About the Critical Languages Series

Despite the fact that they are spoken by millions of people, many languages are not usually offered in schools or colleges in the United States. The Critical Languages Program (CLP) at the University of Arizona, Tucson, was created to meet the need for interactive instruction in less commonly taught languages. In cooperation with the National Association of Self-Instructional Language Programs (NASILP), the U.S. Department of Education, the National Security Education Program (NSEP) and the University of Arizona College of Humanities, The Critical Languages Program at the University of Arizona has developed a series of courseware for Brazilian Portuguese, Cantonese, Chinese, Kazakh, Korean, Kurdish, Turkish, and Ukrainian.

The Critical Languages Series courseware is developed using the MaxAuthor™ language-teaching authoring software that has been created, distributed, and refined at the University of Arizona over the past decade. MaxAuthor is free for non-commercial use to authors worldwide who wish to create their own lessons. By providing completed courseware and the capacity to develop additional lessons, and by continuing professional development efforts among less commonly taught language programs and instructors, the Critical Languages Program works to promote and further the study of less commonly taught languages in secondary and postsecondary institutions and beyond.