The Significance of Language Education at Technical Universities
Agnieszka Licznerska1 ✉️ 1Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, Poland
Cite as: Licznerska, A. (2025, May). The Significance of Language Education at Technical Universities. In SCS 2025, 2nd International Conference on Social Contexts of Science (p. 55). Wrocław University of Science and Technology, Poland.
Abstract
The presentation explores an integrative potential of meaning creation, a topic central to language lessons, including those run at technical universities. The presentation integrates insights from philosophy and pedagogy to underline the significance of language education at technical universities. The problem is that the curriculum of technical universities is typically characterized by methodical approach, linear processes and clearly defined sequences of knowledge acquisitions. However, language lessons diverge from this model by emphasizing synchronous construction of meaning. Therefore, it has become common to underestimate the process of meaning construction. In sum, language is mostly perceived as the medium of communication of technical ideas. Some might insist that this is enough. Although I concede that language as a medium sometimes suffices, I maintain that we need a new concept integrating language, science, and technical universities. When discussing science, many scientists seem to forget that its initial development was driven by the pursuit of power, action, and improvement of the practical arts (Randall, 1940). The element of practical arts, i.e. people as users has recently emerged from the depths of ongoing discussions on humanity or human capabilities, especially in the context of developing AI. In this context, “practical arts” refer to drawing insights from students’ or individuals’ lived experience. Yet in technical universities little attention is paid to the role of language and the manner in which students’ or individuals’ lived experiences are positioned within curricula, even if human feelings or beliefs constitute a fundamental element in the cutting-edge method of innovative thinking, i.e. Design Thinking. Central to this presentation is the recognition that language courses do not merely transmit pre-defined knowledge of grammar and vocabulary but construe meaning during language lessons via language games (Wittgenstein, 1999). Language teachers do teach about words like tools ‘a hammer, pliers, a saw, a screw-driver, a rule, a glue-pot, glue, nails’ (Wittgenstein, 1999, §11) and about words’ functions as craftsmen teach about functions of these tools. However, they do not exclusively examine the inside of a locomotive’s cabin and define the handles of a crank or a switch, solely determining their positions and functions—for example, the crank opens a valve and the switch toggles on or off (Wittgenstein, 1999, §12). They focus on application and—dependent on adequate contexts—make distinctions between giving orders and obeying them, reporting an event, constructing an object from a description, speculating about an event, or solving a problem (Wittgenstein, 1999, §23). Since students often seem unaware of how the world works, language lessons cover a wide range of topics—from birth, banks to technology, tools, food, and death. This approach helps address the common complaint from students that they struggle even in Polish, so they see no point in trying in English. Language courses see the point of embedding various issues in context. Language learning is a context-dependent dynamic process, where meaning is collaboratively negotiated during language-games (Wittgenstein, 1999). Language-games matter because they open the world to students, introducing them to collaboration, thinking, seeing connections, discovering intermediate hidden cases before arriving at a final clear state, i.e. meaning.
Keywords
Meaning, Language-games, Lived experience, Educational practices, Technical universities
Current status of the research is: Work-in-progress