Since the events of September 11, 2001, one of the resources that the federal government has been forced to reexamine is its foreign language capability. A 2001 study found that more than 80 federal agencies required foreign language proficiency to fulfill their duties.1 In the past few years, a government-wide effort has begun to ensure that the language needs identified by various departments are being met.

The Department of Defense and the Center for Advanced Study of Language at the University of Maryland in 2004 convened the National Language Conference where they brought together experts from government, academic, and private industry sectors to discuss the state of the nation’s language capabilities. These experts identified needs and made recommendations which will be drawn up and presented to Congress in an attempt to spur the creation of a national foreign language agenda.2 The theme of the conference emerged after two days of discussion as “A Sputnik Moment,” recalling the 1957 impetus for the National Defense Education Act; conference participants hoped that the events of the previous three years had sparked the same renewed dedication to language studies in the United States.3

Besides the white papers produced by the conference, several pieces of legislation have been introduced to Congress concerning foreign language education and maintaining a supply of foreign language professionals. During a 2004 House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence hearing on Intelligence Community language capabilities, Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA) stated, “As a nation, I think we’ve not sufficiently valued and embraced foreign languages. So we have to do everything we can to improve our capabilities because the security of our nation and the safety, certainly of our dedicated men and women serving abroad, really depends on it.”4

The movement toward addressing the nation’s foreign language issues has also been buttressed by two executive departments’ initiatives to examine their own policies and procedures regarding language needs. By 2004, the Defense Department had begun its “Defense Language Transformation Initiative” and the Department of State its “Language Continuum.”5 Many departments recognize that their effectiveness in dealing with national security and international diplomacy depends in part on their foreign language capability.

Why should we assess Department of Homeland Security needs?

It is important for DHS to join this government-wide effort to improve foreign language capabilities. An assessment of the many agencies’ current capabilities, policies and procedures, and needs would allow DHS to employ specific strategies to build up their capabilities. Several surveys of government language capabilities were conducted between 1999 and 2002 before DHS was created.

These surveys did include government agencies that were later brought into DHS. Therefore, the language needs of some current DHS agencies were made apparent. For example, the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Intelligence Division, and U.S. Customs and Border Protection have expressed their need for language specialists to respond in a national security emergency,6 and the Coast Guard, which conducted its own language needs assessment in 1999, found that its daily duties were hindered by language limitations.7

These findings do not suggest, however, that language needs are completely ignored in these agencies; for example, Border Patrol officials are trained in Spanish at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center.8 However, if a department-wide assessment were conducted, other critical languages could be determined and those needs could be addressed. The goal of a needs assessment would be to identify specific solutions for specific needs.

How to assess foreign language needs

Language capabilities and needs can be analyzed through the perspective of the Strategic Market Forces Framework described by Richard D. Brecht and William P. Rivers in 2000. This model, based on economics, examines the demand, supply, capacity, and need for language expertise in order to determine the status of the foreign language market.9 Applied to DHS, this model would define demand as the current official foreign language requirements in the department; supply would be the language expertise available to the department; capacity would be the capability of the available expertise supply to fulfill current and future needs at the department; finally, the need would encompass the specific number of professionals needed and at what proficiency in the necessary language.10 Noting this general model provides an understanding of what questions should go into an assessment of current DHS capabilities and needs. We want to ensure that the need is reflected by the demand and that the necessary supply is available.

The question of what specific language needs DHS might have also provides insight into how to plan to fulfill future needs. Because of the unique mission of DHS to protect the homeland, it has both internal intelligence and security needs as well as a responsibility to the American public to provide services and to protect in times of emergency. Within the ranks of DHS employees, there are many examples of language need that can be fulfilled by employees in two general categories. The first category consists of employees whose foreign language proficiency is necessary in addition to some other skill. An example would be a Border Patrol officer who has significant procedural training in addition to foreign language training. The second category consists of employees whose job is characterized by their language ability. An example of this would be a translator or interpreter who is hired for that specific skill.11

While DHS has in-house needs where language is necessary for the completion of daily missions and tasks, it requires foreign languages to provide a service for the public. In times of crisis, the Emergency Preparedness and Response directorate responds to public need. One possible barrier in providing public services is language. According to a U.S. Census Bureau report, 18% of the population speak one of 380 languages other than English at home, and roughly 8% speak English less than “very well.”12 These members of the population, or those who have limited English proficiency, regularly require services such as medical and court interpreting; however, they also need interpretation services in emergencies. For example, after the attack on the World Trade Center in 2001, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, now part of DHS, hired translators for more than 35 languages at its downtown Manhattan Disaster Assistance Service Center.13 Therefore, determining language needs and addressing them will ultimately allow DHS to better fulfill its mission to “reduce the vulnerability of the United States to terrorism” and “minimize the damage, and assist in the recovery, from terrorist attacks that do occur.”14 Information such as the number of language professionals needed as well as which languages are most critical must be determined along with current DHS policies regarding language recruitment, hiring, and training.

