Location, Location, Location - Notes

LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION - NOTES

Slide re culture/language

Ask ‘why’ the tweet is correct. > Why is culture ‘key’?

First Iceberg

Iceberg analogy first used by Edward T. Hall in his 1976 book,Beyond Culture; Old idea – much used in international courses – business as well as language. The language teacher’s temptation is to think that language alone is enough. The goal of this session is to argue that it isn’t. If we don’t know context, we miss masses.

Second Iceberg

Teachers make the invisible visible. Not just teaching language. Communicating with the ancients. NEED to know history, culture, geography to hear them. And we need to remember that humanity hasn’t changed much. In fact, they knew more than us about many things…. Where would we be without tech??!! Cf Mnemosyne – the mother of the muses – not google…

Language is more than just language. You miss things if you don’t know the background – or, more positively, you gain if you do…

Location

Let’s get at it from another angle. World languages. Because they are ‘languages,’ because they are communicating, the overall context has to be recognized.

Tree 1

Can we do language without context? (This is an example of the Interpretive mode. Pictures can be interpreted too. Good jumping off points for using language. Quid est? (arbor) Qualis arbor? Novice – can use some English for interpretive. Think about why it’s like this?

Tree 2

Arbor evulsa. 1. Recognizable as a tree even though sideways. 2. Still got leaves. 3. Still growing. BUT – for how long? i.e. We may think we can teach without being rooted in context, but how long can that last/flourish? How real is it? How much will students get from Latin class if we only give them vocab and grammar? Or even if we only give them language, but miss the ‘world’ part of Latin – i.e. if we don’t cross the centuries and hear what the Romans are saying to us.

Tree 3

IN the next slides, we are going to look at a variety of contextual information that sometimes we forget. Somewhat random examples – but things that I wish that I had had in HS – and College – and things that I often forget. Patsy Ricks and Pliny.

Magnifying glass

Looking at just one slice of what we do when we read. FLANC teacher comment: interesting, my historian husband can use this in his classroom. My argument is that we all need to be thinking outside the text to make sure that we don’t miss things. And to engage students in the literary or ancient or geographical worlds…

Context Shapes Message

World languages – Space. History - Because they are set in time. Let’s look at examples of both

We miss things if we ignore context – even though it may be a narrow focus, it is one part among many. (remember why in Iraq soldiers needed to learn language… The web has changed teaching. Treasure box.

aere

Imagine you are coming to the Aeneid for the first time with a class. Don’t get overwhelmed with the language. A variety of contexts. (What other info to people need to ‘get’ the Aeneid.) Big pictures will engage students. Here – one word info.

Ships

Pictures will engage students! Detail can be fun.

Sicily

Mythology/religion/geography. Students don’t know this… Where did Mrs. Kelly grow up?

Google earth 1

Answer to previous question: Malta!

Carthage

Where does Mrs. Kelly live: answer – Carthage! 20 miles from Troy (What people know in the 19th century…)

Storm

Iceberg – common humanity; Katie Foltz – wow! Why hasn’t this been made into a movie. Notice soundtrack in this verse. (Practice reading it…) But for us, we can do more than the soundtrack….

Perfect Storm

Finish part of the way through… enough to show both Virgil’s remarkable understanding of ‘mons’ and the horror of men in this situation. AND: Now do you see why Aeneas is first seen as so ‘small and insignificant.

Literary Context

Let’s get at it from another angle. World languages. Because they are ‘languages’ the literary context has to be recognized

Pushkin - Russian

Intro – how do you feel now??!!

Ask – what do we already know? - K-Want to know - Learnt

K – it’s a poem. And in Russian…except one word

Why am I showing it here… must be about Latin… where? (scanning skill…) Any words in our alphabet? What word could be Latin? (based on Gk alphabet)  What is he likely to have read? Names of Authors? What did Juvenal write? History? (Romulus.)

Alexander Pushkin: Eugene Onegin Novel-in-verse, about a bored aristocrat – well educated (including, evidently, Latin) and good with the ladies.

Pushkin Translation

What proficiency level was he? Note that the historical context was part of his knowledge. What do we want our students to remember?

Genre - Epic poetry (probably)

What type of text? What can we learn about Latin poetry – that someone thought was important? (Elisions)

More poetry - Vocabulary risks…

A different kind of poetry

When loyal Arria handed the sword to her own Paetus,
which she herself had drawn out of her own viscera,
"Believe me, the wound I have made does not hurt," she said,
"but what you will do, this to me, Paetus, is painful."
- If you don't know, it's a poem about a wife who kills herself before handing the very same sword to her husband who has already decided to commit suicide after being exposed for the role he played in a conspiracy against Emperor Claudius. An exemplary display of the Roman ideas of feminine virtue.

Genre – prose

Prose. Also – using vocab for orientation. Sometimes vocab gives us a clue about context. Also: imagine what happens if students come at this without knowing that it’s Caesar (and who he is…)

Segedunum

Roman re-enactment . Travel! OR make sure you’re on a list where you find out about archeological finds. PS – note the modern background. Good example of communities + comparisons

Twitter etc.

Your own pictures from museums – most will let you take pictures if you say they are for your classes. NB Pope on Twitter… (but in this session I’m not talking about language per se…)

Now several slides on how misunderstanding context can mislead in different ways

Mr. Rat

Cf. mythology – yes – it’s a classical context – and authentic in many ways… but hard for students to make connections that lead to understanding. Cf ‘duke’… from midsummer night’s dream…

Ecce

Reason behind reading based texts with an ongoing storyline as we introduce students to a world with many differences (as well as similarities) to our own.

Ambiguity

We deal with ambiguities in English as well as Latin. To disambiguate, we need to know part of speech. Much confusion in Latin due to ambiguous endings. Can only disambiguate by seeing the whole sentence.

Caesar

Rhetorical structure in a different context… then look at historical resources

Lt. Salinas

My first encounter with Caesar's story of the Gallic Wars occurred in January 2003, in Professor Ronald Delph's medieval history course during my second semester at Eastern Michigan University (E.M.U.) following my initial enlistment in the Marine Corps (1998-2002). New to college life, I enjoyed every moment in the classroom. It was a pleasant change from the Spartan routines of the Corps.

Early in the class, we covered the Celtic society in Gaul during and after Roman occupation. Though not overly excited about Druids and such, I was intrigued by the Celtic warrior society and its conflict with the Roman legions, particularly during the circumvallation siege of Alesia as described in Julius Caesar'sCommentarii de Bello Gallico.In 2006 I became aware of "Google Earth." This now widely used mapping program held enormous potential for my sort of mapping work.

Context again

Summarize - tell about teacher who said it would be useful for her husband… NB – you can make this organic. Don’t need to have ‘culture Fridays’… Work it all in all the time – that’s how we will hear what the Romans are saying to us. And use English for it as needed. We cannot reach into Roman culture in the way that you can reach – via video – into modern cultures.

Horse

Travel! Watch movies!

The Chasers

The Chasers – Australian comedians

Icebergs

to review…To review – narrow focus… yet actually incredibly broad. Don’t belittle NLE’s choice of large number of culture, history, background questions…

Aim – so show that these four Cs aren’t just poor relations!

Tree

Can we risk losing our roots? Set the tree back up…!

Last slide:

We need a takeaway… Not allowed just to ‘soak’! Let’s draw students into the ancient world in the most authentic way we can – vial language.