Adults Learning Spanish

In a recent Zogby poll (Hispanic, March, 2001), forty-four percent of the English-speaking respondents selected Spanish as the language they would study if they had the opportunity to learn another language. It should come as no surprise, then, that the number of adult mainstream Americans enrolled in foreign language courses, with Spanish predominating, is skyrocketing. According to Tanya Mohn in "All Aboard the Foreign Language Express" (New York Times, October 11, 2000), most people are studying for work-related reasons. This is evidenced by the fact that the number of language proficiency exams administered by companies to employees has increased 1,000 per cent in the last twelve years. In many instances the goal is merely to familiarize individuals with a foreign culture. There are more exotic reasons, however, and there has been at least one case involving canines. The El Paso police department once approached a language instructor about the possibility of teaching some Spanish to drug-sniffing dogs acquired from Czechoslovakia, but it was decided that it would be easier to teach the officers some Czech. Anyone seriously interested in developing the ability to communicate in Spanish might consider combining formal training with a "quasi" vacation at one of Mexico´s many language schools. The Center for Bilingual Multicultural Studies gets very high marks, and Jane Blackburn Bornemeier gives a full account of her positive experiences there in "Total Immersion in Cuernavaca" (New York Times, April 8, 2001).