The Foreign Language “Crisis” in the United States: Are Heritage and Community Languages the Remedy?

Recent national security concerns and global trade interests have led many to claim that there is a foreign language “crisis” in the US. Some argue that heritage and community language (HL-CL) speakers in the US constitute a resource waiting to be tapped to solve this crisis. This article addresses the issue of whether heritage and community language speakers can or should be exploited to ameliorate this perceived crisis. To address these issues, the paper considers the demographic context of language diversity in the US and how it relates to languages being taught. It analyzes the ideological nature of the discourse about language diversity in the US and reviews the historical position of HLs-CLs. The paper considers current challenges to promoting HLs-CLs given the condition of language teaching. Last, it explores future prospects for promoting community languages in the US and the extent to which HLs-CLs might help to expand foreign language (FL) instruction within the post 9/11 context.