In Memoriam

Jürgen Schlunk

The Northeast Conference is deeply saddened to report the untimely death of Jürgen Schlunk, Associate Professor of German at West Virginia University in Morgantown and president of the West Virginia Foreign Language Teachers Association.

Dr. Schlunk distinguished himself in many ways during his 35- year career, but he left his mark on NECTFL by bringing over 50 WVU graduate teaching assistants—many of them from other countries—to our conference each year to introduce them to the benefits of professional development and to provide them with the opportunity to visit New York or Washington DC. The warm applause that always greeted this impressive group of students at our opening general session conveyed our admiration for Jürgen and for his commitment to recruiting and mentoring future teachers. We can only hope that, in his memory, West Virginia University can continue the tradition. Jürgen’s passion, his sincerity, his dynamism, his intelligence and his brilliant smile will all be missed, but his influence will live on in his students and friends.

We extend our heartfelt sympathy to the Schlunk family. Below, we reproduce the thoughts of two WVU colleagues.

Jürgen Schlunk
1944–2002

On July 23, 2002, as a result of a fatal fall at his home, we lost Jürgen Schlunk, a friend, a colleague, and a teacher. Although he has passed beyond the reach of these words, there are many vibrant moments of his sojourn among us to be remembered. Jürgen, an Associate Professor of German, was born in Marburg and grew up in Fulda, Germany. He studied German and English at the Philipps- Universität Marburg from 1963-1966. During the following two years, he was a Richardson Scholar at Davidson College, N.C., and a graduate teaching assistant at the German Department of the University of New Hampshire where he received his M. A. in 1968. Back in Germany, he completed his studies and received his Ph. D. in 1970 from the Philipps-Universität with a dissertation about American drama. He spent a year working as dramaturg at the Erwin-Piscator Theater in Marburg, but then returned to the U. S. to look for a teaching position. When Davidson College was in need of a resident director to conduct its Junior Year Abroad Program in Marburg, he served in that capacity from 1972-73. In 1973, he assumed a position as a visiting assistant professor at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, PA. Since 1974, he had been teaching in the Department of Foreign Languages of West Virginia University. During his years at WVU, Professor Schlunk returned to Germany on several occasions: during 1976-77 and 1980-81 he served as dramaturg and performed with a theater in Stuttgart, the Theater tri-bühne. In the spring of 1977, he organized for the tri-bühne a 3-month U.S. tour, funded in part by the Goethe Institute. In 1981, he acted in Hans W. Geissendörfer’s Der Zauberberg, a film and television adaptation of Thomas Mann’s famous novel. During 1985-86, he was a visiting professor at the Pädagogische Hochschule Heidelberg.

Professor Schlunk’s research areas were 18th and 20th century drama and German cinema. Among others, he wrote articles on Friedrich Schiller, Ernst Moritz Arndt, Peter Weiss, Martin Walser, and Wim Wenders. He co-edited the volume Martin Walser: International Perspectives (1987), the result of an international symposium at WVU that he organized in 1985. His teaching included advanced language teaching, 18th to 20th century German literature, German drama, cinema and culture, as well as American culture. Since 1994, he conducted WVU’s Study Abroad Program in Bamberg, Germany. He received several NEH summer seminar stipends and outstanding teaching awards. Outside of his teaching, he served on many committees and boards of the West Virginia Humanities Council and the West Virginia Foreign Language Teachers Association.

As an actor, Jürgen was a master of his craft. When he was on stage you saw not Jürgen, but the character he portrayed. When he was off stage, he was frequently engaged in passionate support of one or another initiative that would enable him to share his love of theater—and especially of German theater—with his adopted West Virginia. Whether he was in the administrative offices of West Virginia University, in the West Virginia Trade Office, in the Office of the Governor, or among the West Virginia Humanities Council, Jürgen was always promoting (and seeking funding for) another cultural event centered around a stage production. The unique opportunities that he brought to us through his love of the theater have enriched us all.

Jürgen was also a teacher—a man passionate about his subject and an outspoken advocate for his students. Occasionally, he would encounter a situation where an international student from Germany had failed to conform to the university time frame or some other condition of admission. Who, but Jürgen, would have called the Director of International Admissions (to his face, mind you!) a Nazi because he would not bend the rules to accommodate the needs of the student! And by the way, Jürgen usually won in these encounters. To many of his students, Jürgen was an inspirational mentor, pushing and challenging them to go beyond what they believed themselves capable of doing. His enthusiasm was contagious, and surrounded him like an aura, permeating the classroom, the hallways, and his office—which, by the way was probably the only thing that could permeate the organized clutter that one encountered when entering it!

