美国20世纪双语教育发展状况解析

The Development and Analysis of American Bilingual Education in the 20th Century

双语教育是美国20世纪语言政策的主要特征。美国双语教育政策的制定和废除在很大程度上与联邦政府和整个美国社会对待移民的态度有关。美国20世纪的双语教育大体经历了三个时期,即双语教育限制期(1900-1950)、双语教育蓬勃发展期(1958-1980)、双语教育排斥期(1981-2002)。探究双语教育从被限制到发展,再到排斥,其原因主要是多语种存在的事实、60年代民权运动的冲击、多元文化思潮的挑战、英语中心主义以及昂格鲁-撒克逊文化趋同理念所致,其根本目的是为保护英语的中心地位和加强美国单元文化。

Bilingual education was a typical characteristic of the American language policy in the 20th century.The establishment and eventual abolishment of the American bilingual education policy had,to a great extent much to do with the attitudes of the Federal Government and society as a whole to the immigrants.Generally,American bilingual education in the 20th century experienced three periods：namely the period of restriction（1900-1950）;the period of development（1958-1980） and the period of exclusion（1981-2002）.After studying the development of the American bilingual education in the 20th century,we analyzed that there were many reasons which contributed to the changing of the American bilingual education in the 20th century.The main reasons were：the proliferation of languages that could claim legitimacy to being addressed under the program;the direct intervention of the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s;the challenge of the multi-cultural trend of thinking,and the central commitment of the Anglo-Saxon tradition to maintain English as the exclusive,true and proper language for America and for all Americans.