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Languages now: from crisis to transformation?
Abstract
The article addresses the multiple challenges faced by the language disciplines across the educational pipeline in the UK, with a particular focus on Higher Education (HE). It explores the reasons, both global and local, for the current situation, and sets out the contexts—relating to policy and social realities such as multilingualism—in which a ‘new public idea about language’ is to be forged. There is a focus on the decline in numbers of language learners in schools, impediments to student mobility, the contraction in lesser-taught languages and the social justice issues that result from the emergence of cold spots in HE provision. The article concludes with a discussion of a number of measures, cross-sectoral and cross-disciplinary, that have been adopted to enhance public understanding of languages, promote linguistically sensitive policymaking and encourage the establishment of a national languages strategy. This article is published in the thematic collection ‘On recent closures and threats of closure in the Humanities and Social Sciences’, edited by Regenia Gagnier.
Keywords
cold spotseducational pipelinelanguagesmultilingualismnational languages strategypolicypublic understandingsocial justicestudent mobility The language disciplines, with that subject category understood broadly and inclusively, are currently navigating multiple transformations across the educational pipeline in the UK, as the fields they encompass face a series of increasingly significant challenges. These include global phenomena, such as the consolidation of English as a transnational lingua franca or advances in new technologies in language acquisition (as well as in translation and interpreting), and more localised ones such as political uncertainty following Brexit (relating not least to the youth mobility on which language acquisition and the development of intercultural agility depend). While all these shifts have exacerbated a set of circumstances that are increasingly associated with disciplinary crisis, such developments in languages remain in many ways paradoxical, especially as the UK rapidly acknowledges its own status as a multilingual country [with English complemented by the nation’s minoritised languages as well as a broad range of Home, Heritage and Community Languages (HHCLs)]. At the same time, with the growing emphasis on international connectivity in a wide range of sectors, not least in the context of the new government’s theme of ‘Britain reconnected’, language skills are more important than ever.
In a lecture first delivered in 2000, Mary Louise Pratt called for a ‘new public idea about language’ in the USA (Pratt 2003). Within the UK, this aspiration is reflected (in part at least) in an increasingly successful effort to forge unity across traditionally disparate disciplinary areas, that is, across Modern Languages, Classical Languages, Language-Based Area Studies, Celtic Studies and Sign Language Studies. With Linguistics also increasingly under threat as a subject area, as is evidenced by several recent departmental closures or other significant contractions, the need to foster broader links, to identify wider cross-disciplinary connections and to encourage further synergies acquire additional urgency. Despite such shifts, however, what often seems to remain unresolved is the question of how to determine and forge any sense of shared function or purpose. Such uncertainty is partly reflected in the remarkable eclecticism of objects of study explored by those engaged in languages teaching and research (and in the range of methodologies deployed to analyse them), partly in the varying expectations of students, parents, government stakeholders and indeed wider society of the value of language study and of a languages degree: are these intellectual or functional? academic or vocational? related to education and skills or endowed with wider societal relevance?
Researchers and teachers in languages do not, of course, have any monopoly over these questions relating to purpose, value and future direction. Such concerns are exercising all colleagues across the Arts and Humanities at a time when our fields are collectively under pressure, both political and financial. Answers from the perspective of languages involve, however, all the elements set out above. Studying languages offers a range of advantages to the individual as well as to society more broadly. The development in each generation of a valuable range of language skills in a body of highly trained modern linguists is complemented by a number of other benefits, including creativity, criticality and (notably in the context of a Year Abroad, as observed above) intercultural agility. With such acknowledgement of value comes the recognition of an opportunity cost as the risks of neglecting language study and of allowing a decline in UK national capacity in languages become increasingly clear. Yet, despite this renewed articulation of the importance of languages across multiple sectors, their future in UK universities remains uncertain. With language degrees being intensive to deliver and reliant on the complex institutional structures required to provide multiple, language-specific modules, language departments are becoming low-hanging fruit when universities, faced with significant operating deficits, seek to achieve rapid savings. The situation is compounded by additional subject-specific challenges, not least the reduced numbers of candidates in languages post-14 and post-16, notably at GCSE and A-level. In 2002, shortly before the obligation to study a language at Key Stage 4 was removed, 76 per cent of young people took a GCSE in a language. By 2011, this had dropped to 40 per cent (Muradás-Taylor 2023: 323). The last Conservative government stated an ambition—as part of an English baccalaureate—to raise the proportion of young people taking a language GCSE to 75 per cent by 2022 and 90 per cent by the year 2025. These targets have not been met and the current percentage of candidates for languages at GCSE, while constituting an overall increase from that previous low point, seems to remain below 50 per cent. For A-level, there is similar evidence of decline: 40,000 language entries in 1996 had reduced to 27,000 by 2005 and have remained low ever since (Muradás-Taylor 2023: 323). More recently, in 2024, in a context where the 18-year old population has grown (by 0.9 per cent) and overall comparatively more students are taking A-levels, French entries increased by 6.8 per cent (from 7,063 in 2023 to 7,544 in 2024), Spanish entries by 1.6 per cent (from 8,110 to 8,238) and German by 3.1 per cent (from 2,358 to 2,431), with other languages also rising from 5,955 to 6,429.1