Recommendations for meeting short-term language needs

Once the department has identified its most immediate needs, there are several models in place regarding policies and procedures that can be instated. The Government Accounting Office in 2002 released a report examining the language policies of the U.S. Army, the State Department, the Foreign Commercial Service, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.15 In a summary of those policies, the report discussed strategies that the agencies used to address their language needs. The GAO analysis found that these strategies fell into three general categories: staff development, external resources, and uses of technology.16

The staff development strategies include language training, pay incentives, and attractive career paths for linguists. In-house language training is conducted by the departments of Defense and State at their Defense Language Institute and Foreign Service Institute, respectively. Pay incentives may be instated to encourage employees to maintain or increase their language proficiency or to learn a new language. Attractive career paths have been developed to decrease the rate of attrition of language professionals.

The second type of strategies focus on bringing foreign language professionals into the department. These strategies include hiring contract staff, recruiting native speakers of the critical languages, and recruiting language-capable professionals. Many agencies will hire contract staff to fill immediate or short-term needs. Some federal agencies, including the U.S. Army, also put effort into recruiting native speakers of critical languages. This resource of heritage speakers in the United States, or citizens who are bilingual in another language and English, may prove valuable to government agencies that need highly proficient language professionals. The potential for this portion of the language supply is underscored by the U.S. Census finding that 55% of those who spoke a language other than English at home also spoke English “very well.”17 The State Department and others stress language ability in their recruitment by giving extra points in the hiring process to those who have demonstrated language proficiency.

The third category of strategies primarily consists of efforts to use technology to strengthen language capability. This includes machine translation, such as the Phraselator, which has been used by the Army.18 Other efforts include creating a database of employee language abilities, such as the Law Enforcement Interagency Linguist Access database, which provides information about language contractors and is available across the Department of Justice.

A study conducted by the National Security Education Program found that there is sufficient need for skilled linguists during crises to warrant keeping proficient speakers on reserve for federal agencies.19 This type of reserve corps may also work to fulfill the public language needs of DHS discussed earlier. If, for example, U.S. Census language data were used to identify pockets of non–English-speaking communities, those foreign languages might be targeted by the volunteer reserve corps to provide language services in a particular area of the country in times of emergency. Such information about where various heritage communities are located in the country is available; one source is the Modern Language Association Language Map, which shows the density of speakers of 30 of the most commonly spoken languages in the United States.20 A database of paid interpreters would also be useful to serve everyday needs of court and medical interpreting. These types of dual-benefit solutions would create a language infrastructure to serve the public in peacetime and during national emergencies. Brecht and Rivers stressed this need to warehouse language capabilities, because without such resources, “agencies must react to sudden demand by ad hoc programs of recruitment and training,” which “inevitably results in shortfall of supply.”21

Maintaining language capabilities

Besides implementing procedures to meet immediate language needs, DHS must put in place a system to maintain its language capabilities. One example of how this can be accomplished is evident in the Defense Language Transformation Initiative, which calls for appointing a Senior Language Authority for each service or agency within the Defense Department to represent that agency’s language issues on the Defense Language Steering Committee.22

Another important effort is for DHS to join the language community that has emerged among federal agencies. A DHS language officer should represent the department’s language capabilities and needs at various language-focused interagency groups, including the Interagency Language Roundtable, which has regular meetings with representatives from various federal agencies to discuss common needs and goals.23 Another such organization is the National Security Education Program, which has representatives from the federal government on its board to advise the program on the execution of its scholarship and fellowship program.24

Finally, DHS may be able to take the lead in supplying language professionals through its own educational initiatives. Much of the recent legislation looking at bolstering U.S. language capability urged various initiatives and incentives to increase educational opportunities for foreign language study in languages critical to U.S. security. For example, the Homeland Security Federal Workforce Act suggested a National Security Fellowship for students studying disciplines important to national security, including foreign languages.25 DHS has already put in place its Scholars and Fellows Program, which provides scholarships to undergraduate and graduate students who are studying issues critical to homeland security. The program also requires an internship on a DHS-funded project; this program could expand its scope to students of foreign languages needed within DHS, once those languages are identified.

