BACK-TO-SCHOOL

Learning a foreign
language is "in,"
especially among
businesspeople
who see it as career
advancement.

JENNIFER FINER

Special to The Jewish News

f you thought learning a
foreign language was
only for high school or
college students think
again. You might as well
add adult language
classes to the list of fads
for the '90s because hoards of
people are enrolling in a variety
of language classes for several
different reasons.
Because companies in the
United States are doing business
with foreign corporations both
here and overseas, adults are
finding they need to learn a sec-
ond language or they simply
want to learn another dialect to
make themselves more mar-
ketable.
The National Foreign Lan-
guage Center, in Washington,
D.C., reports that 42 percent of
American public high school stu-
dents are now studying a foreign
language — the highest per-
centage since 1928. The Center
reports a similar surge of inter-
est among college students and
business people, who see it as a
way to get a leg up on the com-
petition.
According to Ted Johnson, di-
rector of Berlitz in Bingham
Farms, 90 percent of their clien-
tele is corporate including the Big
Three auto makers.
One of their specialty courses
is called Total Immersion, a two

i

Jennifer Finer was a summer
intern at The Jewish News.

66

FRIDAY, AUGUST 28, 1992

week crash course in any lan-
guage.
"If someone is being sent over-
seas for a long period of time,
they usually only have a limited
amount of time to prepare for
their trip including learning the
language," Mr. Johnson says.
The most popular languages
they teach are German, Spanish,
and Japanese.
"German is the most popular
because of the economy and ev-
erything being tied into Europe
and Japan. The auto industry

sends a lot of people over there.
Spanish is making a comeback
especially now that a free trade
agreement has been signed. The
world is becoming a smaller
place," Mr. Johnson says.
Berlitz also offers language
classes to adults whose reasons
are not business related.
"I see a lot of second-genera-
tion people, whose parents are
from other countries, coming to
learn their parents' native lan-
guages," Mr. Johnson says.
In fact, there is not a language

erlitz can't teach. So if you have
always wanted to understand
your parents or grandparents
when they spoke Yiddish, this
may be the answer.
The National Foreign Lan-
guage Center attributes part of
the greater interest in foreign
languages to more affordable in-
ternational travel and to greater
awareness of world events. For-
eign -language tapes, CDs and
videos have grown into a $20 mil-
lion annual business, according
to industry estimates.
The "hot spots" in the news
definitely influence what lan-
guages-on-tapes are popular.
Berlitz Publishing, which pro-
duces self-teaching tapes in 23
languages, reported that German
became a best seller when the
Berlin wall came down; Arabic
tapes were best sellers during the
Gulf War; and Spanish is cur-
rently popular because of the re-
cent Olympics in Barcelona and
the upcoming Expo '92 in Seville.
(Among business people, though,
Japanese tapes remain best sell-
ers.)
Suzuki, Meyers & Associates
in Novi does a lot -of Japanese
translating and interpreting for
businesses and they teach stu-
dents Japanese culture and cus-
toms.
According to Steve Myers, the
principal associate of the com-
pany, there has been an increase
of interest in Japan because of
exposure to the culture over the
past few years.
"I hear a lot of people say I'm
looking for business opportuni-
ties so maybe I should learn
Japanese," Dr. Meyers says. "It
is a combination of business and
intellectual curiosity."
Colleen Brooks, an associate of
Suzuki, Meyers & Associates,
says they get a lot of calls asking
where to take Japanese language
classes.
"We don't offer classes, but it
tells me there are a lot of people