As a colleague, Jürgen was always quick to volunteer or assist whenever and however needed. Whether it was sitting at a registration table, hauling materials, providing a translation, or simply brainstorming, Jürgen was there. It was Jürgen, for example, who assumed the rather daunting task of organizing the trip to the Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages each year for more than 60 graduate students—a function he performed for six years in succession. Jürgen was especially proud of the public professional recognition this group brought to West Virginia University and the Department of Foreign Languages, and he made certain that all were present for a group photo at the opening general session.

One cannot adequately summarize or eulogize our departed colleague and friend. Jürgen and his ever-generous heart has touched us all—friends, colleagues, students, and audiences in many wonderful and unforgettable ways. We will remember his ready smile and his indomitable enthusiasm. May the memory of his passion and spirit inspire us all to sustain that which he has begun.
Frank W. Medley, Jr.
Jeffrey B. Bruner
Department of Foreign Languages
West Virginia University

Joan LaGarde Feindler

In 1973, the year she chaired the Northeast Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, Joan Feindler wrote, “Too often, in foreign-language classes, the student’s opinions and feelings about what and how he is learning are entirely ignored. Too often, indeed, we teachers are completely unaware of the impressions we make upon young people, merely by the way we ask questions, correct mistakes, and give or withhold praise (...) At the 1973 meeting of the Northeast Conference, then, let us examine carefully who we are in the classroom, how we teach our subject, and the amount of satisfaction and joy that students might take from their brief encounter with us. It is, after all, only in the presence of such frank personal evaluation that true professional integrity begins.” Joan’s insightful and sensitive advice finds reflections in her other writing for the Northeast Conference: as early as 1970, she participated in a working committee charged with helping foreign language teachers “better understand students.” That committee developed a survey—the Foreign Language Attitude Questionnaire—that teachers could use in their own classrooms to uncover student opinion, improve instructional practice, and rectify false impressions. And in the 1972 Reports, before widespread dissemination of communicative models of language competence and before the development of standards, Joan advocated placing culture at the center of the curriculum and using the experience of another language and culture to further understanding of one’s own, as two means of responding to students’ interests and perspectives (“Of necessity, some of the aspects of the traditional French class may well fall by the wayside under new methods [e.g.recitation of verb paradigms, analysis of grammatical points, the teacher’s role as chief interrogator, etc.], but the rewards in enthusiasm and sustained involvement on the students’ part will more than outweigh any so-called loss of ‘curriculum coverage.’”). Clearly, Joan’s focus was on the learner, and in that regard, she truly embodies the spirit of the Northeast Conference.

The Board of Directors and staff of NECTFL were shocked and dismayed to receive the news of Joan Feindler’s passing. Our sympathies are with her husband and the rest of her family, but also with her friends, colleagues and former students.

Joan was especially active in the Long Island Language Teachers organization (LILT), and the following obituary is reprinted with their permission from the LILT Newsletter of October 2002:

LILT mourns the passing of a dear friend and colleague, Joan LaGarde Feindler, on August 8, 2002, after a very courageous battle against cancer.

Joan was with us in the early days of LILT’s formation and was always eager to help any way she could. She was one of our outstanding judges who was comfortable with French, German, Latin and Spanish. She knew Russian as well.

Joan was a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and Teachers College at Columbia University. From the very beginning of her career, she was involved with NDEA Institutes at Harvard, SUNY and Columbia. She also served on the Board of Directors of the Northeast Conference (1968- 1974) and chaired its conference in 1973. She was a member of AATF all of her teaching years and into retirement as well. She was president of AATF Nassau (1971-1974) and was AATF’s Regional Representative (Region I: Metropolitan NY, Westchester, Nassau and Suffolk Counties) from 1983-1988. She served as the Nassau chapter’s treasurer the last several years. Joan gave back to the profession she so dearly loved as a presenter and speaker at innumerable foreign language conferences.

Joan spent her entire career at the Wheatley School in East Williston (1957-1996) and became Curriculum Associate in Foreign Languages for the East Williston School District in 1963. She organized many school exchanges during her teaching career from which many students have very fond memories. A scholarship has been established at the Wheatley School in Joan’s name.