At just below 25,000 in 2024, the decline in the total number of entries for language A-levels may now have plateaued and may even—in response to a series of initiatives, including language ambassador or mentoring schemes—be showing evidence of the beginnings of a modest increase.2 Despite signs of a reversal of past trends, sustaining and then ideally growing the provision of language degrees in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) remains a major challenge. These courses have a higher delivery cost as they relate to a semi-practical subject requiring smaller classes and lower staff–student ratios [but they no longer benefit from the additional funding associated with differential banding, especially when the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) categorised languages as Strategically Important and Vulnerable Subjects (SIVs)]. While still seen as an integral element of a language programme, the Year Abroad is also viewed by many institutions as anomalous in the context of otherwise standardised degree structures. Post-Brexit, with withdrawal from Erasmus+ and in the context of its unsatisfactory alternative, the Turing scheme, this element is increasingly expensive to deliver.3 Moreover, language departments are complex units, often delivering programmes across a selection of smaller languages, which means little flexibility in covering for research leave or deciding on replacements when posts become vacant. Financial sustainability is further threatened by the fact that some posts, especially in lesser-taught languages, are often reliant on shared funding with cultural partners, and current visa arrangements make the employment of Native Language Assistants increasingly more challenging (British Academy 2022b).
The result is that the current landscape for languages in UK HE remains volatile and unpredictable, with evidence of considerable changes in provision in recent years, ranging from contraction in the range of languages offered to more significant departmental closures. As a result of the fall in numbers of language students at A-level (or equivalent) noted above, numerous universities have limited their language provision: 105 universities in the UK offered languages in the year 2000, and this was reduced to 62 by 2013 (Muradás-Taylor 2023: 323). There have been several prominent closures in recent years, especially Aston and Hull where national campaigns to defend the subjects in the institutions gained little traction. Over the past year, with the increased financial precarity across the HE sector, the situation has become more acute, with public scrutiny directed at management plans to alter radically (or even discontinue) language provision at a number of universities, including in recent times Aberdeen, Kent, Surrey and the University of Central Lancashire (Ayres-Bennett 2024). The different contexts evident across these universities—in terms of geographical location, institutional mission and demographic mix of the student body—reveal the renewed risks faced by languages across the sector. In each case, a decision by an individual HEI to contract language provision has had implications for regional language policy, as this relates to the creation of a pipeline for Initial Teacher Education, support for minoritised languages or the need for skilled linguists to underpin growth in the local economy.
The national languages community—through bodies such as the University Council for Languages (UCFL) and the Institute for Languages, Cultures and Societies (ILCS)—proposes an increasingly focused and bespoke response to proposed departmental closures or significant contractions, offering advice on the disciplinary context or on possible solutions adopted successfully in other institutions. The relationship between the provision of language degrees and the offerings of language centres or Institution-Wide Language Programmes has, for instance, been subject to growing scrutiny, with synergies between the two—especially in the case of lesser-taught languages—offering effective solutions in a number of cases. What has become apparent is the lack of weight attached in many institutions to research performance in languages, especially that reflected in results from REF2021. There is a growing concern that institutional indifference to arguments about research excellence will contribute to a rapid contraction of previously world-leading infrastructure in languages (and indeed across the Arts and Humanities more broadly), with pockets of excellence such as the Surrey Morphology Group and the Vladimir Vysotsky Centre for Slavonic Studies at the University of Central Lancashire serving as examples of units that have risked vulnerability in contexts of institutional disinvestment. This tendency stems in large part from a key disconnection within HE policy that results in teaching and research no longer seen as interdependent but controlled instead from different perspectives and by different ministries (notably the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and the Department for Education), with varying responsibilities across the jurisdictions of the UK.
