.

Audio files for the series are available on the website of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (http://www.actfl.org/) and its YOL site (http://www.yearoflanguages.org/). The materials are also available on compact disks at cost ($9.65 plus postage for the set of 4 disks,) from Georgia Schlau, Director, Michael Pincus Language Resource Center ([e-mail]), College of Charleston. Campus radio stations may be particularly interested in broadcasting the series. If you wish to have the series broadcast in your area or on your campus, send the name of the station and e-mail address of the station manager--or other questions or comments about the series--to Dr. Rickerson at: [e-mail].