A foreign language and culture program is advocated in place of the traditional language and literature program in today's schools. The potential importance of television and films in presenting cultural context is stressed, but the poor caliber of existing foreign language television programs in the United States (with a few notable exceptions) is criticized. The poor quality is attributed to lack of professionalism in the preparation of such programs and insufficient publicizing of the good ones. Some of the better programs which point the way to a revitalized language program are identified and described. (AF)