Grammar Translation Origins

At the beginning of every school year, my goal is to daily read through Eric Herman's book Research Talks: Motivating Acquisition-Centered Classroom. The book's format is set up similarly to a daily devotional but instead of religious scripture, there is a research quote related to different second language acquisition topics such as input, communication, output, textbook grammar, etc. I have said before that I always mistakenly call this book Research Bites (much like the movie Reality Bites). I like calling it that though, because Eric presents this research in bite-size chunks and makes it very easy for my academic research-challenged brain to synthesize. 

In his Week 3 chapter, under the heading of Textbook Grammar, Herman addresses what many point to as the formal codification of the grammar-translation movement. While grammar translation had been employed throughout the ages prior, it was not until the late 16th century that it became a part of formalized language education. In 1540, St. Ignatius of Loyola founded the Jesuit Society, of which one of its primary focuses was the promotion of education. Its academic curriculum centered on the learning of humanities through classical literature and a heavy emphasis on Catholic theology as a response to the Protestant Reformation in 1517. In 1558, in the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus (Part IV, Chapter 15, Paragraph [471], Ignatius wrote: 

In the study of humane letters and the languages a definite period of time for their completion cannot be established, because of the difference in abilities and knowledge of those who attend the lectures, and because of many other reasons which permit no other prescription of time save that which the prudent consideration of the rector or chancellor will dictate for each student.

Essentially, Ignatius realized that when it came to a humanistic education of grammar, rhetoric, and language acquisition (immersive Latin), there could not be a prescribed timeline due to various factors which the students themselves brought to their education - wealth, previous education, natural abilities, etc. As a result, he advocated that learning could not be dictated by a timeline. Rather, the pace of study was something to be determined individually on a student-by-student basis with the student's teachers. Basically, Ignatius understood that when it came to language acquisition, not every student acquired language at the same rate; to state that in language learning that all students acquire something when one teaches it was wrong in his view. Therefore, Ignatius believed that the acquisition of Latin could not be bound to a designated timeline.

However, in 1599 (some forty years after Ignatius' death), in the Ratio Studiorum in "Rules of the Prefect of Lower Studies" in Rule 8, the Jesuit Society wrote:

All rules of Emmanuel (a standardized Latin grammar textbook written by Emmanuel Alvarez, a Portuguese Jesuit priest) must be divided into three books, of which each is appropriate for a single class...The master practically completes the book of each class during the first semester and begins from the beginning in the second."

Although the Jesuit Society did not invent grammar-translation methodology, it certainly standardized and streamlined it. However, while this made the teaching of Latin more efficient in spreading it over a 3-year period, it was neither practical nor realistic in terms of how language acquisition actually works and in truth was counterintuitive to the way in which one acquires a language.

So whatever your view is of grammar-translation, you can look to the Jesuit Society for its formal codification of this methodology and also see that its founder St. Ignatius of Loyola was a staunch opponent of the principle.