2003-01-14
To be or not to be? The future of small languages in higher education in Sweden ? a government commission
Today the institutions identify small languages as the subjects that are unable to cover their own costs. In principle, this criterion includes all languages except Swedish/Nordic languages, English, French, German and Spanish. The institutions have concluded that strict application of the principles of the funding system would make it impossible to continue to offer small languages. For this reason all the institutions supply extra financial support to these languages, often in the form of internal reallocation of faculty funding and also with support from the central administration. It is pointed out, however, that the situation for small languages is still precarious and that the current solutions should rather be regarded as “life support measures".
Criteria for small languages
The aim of proposing criteria to determine which languages to regard as small ones should be to provide an instrument to enable the weaknesses of these subjects to be dealt with. For this reason these criteria should be based on the fundamental dilemma of the small languages: the resource problems that result from the low number of student applications combined with the focus in the funding system on full-time students and annual performance equivalents. One appropriate although not entirely unproblematic criterion for when a language subject should be considered small is, therefore, that the funding allocated per FTE and annual performance equivalent does not suffice to pay for a minimum level of teaching staff and normal costs. What can be defined as a reasonable minimum level will vary from subject to subject and higher education institution to higher education institution.
How can the government safeguard small languages?
The study also shows that today the gravest problem for small languages is, as it has been previously, finance. If the authorities want to ensure the provision of multifaceted language training in Sweden extra funding in addition to the normal funding is required.
A system of dividing responsibilities between higher education institutions - a proposal
The study also proposes that the government introduce an extended system of special undertakings for specific languages which would include more subjects than today and which would be accompanied by earmarked funding. An undertaking of this kind would therefore mean that a higher education institution would be given the responsibility and the funding needed to guarantee the survival and development of a subject. If other institutions were thereafter to opt to offer programmes in the same subject, no special funding would be provided. The aim is to guarantee that programmes in specific languages are offered to a reasonable extent in Sweden and to create incentives and scope for the division of responsibilities, collaboration and ongoing quality development. The higher education institutions would apply to the government for the allocation of undertakings for specific languages or groups of languages and the resources required to fulfil these undertakings. The National Agency for Higher Education and the National Research Council would submit opinions about the applications and propose what allocations the government should make. In assessing these applications a number of criteria should be taken into account, concerning, for instance, organisation and quality. Funding would be subject to quality and economic commitments by the higher education institutions and the undertakings would be for a period of six years, after which they would be reviewed. It should be possible for the government to make its decisions in connection with the normal budgeting procedures. Undertakings for small languages should be specified in the annual grant document for the institutions concerned.
System for national and Nordic collaboration
Varying experiences have been reported from attempts to collaborate. The main benefits from collaboration with other Swedish and Nordic higher education institutions seem today to be found chiefly at the postgraduate and research levels. Examples of potential forms of collaboration are national seminars for postgraduate students or graduate schools and conferences. At the national level, one future possibility could also be joint investments in IT based distance teaching within the framework of the Net University.
It is considered that national and international collaboration can offer no more than a supplementary solution. Collaboration does not in itself provide a solution to the economic problems of the small languages, but can at best help to augment quality.
The National Research Council´s resources for small subjects
The government has given the National Research Council the task of coordinating the allocation of resources and research profiles for small subjects in collaboration with the higher education institutions themselves. The Universities of Gothenburg, Lund, Stockholm, Umeå and Uppsala were offered the possibility of applying for funds in connection with this initiative during 2002. In the first round of application, the following languages or groups of languages were awarded funding:
- Lund University: Slavic languages
- Stockholm University: Finnish, Meänkieli (Tornedal Finnish) and Estonian
- Umeå University: Sami languages
- Uppsala University: Classical languages and Byzantinology, and
- Gothenburg University: African languages (a planning grant).
This study proposes that the National Research Council should be assigned the responsibility of assessing the research elements in the applications from the higher education institutions for the allocation of special undertakings, while the National Agency for Higher Education would assess those elements relating to undergraduate and postgraduate programmes.
Languages in which there is risk that programmes and research may disappear
With no form of extra financial support from the higher education institutions or faculties, most of the existing language subjects would be under threat. As long as the institutions have both the desire and the economic resources to support the small languages there is, however, no immediate risk of their overall disappearance in Sweden.
Half of the teaching staff in the small languages will reach retirement age within the next ten years. Retirement in combination with the small number of teaching posts poses the greatest threat to individual languages. The lack of potential regeneration, such as supply of postgraduate students and recruitment posts, constitutes another serious threat. In this respect, the situation is particularly problematic for Serbian/Bosnian/Croatian, Bulgarian, Kurdish, Assyriology, Aramaic/Syrian, Romanian, Tamil, Thai, Indonesian and Swahili.
Languages with no teaching or research despite probable national interest
The study expresses the opinion that there should always be preparedness to deal with new teaching needs in the community by developing new language programmes. On the basis of an assessment of national interests the study proposes therefore that consideration should be given to the introduction of a number of languages in Sweden or on some form of Nordic basis: Romany, Yiddish, Albanian, Somali, Amharic, Tigrinya, Ukrainian, Slovenian, Slovak and Vietnamese.
None of these languages is offered by the major Nordic universities. However, a large number of Asian, African and East and Central European languages are taught at the large language departments of the University of London. Even so, possibilities of studying abroad can never replace programmes offered at home but can only provide a supplementary alternative in individual cases.
The study concludes with the opinion that the government should develop and establish a national policy for the languages that are indispensable in higher education in Sweden. The National Agency for Higher Education should collaborate with the National Research Council in preparing the groundwork for such a policy.
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