In a number of universities, languages are delivered in units alongside other disciplines, and there has been growing evidence of cross-disciplinary alliances emerging to defend languages and cognate subject areas. This is notably true across Modern Languages, Linguistics and English (the English Association, through initiatives such as ‘Thinking Forwards’, has proved particularly active in creating connections between fields). With the development of tools, such as an interactive map that tracks the UK’s subject ‘cold spots’, the British Academy continues to work with UCFL, ILCS and other bodies to monitor developments, support threatened units, share good practice in terms of innovation and renewal, and work to develop a new public idea about languages that not only foregrounds the UK’s status as a multilingual country, but also promotes the need for linguistically sensitive policymaking.
It is the lack of any national strategic focus in languages that has led both to cold spots and to declining opportunities in lesser-taught languages. There is growing concern about access to languages at degree level, with this situation creating significant issues of social justice. The work of Becky Muradás-Taylor on the availability of languages in ‘lower-tariff’ universities is particularly striking in this regard. Whereas previously most post-92 institutions had language provision, with some units in the 1980s and 1990s pioneering significant innovations in the field (including the integration of film studies or the extension of the curriculum to encompass postcolonial literature and culture), only ten now retain degree-level provision (Muradás-Taylor 2023: 323). As Muradás-Taylor notes, before 2014, seventeen institutions had already closed their languages degrees, and since 2014 another eleven have been added to this list, making a total of twenty-eight closures in a period of just over two decades. This has been achieved through a mixture of compulsory or voluntary redundancies and redeployment of staff. The evidence that language degrees are retained in some form in just ten teaching-intensive institutions requires close scrutiny, for the level of provision is uneven and the range of subjects offered often very limited. Italian and German have been subject to particular contraction, and some universities have been left with single languages, the sustainability of which is in doubt as students seek increasingly to study two or more languages in combination. Where degrees in languages have been closed, a residual commitment can be seen in the teaching of a language as a subsidiary, with subjects such as international business. This contraction across the sector in lower-tariff institutions has led to the development of what Muradás-Taylor dubs ‘cold-spots’, indicating the ways in which the patchiness of geographical provision in languages needs to be understood with a greater degree of granularity and through an intersectional lens.
There is clear evidence that those universities that are less likely to have provision in languages at degree level have often recruited greater numbers of students from less socioeconomically privileged and non-traditional backgrounds, as well as from under-represented groups with reduced capacity to travel away from home to study for a degree. In this context, the (in)accessibility of language degrees has become a major social justice issue, compounded by the fact that the pathways leading from secondary education are already distorted: significant challenges in terms of widening participation result from the fact that disproportionate numbers of languages students are increasingly taught in independent schools (Lanvers 2017). There is nevertheless some evidence of expansion in recent years, notably in Korean, and where offered, Institution Wide Language Programmes remain relatively buoyant with much interest from international students. The broader trends, however, reveal a rapid contraction of degree provision in lesser-taught languages. It is no longer possible for students to take degrees in major languages with strategic importance such as Urdu or Hausa, and in a context of financial constraints, even SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies) has downgraded or discontinued a range of its language degrees. The result is that, while speakers of HHCLs in UK are encouraged—not least through a network of dedicated complementary schools—to take formal qualifications in these languages (Urdu is included, for instance, as an L2 in Scotland as part of the ‘1 + 2’ policy), there is no place to continue study of them at university. As part of the 2020 Towards a National Languages Strategy (TNLS), the British Academy and partners [Arts and Humanities Research Cultures (AHRC), Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL), British Council and Universities UK (UUK)] are proposing the establishment of Languages Challenge Funds to encourage innovation in or expansion of provision, ensuring that national provision in strategically important languages is not dependent on the whim of individual institutions. This is a key area where an effective sectoral regulator could provide the strategic overview required (Black 2024), with the adoption of digital technology and coordinated development of regional/national consortia likely to be part of any solution that allows access to a broader range of language degrees.
