Platiquemos was founded to meet the apparent need for significant numbers of Americans to gain proficiency in foreign languages, as well as the cultural understanding that accompanies a well-founded program of language learning.  The founder of Platiquemos knew from his own experience that Americans are capable of becoming proficient in other languages; but had also learned from his many years representing the U.S. abroad that few had realized this potential.  There are many reasons for this, and to a large extent Americans' near indifference to foreign language skill is understandable.  English is the world's second language, and it is possible to get by almost anywhere with English.   It is hard to think of a place on earth anymore where American fast food isn't available, American movies and television programs don't dominate, and where people who've lived or studied in the U.S. can't be found.  In a three-thousand mile journey that would take most Europeans through literally dozens of different language-speaking areas, populated by people who don't speak the traveler's own language, an American will experience only almost imperceptible differences in the American dialect of English.   Americans simply don't have the obvious need, and the motivation that flows from awareness of that need, to learn other languages. 

To complicate the issue, the United States has been able to not only survive but prosper with the top levels of institutions, both public and private, staffed almost entirely by monolingual English speakers with no significant overseas experience.   Despite constant hyping of the "global market"; the role the U.S. has adopted as peacekeeper involved in literally dozens of countries; the incredible growth of "maquiladoras" on the Mexican border and other overseas involvement of U.S. business; native-born Americans by and large remain monolingual English speakers.   The adverse effects of this are diffuse, and easy to ignore for most people.   Our incredible foreign trade deficit may have cost thousands of jobs, but the realization that either competition or cooperation with people we haven't taken the trouble to understand may be a big part of the problem apparently hasn't yet sunk in.   The nation-wide debate over what to do about the education problems of our burgeoning, largely Spanish-speaking, immigrant population is a case in point--a drama played out before an audience with no idea of foreign (or second) language learning, by actors who are motivated largely by political motives.  Detailing the present and future problems of continued resistance to foreign language learning is too complex for serious discussion here, but thinking people know that these problems are real and growing.

Starting with "Sputnik" startling Americans out of their complacency about world-wide scientific leadership, millions upon millions of dollars, both public and private, have been spent on "foreign language education".  The results have been a proliferation of theories, methods and systems; an equal proliferation of purveyors of theories, methods and systems--and no perceptible change in language proficiency in the American population at large.  Over the past four decades, there has been a bright spot in an otherwise dismal picture.  The U.S. Foreign Service overcame the indifference of Americans to learning foreign languages by making demonstrated foreign language competence a condition for continued employment.  The crucial factor, though, was using some of the millions made available by the post-Sputnik reaction to engage the world's greatest language experts to design a series of complete, structured courses to make it possible for previously mono-lingual Americans to become the polyglots who today make up the Foreign Service.  It is ironic that the Foreign Service (which means diplomatic and consular) of the most linguistically disadvantaged country in the developed world should be generally acknowledged as the most linguistically competent.   Why shouldn't all Americans have access to the programs that made this possible?

Why Platiquemos?

Having experienced two FSI langauge programs first-hand; and having known hundreds of colleagues who had experienced literally over a hundred others, Don Casteel had no doubt that the FSI program had that most elusive of qualities in any educational program: a track record of proven success.  Others have also figured that out, and have been selling knock-offs of FSI language programs for years and decades, though, without apparently making a significant impact.  What could Don bring to a program that others couldn't?  First, he has been a successful foreign language learner as an adult (five languages, all learned after the age of 20).  This experience has given him a "feeling" for language learning that can only come from such broad experience.  Second, he had first hand experience with FSI programs at FSI.   Third, and most important, he decided to avoid trying to be a master of all trades, and to concentrate on a language he had begun learning at FSI (if you ever stop learning a foreign language, what you once learned won't  hold up very well).  Fortunately, one of the languages he studied at FSI, and the one he has maintained most proficiency in through twelve years working in Latin American affairs with the State Department and family ties by marriage, is Spanish.  This is fortunate because not just Don but most informed people believe that Spanish is the single most important language for English-speaking Americans to learn as a first foreign language.  Of course, Spanish shouldn't be the last.  It is, however, crucial to have a good first experience with language learning to clear the way for learning other, perhaps more exotic or less accessible languages. 

What has Platiquemos done?

The decision to concentrate on one language he knew well made it possible for Don to go far beyond the mere copying of the original Government work which most others have done.   The original, while widely recognized as the best and most complete program for learning Spanish ever devised--and certainly the most successful--wasn't that "user-friendly" for most people.  It featured a complex phonetic alphabet, which almost nobody found useful--and to make things even worse, in many instances the text didn't even have the Roman alphabet.  There is no real reason for this.  Spanish is very phonetic, and the differences between Spanish and English in the sounds represented by the letters is not terribly difficult to learn.  Although there may have been a theoretical advantage to using the phonetic alphabet (and the principle authors of the FSI program were PhD's in Scientific Linguistics, it just isn't very practical for us non-academic people.  So the first job was to translate the phonetic alphabet back into the Roman alphabet.

The original FSI program also contained quite a bit of military and government jargon, of little use to most people.  Also, some of the vocabulary was out of date.  Re-writing the program to solve these problems was time consuming, but necessary.

Third, the original program was page after page of poorly-formatted text, with no visual relief of any kind and very little cultural information.

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