Lion's Eye Favorite: Modern Languages Department Brings Culture to the Classroom

July 8, 2010

Exeter's modern languages curriculum places primary importance on reading as a means of developing cultural competence. Literature "is an indispensable expression of culture, providing a window onto social, historical, political, and philosophical phenomena at the heart of French-speaking societies around the world," says Kitty Fair, French instructor. "Extensive reading of novels, plays, and poetry is a key to achieving fluency and literacy in any foreign language."  

Exeter's annual Russian dinner is popular with studentsBut, reading about a culture is not enough, feels the department, whose 26 faculty teach 8 languages: Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Russian and Spanish. Experience is essential for linguistic and cultural competency. 

Cultural artifacts litter modern language classrooms: flags, dolls, wood carvings, lanterns, maps, magazines, newspapers, menus, posters, cartoons, puzzles, and altar pieces. While some learning happens through touch, students can also see, hear, smell, and taste the many cultures enveloped in the languages they study.     
 
"I love pronouncing French cuisine, and eating it too," says Gissell '10, who "fell in love with French in 6th grade," and has enjoyed her 4 years of French at Exeter. Modern language classes use food to learn measurements and ingredients. Chinese classes eat moon cakes during the Moon Festival, and Instructor Ting Yuan and her students cook and eat dumplings for the Chinese New Year. Japanese classes make sushi and celebrate the traditional tea ceremony with sweets. Russian classes drink tea with cookies, pastries and cakes from the Russian grocery store in Boston, and enjoy an annual Russian dinner attended by Russian students, students of Russian and Eastern-European backgrounds, day students and parents who live in the area.

Instructor Mark Trafton's Spanish classes make tortillas, and Instructor Viviana Santos' classes research dishes before gathering in the Phelps Academy Center kitchen to eat selections from Puerto Rico, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Peru. Instructor Ahmed Jebari's French, Spanish and Arabic classes cook local foods and eat together. Chinese classes trek to local Chinese restaurants, and Spanish classes visit Las Olas Taqueria , a local restaurant, to talk with the cooks.

These students made and ate dumplings with Chinese Instructor YuanThanks to the Internet, students can easily experience samples of everyday life in faraway  places. Students in all languages navigate the web to search for current events, explore culturally related topics and prepare oral exposés. Richard Schieber, instructor of French and German, uses podcasts of children's shows and sports to improve listening comprehension. Japanese classes watch music shows. French, Spanish, Italian, and German students watch news. Modern Languages Instructors Fermín Pérez-Andreu and Paolo Reichlin use digital pictures and paintings to prompt conversation. French classes have blogged and conversed through Skype with native French speakers in France.

Harkness discussion is a natural gateway to exploration, allowing students to examine many angles of a culture, including literature, superstitions, customs, philosophy society, politics, art and religion. They do this through discussion, activities - which have included singing songs, practicing calligraphy, playing games and making greeting cards - and guest speakers. Recently, Russian classes discussed culture with an 18-year-old violinist from Belarus, who then played for them.

Instructor Santos cooks with her Spanish classFor Viveca '10, studying Chinese at Exeter has been "exciting because it's the world's most widely spoken native language and China is one of the fastest-growing, most important and most influential nations on our planet." She enjoys her Chinese class Contemporary Film and Drama. "The films we watch tell the stories of individual Chinese men and women during the Cultural Revolution and the economic reform that began in the late 1970s. In addition to analyzing the movies' themes and characters, we spend a lot of time discussing this fascinating period of history."

"To me everything is culture," sums up Spanish Instructor Elena Gosálvez-Blanco. "Even Spanish grammar reflects culture. For example, Spanish-speaking cultures use the subjunctive all the time because we don't know what might happen (we have a tragic sense of life . . .). I tell students that the subjunctive is really a mood, a way to confront life, and that helps them put the rules they have to learn in a wider communicational context. They understand how the subjunctive is part of the Spanish-speaking soul! Language and culture are one: together they form a point of view about the world."

For Gissell, the cultural approach to learning modern languages has been a hit. "I love being able to take electives in French because it broadens my learning of the language," she explains. "Currently I'm taking Studies in French Cinema, which is a fabulous class. Monsieur Jebari selects very good movies to watch and discuss. I have also taken Contemporary France with Madame Christoph, one of my all-time favorite classes. It was interesting to learn more about France, including the politics, social status, school system and history."

Interested in learning more?

Read about Exeter's Modern Languages Department…

See photos of the annual Russian dinner, a Spanish class cooking and a Chinese class enjoying dumplings...

 Lion's note: this article first appeared on May 25, 2010.