Despite the gravity of the situation, there is clear evidence of emerging solutions, especially—where languages are still offered—around new subject combinations and the sorts of innovations in the curriculum (notably engagement with sustainability and entrepreneurship) proposed by the recently redrafted Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) benchmarking statement for Languages, Cultures and Societies. Moreover, recent policy initiatives [echoing recommendations in Towards a National Languages Strategy but also reflecting coordinated engagement with bodies such as the Cross-Government Languages Group as well as the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Modern Languages] are beginning to bear fruit. The Languages Gateway, which describes itself a ‘one-stop shop for all things languages in the UK’, was launched in October 2023.4 Ofqual have positively adjusted GCSE grades in French and German to reflect the severity of marking of language exams in comparison to other subject areas, although there is a need to continue to argue for greater adjustment. The Strategic Committee for Languages in Higher Education, a body which tracks trends in the provision of languages in the UK, has been active since 2022, and at the other end of the pipeline, there is growing consensus around the need for education in languages at primary level to acknowledge the existing linguistic resources of pupils while privileging a multilingual sensitivity that will facilitate transition to secondary school (notably in England, from KS2 to KS3).
In a number of other sections of the languages pipeline that leads to university admissions, issues are outstanding or in progress. TNLS expresses concerns that current qualifications for students post-16 are too limiting, meaning that those who take a GCSE or equivalent but who decide against continuing with A-level or Highers are obliged to discontinue language study. In the context of the Department of Education curriculum and assessment review in England, conversations around ‘core languages’ or ‘applied languages’ have recently re-commenced. These developments include advocacy for the integration of languages into vocational and technical qualifications, notably in Further Education (FE) where languages are currently not seen as a priority (Collen et al. 2023). With the UK’s disassociation from Erasmus+, restrictions to staff and student mobility remain a concern. The commencement of the Turing scheme has created issues relating to languages study, although the Welsh Taithe scheme has restored some of the benefits lost. Universities have been obliged to negotiate agreements with partner organisations bilaterally; students with UK passports find the visa application process for work or study in Europe time-consuming and unpredictable; and languages departments are faced with funding challenges as they seek to ensure that the Year Abroad is affordable for all undergraduates. Recently, the British Academy called for reassociation to Erasmus+ in their pre-election ‘A manifesto for the Social Sciences, Humanities and the Arts’ (British Academy 2024), a proposal echoed by UUK in their Autumn 2024 ‘Opportunity, growth and partnership: a blueprint for change from the UK’s universities’ (UUK 2024). Finally, the delivery of languages across the pipeline depends on a robust strategy for language teacher recruitment and retention, areas in which problems persist across the UK. The British Academy continues to monitor this situation and advocate for a joined-up approach across the administrations to address this.
Since the publication of TNLS in 2020, the broader contexts in which strategy and policy relating to languages are developed have evolved considerably. As noted above, there is growing evidence, reflected not least in public health initiatives in the context of Covid-19 and an increased awareness of the importance of Public Service Interpreting, of recognition in both policy and research of the social and cognitive benefits of multilingualism (Woll & Li 2019) and of the need to acknowledge the importance of pre-existing HHCLs in the UK (Matras 2024). At the same time, there is enhanced focus on the impact of artificial intelligence and other digital technologies on language acquisition and translation/interpreting. Engagement of academics with the Cross-Government Languages Group and other related bodies has emphasised the importance of acknowledging languages in a broader range of policy areas, grounded in but moving beyond education and skills. It is likely that the mission-based approach to government of the new Labour administration—with emphases on, for example, ‘kickstarting economic growth’ and ‘breaking down barriers to opportunity’—will permit mechanisms through which we can frame and demonstrate the urgent need for languages and the centrality of multilingualism to society.
