UNITED STATES The attempt to make general the employment of the "direct method," in the teaching of foreign modern languages in the United States had begun to subside before 1909, when it became clear that the method was looked on askance in the best high schools and preparatory schools, and especially in the colleges and universities. Many teachers were well acquainted with foreign languages by ancestry and study abroad; but some could not speak such languages with ease. Also, the increasing desire for travel in Europe, now so manifest, was only beginning to develop. In the universities and colleges, the professors laughed the matter out of court. But agitation over the direct method has borne fruit. Indeed, nearly all the text-books in modern languages bear an im print, however faint, of the direct method, the influence of which has been beneficial. It is true, furthermore, that the World War gave a strong and perhaps lasting impulse to the study of the spoken language.
Much of the improvement in the teaching of the modern lan guages came from another source: the introduction of phonetics. This study made its way under two forms : formal or theoretical and experimental phonetics. The first came from both France and Germany, as well as from the English school of Bell and Sweet ; the latter came from France. French influence was also seen in the steady extension through the universities and high schools of the international phonetic alphabet, which is now the only one used in the United States in teaching the foreign spoken languages. This alphabet was contrived by Paul Passey (who took hints from Ellis, Bell, Sweet and others) and began to be known in the early '9os.
The science of experimental phonetics was founded by the Abbe Rousselot, whose laboratory at first was in the Institut Catliolique, Paris, then in the College de France. Two or three scholars began research at Harvard university at about the same time as Rous selot in France. The study of experimental phonetics is being given an ever growing importance in the training of teachers of the modern languages in the United States. Courses in this sub ject are offered in many American universities and colleges, e.g., at the universities of Chicago, Michigan, Ohio State, Utah, at New York university and Washington and Jefferson college. Middlebury college offers in the summer a full list of courses in experimental and theoretical phonetics for teachers. It is said that Boston university is about to equip a laboratory. The University of Havana, Cuba, did so many years ago.
The World War favoured the extension of French in the United States. Combined reports from about 76% of the elementary schools, public and private, and the high schools and academies and from about 89% of the colleges and universities indicate an enrolment during the year 1923-24 of 629,000 students of French, of Spanish and 65,00o of German. (R. WE.)