Epilogue: A way with words – perspectives on the contributions and influence of Earl W. Stevick

Summary

How does one meaningfully summarize the contributions and influence of a gifted teacher and scholar whose engagement in language education has, in one form or another, spanned six decades and several generations of language learners, educators and researchers across five continents?

When I told Earl of my task for this book, his response was to provide me with his own perspective, expressed in inimitable Stevick style:

Most people have one or more ‘talents’, which is to say that they can perform various tasks more readily or satisfactorily than their average conspecifics can. Looking back over the years, I think that in comparison with most people I have known, I am a person with a single talent, namely, that I ‘have a way with words’. This talent manifests itself in a number of ways: in associating new words with their meanings, in memorizing poems, in persuasion, in learning new styles of handwriting, to name a few. In other kinds of tasks – in peeling potatoes, in throwing and/or catching balls, in carrying a tune, in playing board games, and in countless more – I am simply an educable moron.

(personal communication, June 2011)

I begin with Earl's self-assessment for two simple reasons: first, it is not what one might expect from a distinguished expert of international renown, at least not the last part of the statement. Second, it is what one might expect from Earl W. Stevick: an insightful and engaging observation demonstrating clarity of thought and expression – and the unpretentious stance that has made him not just a teacher and scholar of influence, but the beloved friend and mentor of many.

Early years and prevailing methodologies

Earl was born in Iowa ‘midway between the Great War and the Great Depression’, as he describes it. He was first exposed to formal foreign language instruction in high school as a student of Latin ‘taught by the Grammar Translation method in its dullest, most mechanical version’. It was also in this context that he got his first language teaching experience, taking on the role of tutor to a fellow student of Latin in 1940.