Academic programs have been further encouraged by the Homeland Security Education Act, which not only proposes loan forgiveness for study of critical languages such as Chinese, Arabic, Korean, and Russian, but also proposes a feasibility study for a National Language Foundation.26 Examples of this type of research center are the Center for Advanced Study of Language, a university-affiliated research center sponsored by the Defense Department. Through its Science and Technology Directorate, DHS has also encouraged new research and a relationship with the academic community by creating the Centers of Excellence program, in which research centers focusing on homeland security issues are sponsored at universities across the country. If such a center were devoted to applied linguistics, it could create the necessary language infrastructure for DHS.

These efforts would aid in maintaining the necessary language capabilities and providing a line of communication for language needs throughout the department. Ultimately, the goal is for DHS to put in place a language system that will grow with the young department rather than wait to address this issue and have it emerge as a weakness. An initial assessment of current practices and needs would allow the necessary administrative measures to be taken. Finally, the department need not start from scratch in its language efforts; there are several models in place for dealing with language capabilities, and the goal of initiatives such as the National Language Conference has been for federal agencies to work together on this issue and coordinate their efforts to fill gaps in federal foreign language needs.

References

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1. Ted Crump, “Translating and Interpreting in the Federal Government,” American Translators Association, 2001.

2. Center for Advanced Study of Language, “An Introduction to American’s Language Needs and Resources: National Language Conference Briefing Document,” University of Maryland, 2004; http://www.nlconference.org/docs/NLCBkgdweb.pdf.

3. Samuel G. Freedman, “After Sputnik, It Was Russian; After 9/11, Should It Be Arabic?” New York Times, June 16, 2004; http://www.samuelfreedman.com/articles/education/nyt06162004.html.

4. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Policy and National Security Subcommittee, Committee Hearing on Intelligence Community Language Capabilities, Federal Document Clearing House Political Transcripts, May 13, 2004.

5. Center for Advanced Study of Language, p. 14.

6. National Security Education Program, “United States Civilian Linguist Reserve Corps Feasibility Study,” National Defense University, 2003; http://www.ndu.edu/nsep/CivilianLinguistReserveCorpsFeasibilityStudy.pdf.

7. National Security Education Program, “Analysis of Federal Language Needs,” 2001; http://www.ndu.edu/nsep/Federal_Language_Needs_2001.htm.

8. Federal Law Enforcement Training Center, “2003-2004 Catalog of Training Programs.”

9. Richard D. Brecht and William P. Rivers, Language and National Security for the 21st Century: The Role of Title VI/Fulbright-Hays in Supporting National Language Capacity, Kendall-Hunt and the National Foreign Language Center, 2000.

10. Ibid., p. 20.

11. R. T. Clifford, “Foreign Language Needs in the U.S. Government,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, vol. 511, 1990, pp. 109-121.

12. “Census 2000 Brief: Language Use and English-Speaking Ability: 2000,” U.S. Department of Commerce, 2003; http://www.census.gov/prod/2003pubs/c2kbr-29.pdf.

13. “From 9/11 to One-to-One: FEMA’s Disaster Assistance Service Center,” Federal Emergency Management Agency; http://www.fema.gov/remember911/911_one.shtm.

14. Homeland Security Act of 2002; http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=107_cong_public_laws&docid=f:publ296.107.pdf.

15. U.S. General Accounting Office, “Report to Congressional Requestors. Foreign Languages: Human Capital Approach Needed to Correct Staffing and Proficiency Shortfalls,” GAO-02-375, Jan. 2002; http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d02375.pdf.

16. General Accounting Office, pp. 15-21.

17. Department of Commerce, p. 2.

18. Bill Atkinson, “A Hand-Held Translator Is Boon to GIs in Iraq,” Baltimore Sun, May 18, 2004.

19. National Security Education Program, “U.S. Civilian Linguist Reserve Corps Feasibility Study,” p. 5.

20. Modern Language Association; http://www.mla.org/census_main.

21. Brecht and Rivers, p. 101.

22. U.S. Department of Defense, “Defense Language Transformation Information Paper,” June 2004.

23. Interagency Language Roundtable; http://www.govtilr.org/.

24. National Security Education Program; http://www.ndu.edu/nsep/.

25. Homeland Security Federal Workforce Act, S. 589, 108th Cong. (2003).

26. Homeland Security Education Act, S. 2299, 108th Cong. (2004).