In 1987, Joan was made a Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques by the French Government. She also received the Ruth Wasley Distinguished Foreign Language Teacher Award from NYSAFLT and the Stefano Morel Award from the Foreign Language Association of Chairmen and Supervisors.

Through all of Joan’s outstanding academic achievements, we will remember her most as a vivacious lady, a pioneer in her field and a fabulous innovator. For her, foreign languages were not academic trials, but useful, exciting and wonderful tools for all to master. LILT will sorely miss her vivacity and talent.

Her husband of fifty years, Klaus, her two daughters, Eva and Alexa, and her four grandchildren survive her.

R. Orin Cornett

The Northeast Conference expresses its condolences to Gallaudet University and to the Cornett family on the loss of Dr. R. Orin Cornett in December, 2002. We thank Gallaudet’s Office of Media Relations and its director, Mike Kaika, for permission to reprint the following obituary.

Dr. R. Orin Cornett, inventor of Cued Speech and former vice president at Gallaudet University, died of a heart attack on December 17 at his home in Laurel, Md. He was 89 years old.

Cornett was born in Driftwood, Okla. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Oklahoma Baptist University, followed by a master’s degree from the University of Oklahoma and a Ph. D. in physics and applied mathematics from the University of Texas. He taught at his alma mater and at Penn State and Harvard universities.

In 1965, he accepted a position as vice president for long-range planning at Gallaudet. During his first year, he developed Cued Speech, with the express purpose of providing a way for deaf and hard of hearing children to become good readers after learning that children with prelingual and profound hearing loss typically had poor reading skills. From 1975 to 1984, he was director of Cued Speech Programs and had adapted Cued Speech to all but four of the 56 languages and dialects in which it is available. When he retired in 1984, Gallaudet awarded him professor emeritus status.

Cornett’s ingenuity also was the primary factor in reducing the Gallaudet football team’s offside penalties. He suggested the offense use a large bass drum at the line of scrimmage. Prior to this unique idea, when the offensive players got on the line of scrimmage, each had to count to themselves—1, 2, 3, and on whatever number the quarterback signaled in the huddle, that is when the ball would be hiked. It was almost impossible to have all 11 players count at the same pace. Invariably, Gallaudet would amass a lot of offside penalties. When the bass drum was introduced, the drummer would hit the drum with a tremendous force until the ball was hiked. Even though Gallaudet players are deaf or hard of hearing, they can feel the vibration from the bass drum and as a result, offside penalties became rare.

Cornett authored many publications in mathematics, physics, electronics, education, and communication. He held three honorary doctorates and was a recipient of the Nitchie Award in Human Communications from the New York League for the Hard of Hearing and the Distinguished Service Award of the National Council on Communication Disorders.

Cornett’s wife of 59 years, Lorene, predeceased him on January 21, 2002. He is survived by three children.

Senator Paul Simon (D-IL)

J. David Edwards
Executive Director
JNCL-NCLIS

The language and international studies communities lost one of our greatest and most respected champions. Former Senator Paul Simon died after undergoing heart surgery. A member of the 1979 President's Commission on Foreign Languages and International Studies, Congressman/ Senator Simon was a tireless advocate for national policies encouraging languages, international education and study abroad. The author of the Tongue-Tied American and numerous articles about America's language needs and shortcoming, Senator Simon was an intellectual leader in the struggle to improve our nation's language skills. In Congress, Paul Simon sponsored numerous bills and amendments to support languages and international education, such as: the Foreign Language Assistance Act, the National Security through Foreign Language Assistance Act and the Global Education Opportunities Act, just to name a few. Chairman of the Board of the National Foreign Language Center, Senator Simon most recently served as Co-Chair of the NAFSA task force that produced "Securing America's Future: Global Education for Global Age - A Report of the Strategic Task Force on Education Abroad." He was the driving force behind the Abraham Lincoln Study Abroad Fellowship Program, which Congress will consider through a commission created in the now pending Omnibus Appropriations bill.

Personally, Paul was a mentor and friend. In the 23 years that we worked together on a variety of projects, I have not known anyone more thoughtful, courageous, honest and decent. He was a gentle man. Paul Simon was truly a public servant dedicated to improving our nation and the world. He will be sorely missed.

