Vew from the chair: Speeches of Richard WL Austin

Homer, into pigs; and, by revening the process, back once more into menl Who more suitable to control an aerospace company than a man who knew from Virgil that it was possible to fly quite close to the sun provided, of coune, that you did not, like Icarus, try to hold your wings together with waxl Today, all these wheels have turned full circle. Women are expected to be as well– educated as their husbands, if not more so; most scientists are now the lords and owners of their own faces; and there is a new slogan on the educational airwaves– 'Every Australian child shall learn to speak an Asian language'-with Japanese at the top of the ratings. The first two turns of the wheel were long overdue and should be welcomed wholeheartedly. Only an unrepentant reactionary would have it otherwise. The third, however, the Asian language catchcry, deserves critical examination. In the fint place, it has about as much chance of being achieved as that naive prediction made by a former Prime Minister in 1987, that by 1990 no Australian child would live in poverty. While I am a firm believer in Browning's exhortation that a man's reach should exceed his grasp-and that goes for a child's, too-we should not ignore the cost of failure. Australians-at least the large proportion of the population that is of Anglo-Saxon and Celtic descent-are notoriously poor linguists, partly because we live in a country with no frontiers and partly because we have been taught to believe that, if we talk English loud enough, foreignen will understand us. With the possible exception of Indonesian and Malay, Asian languages are hard languages-and, as I know to my own cost, Japanese is especially hard-and only the few who are both dedicated and able will master them. Such people should, of coune, be encouraged, with the aim of producing a select corps of really competent linguists and interpreters able to operate in a number of Asian countries. Those, however, who are unlikely to reach this standard, would do better to concentrate less on language and more on culture. Undentanding of Asian history– and tolerance and sensitivity towards the varied and complex customs, traditions and behaviour patterns which make up Asian cultures-will do far more for our relationship with Asians than an indifferent ability to speak their languages. My second concern about the push towards the learning of an Asian language is the secret protocol which, I suspect, lies somewhere in the small print-'Learn an Asian language and you need not bother about the classics'. Already, classical studies are being guided in the direction of the cemetery, and this could be a neat excuse for putting another nail in their coffin. If that happens, we shall be discarding the study, not only of the language, but also of the civilisation of the two countries from which we have derived a very high proportion of our own language and civilisation. From Athens and Rome we derive most of our literary forms, most of our practice and appreciation of architecture and s~ulpture, much of our philosophy, our medicine and our science, and not a little of our religion. We derive from them our ideas of law and order, of government, of citizenship, of freedom, and of proportion. In the sphere of proper behaviour and deportment, both in private and in public life, the Greeks have given us the concept of the ideal man who is both beautiful and good-the kalos 162