There remain significant challenges, nevertheless, relating to the mismatch between institutional approaches to languages in HEI and the lack of any national strategy in this area. Evidence of these challenges is provided by the regular threats of departmental closures and contractions discussed at the beginning of this piece. TNLS outlined in 2020 a series of measures whose ambition was the establishment of a national languages strategy. This goal will provide a coherent pathway for languages across the educational life cycle, from primary to FE and HE. Such an approach will build on recognition of the importance of celebrating and harnessing the existing (and often underutilised) linguistic resources of the UK. It will as such include support for provision in complementary schools while ensuring that a broader range of qualifications are developed, so that languages are genuinely available for all. There is a risk that repeated claims of crisis in the languages disciplines risk generating a self-fulfilling prophecy. Yet we are seeing increasing evidence of a shift from such talk of crisis to the forms of disciplinary transformations that will ensure that languages are central to our responses to the challenges of the 21st century: university departments are working purposefully across sectors to ensure joined-up approaches to the future of languages; they are collaborating with a broad range of organisations committed to languages; researchers and teachers in languages are committed to acknowledging the importance of languages in the UK science base (Levitt et al. 2009), across disciplines and—within the British Academy—across sections and in dialogue with other national academies.5 These approaches rely on the formulation of clear policy requests around which the languages community can gather, developed in collaboration with key partners such as the APPG for Modern Languages and the Cross-Government Languages Group. They also depend on the support of initiatives, such as the Languages Gateway, which contribute to an urgently required new public idea about languages—according to which the articulation of educational, cultural and social value is complemented by advocacy for the cognitive benefits of multilingualism and the importance of languages for business. The current threat to language departments in HE is part of a broader downplaying of the importance of languages others than English in the Anglophone world. The opportunity costs of perpetuating the current situation are high. The onus is on those who teach and research languages, cultures and societies in our universities to make a collective commitment to being in the vanguard of change.
References
Ayres-BennettW. (2024), Report on Modern Languages Closures and Restructurings (University Council for Languages). https://university-council-for-languages.org/2024/07/08/report-on-modern-languages-closures-and-restructurings/
BlackJ. (25 April 2024), ‘Just like football, UK universities need a regulator’, British Academy Blog. https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/news/just-like-football-uk-universities-need-a-regulator/
British Academy (2020), The Importance of Languages in Global Context: An International Call to Action. https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publications/the-importance-of-languages-in-global-context-an-international-call-to-action/
British Academy (2022a), What Works: Languages Mentoring and Ambassador Programmes. https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publications/what-works-languages-mentoring-and-ambassador-programmes/
British Academy (2022b), Visas for Language Assistants and Lectors (British Academy) https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publications/visas-for-language-assistants-and-lectors/
British Academy (2023), The Turing Scheme: Understanding Impacts and Implications. https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publications/turing-scheme-understanding-impacts-and-implications/
British Academy (2024), A Manifesto for the Social Sciences, Humanities and the Arts. https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publications/manifesto-social-sciences-humanities-arts/
CollenI., HendersonL., LiuM.-C., Aisling O’BoyleA. & RobertsJ. (2023), Languages Provision in UK Further Education (British Academy). https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publications/languages-provision-in-uk-further-education/
LanversU. (2017), ‘Elitism in language learning in the UK’, in
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MatrasY. (2024), Speech and the City: Multilingualism, Decoloniality and the Civic University (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press). https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108757959
Muradás-TaylorB. (2023), ‘Undergraduate language programmes in England: A widening participation crisis’, Arts and Humanities in Higher Education, 22(3): 322–342. https://doi.org/10.1177/14740222231156812
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1
Statistics from Joint Council for Qualifications, https://www.jcq.org.uk/.
2
The British Academy published a ‘What Works’ paper in 2022 on ‘Languages Mentoring and Ambassador Programmes’ (British Academy 2022a).
3
For the British Academy review of Turing, see ‘The Turing Scheme: understanding impacts and implications’ (British Academy 2023).
4
Available at: https://www.thelanguagesgateway.uk.
5
In 2020, the British Academy, American Academy of Arts, Sciences, Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia, Australian Academy of the Humanities and the Royal Society of Canada published, for instance, ‘The Importance of Languages in Global Context: An International Call to Action’ (British Academy 2020).
Cite
DOI: 10.5871/jba/013.a06
Published on: 20 March 2025
Volume: 13
Issue: Issue 1
Article view count: 507
Article download count: 37
Copyright statement
© The author(s) 2025. This is an open access article licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International LicenseCite this article
Forsdick, C. (2025), ‘Languages now: from crisis to transformation?’, Journal of the British Academy, 13(1): a06 https://doi.org/10.5871/jba/013.a06Crossref
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Received
October 2022
Accepted
May 2023
Published
July 2023
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