Jayne Abrate
Executive Director
AATF

[Text to appear in January AATF National Bulletin, reprinted here with permission.]
The AATF was saddened to learn of the sudden death of AATF Honorary Member and former U. S. Senator Paul Simon (D-IL) on Tuesday, December 9. He was 75 years old. Senator Simon, first as a Congressman and then as a Senator, was a champion of the need for Americans to achieve competence in foreign languages. Senator Simon began his career as the owner of a small-town newspaper and was a prolific writer. Among his more than 20 books was The Tongue-Tied American which highlighted America's deficiencies in foreign languages and how that hindered our economic and diplomatic work around the world.

Senator Simon retired from the Senate in 1997 and founded a Public Policy Institute on the campus of Southern Illinois University. He taught an occasional political science or journalism course and greatly enjoyed his interactions with students. He continued to work on the public policy issues close to his heart, bringing to campus experts, political figures, and celebrities of all political persuasions for seminars and colloquia. In March 2002, the Public Policy Institute hosted a symposium on teaching foreign languages in the elementary school. The participants made a number of recommendations which were later communicated to governors, legislators, and officials in U. S. government agencies concerning support for the early study of foreign languages.

Senator Simon ran for the Democratic nomination for President in 1988. He was known for his trademark bow tie and his straight talking ways. He was made an Honorary Member of the AATF in 1981 and supported the move of AATF National Headquarters from the University of Illinois to Southern Illinois University in 1997. The AATF has made a contribution to the Joint National Committee for Languages-National Council for Languages and International Studies in Washington, DC in his name. I am writing this message to urge those of you who would like to honor Senator Simon's memory, either as an association or individually, to do the same by contacting JNCL-NCLIS, 4646 40th Street, Suite 310, Washington, DC 20016 [info@languagepolicy.org]. The work done at JNCL was near and dear to the Senator's heart, and he supported the work of JNCL both in word and deed.

Rebecca R. Kline
Executive Director
NECTFL

In 1978, the Northeast Conference, for the first time, presented an award to "honor an individual outside the profession, for recognition of work on behalf of languages." The award was given to Paul Simon, then a Congressman from Illinois. The Board of Directors highlighted Simon's "major role … in promoting the formation of a Presidential Commission to study the need for foreign languages and area studies in the United States" (Northeast Conference Newsletter 4, n.d., p. 5). NECTFL then obtained the permission of Change Magazine to reprint a piece by Senator Simon titled "Battling Language Chauvinism" (v.9, no. 11 [November 1977]), in which he wrote that we needed to "reintroduce ourselves to the nations of the world-to share humor with them, to give and receive directions, to explain and understand business contracts or treaties, to explicate our way of life, and to become familiar with other ways." Moreover, Simon concluded, "those who know foreign languages will have to start paying more attention to political processes-so that those who know the political processes can start making the right decisions about foreign languages." Over 25 years old, Senator Simon's words still ring true. And his unwavering commitment to the importance of language and culture study is all the more remarkable when one considers that, as he noted, the German he learned in school was presented as though it were a language "spoken on the moon"!

Senator Paul Simon's death last December leaves foreign language and international studies educators bereft. He was that rarest of adherents to a cause: the person who stands to enjoy no personal or professional gain in exchange for his support. He simply, truly believed that what we do is important. The Northeast Conference expresses its deepest condolences to the Senator's family and friends. Our Dodge Advocacy Award will henceforth be presented with an even stronger sense of the honor conferred through its association with the name of Paul Simon.

Michael B. Kline
Professor of French
Dickinson College

(The following citation was offered by Professor Kline with the conferral of the degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa, on Senator Simon by Dickinson College.)

Paul Simon, each of your separate endeavors-newspaper editor and publisher, legislator and lieutenant governor of Illinois, professor, author, member of Congress-might have given us reason to honor you. It is for a special reason, however, that we applaud you today, at this Commencement in celebration of international education, because your early recognition of America's growing cultural isolation, and your work on behalf of foreign language learning in the United States has been instrumental in alerting the nation to problems more subtle but no less dangerous than those which confront us in demonstrable and massive array.

We know you as a leader in Congress on issues of full employment, world hunger, and human rights. You came to chair in the House of Representatives the Subcommittee on Postsecondary Education of the Education and Labor Committee, from which vantage point you have fought for issues of teacher quality, adult literacy, math and science education, foreign language study, and educational and cultural exchange. Your eight books have treated matters of variegated hue and different scale. We take particular note today of your often-quoted book, The Tongue-Tied American, in which you articulated the problem of inadequate foreign language training and examined its impact on trade and international security.

If you have been appalled by world hunger, you have also demonstrated concern for the linguistic malnourishment which menaces us with cultural isolation in an increasingly interdependent world. As a member of the President's Commission on Foreign Languages and Foreign Area Studies, you understood that if America's ethnic diversity had always been a source of our pride and distinctiveness, we have, nevertheless, clung unreasonably to an Anglophonic parochialism that was often interpreted by others as arrogant cultural chauvinism. You have become an advocate in Congress of foreign language and area studies because you understood that to speak and understand another language is to know both the word and the world. So you wrote, "language is a key to opening minds and attitudes…if we do not understand others' dreams, hopes, and miseries-if we live in a narrow, closeted world-we will fail to elect and select leaders who can take us down the difficult pathway to peace." We honor today your conviction that the future will belong to those nations that are wise as well as strong.

Richard Brod

It is our sad duty to report the death this past March 9 of Richard Brod, who worked at the Modern Language Association for 30 years. Richard was a founder of JNCL-NCLIS, which he served as president in the early 1990s. He was a Director on the Northeast Conference Board from 1985-1988, having been consultant to the 1983 conference chair, Jack Darcey. Richard was, with NECTFL stalwarts Joseph Tursi, Ruth Bennett, Helene Zimmer-Loew and Peter Eddy, among others, a member of the Working Committee on New Publics that composed a report for the 1978 NECTFL annual volume edited by Warren C. Born. In 1980, NECTFL conferred upon him the Nelson H. Brooks Award for leadership in the profession. His history and ours have been intertwined for decades, and it is difficult to imagine being deprived of his dryly witty and trenchant comments on whatever it is we will do in the years to come.
Upon his retirement, the ADFL Bulletin, which he had edited from its inception until 1986, published a tribute to him, composed of the plaudits of dozens of colleagues, which appeared in the spring 2000 issue (vol. 31, no. 3, pp. 59-69). Elizabeth Welles noted that "his knowledge, thoughtfulness, and sense of humor were consistently embellished by the clarity, elegance, and geniality of his writing," and that his "energy, commitment, and intelligence … led to many of the positive developments in foreign language education in this country." Helene Zimmer-Loew reflected on Richard's prescient realization "that only by unifying the various professional language associations around critical policy issues would we have any chance of being recognized as an equal among academic disciplines in the eyes of key political leaders in the House and Senate." James E. Alatis found in him "a loyal friend, dedicated professional, and thoroughly competent scholar" but also "a warm, sensitive, caring human being who has endeared himself to everyone who has had the privilege of knowing him." For David P. Benseler, Richard was "one who displays a high degree of tolerance for ambiguity-which he accepts and mixes with appropriate measures of daring-do and caution." J. David Edwards recalls, "He once asked why I wanted him to present Senate testimony on the Higher Education Act. It was because he is intelligent enough to make them understand, secure enough not to be flustered, humble enough not to insult them, and witty enough to make them pay attention. Plus, Richard looks like the gentle, thoughtful academic that he is." Anne Fountain refers to Richard's "quiet insistence on quality"; David Goldberg to both his courage and his discretion. Robert LaBouve wrote, "he makes me laugh almost more than anyone I know. That he continues to bring joy to my heart seems to surprise him, but it never surprises me." And "… he never failed to recognize different points of view," according to Gladys Lipton. Dorothy James advises us to "Read his articles of the seventies and early eighties, and you will find a humanist arguing with passion for the centrality of the humanities in the education system, a linguist arguing with skill for the centrality of language in the study of the humanities, a fine human being arguing with total conviction for the crying need for academic humanists to involve themselves in 'the debates over education, an arena in which injustice, greed, mendacity, and sheer foolishness have too often been allowed to rage unchecked' ("Back to the Center: Activism and the Humanities," ADFL Bulletin 12.3 [1981]: 12)." Indeed. Finally, Murray Sachs comments, "His goal was to bring unity of purpose, and a strong commitment to professionalism, to a segment of the academic community that was by nature fragmented and factionalized"-a goal accomplished thanks to Richard Brod, in Professor Sachs' eyes. Yet Richard would be the first to remind us that, like good marriages or friendships, the unity in a profession such as ours can be maintained only through constant attention, daily work, and a sincere willingness to listen and to compromise. Richard once said, at a JNCL-NCLIS meeting, "I hate the word 'tolerance'-why should we merely 'tolerate' each other?" In his memory, let us end the "zero-sum" thinking that mere tolerance permits. Let us instead celebrate each other-and all others-as Richard did.

Rebecca R. Kline

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