Extending Education
The Art of Geography/the Geography of Art View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Michael Kilburn, Cynthia Roberts
The team-taught course. “Geography of art/Art of geography,” at Endicott College in spring 2016 explored the nexus of social studies in the humanities (and vice versa) and offers a template of interdisciplinary theory and practice. Art and Geography are distinct yet complementary ways of imagining, mapping, and exploring the world we live in. Both are primarily visual disciplines grounded in material reality but encompassing all aspects of the human experience and imagination. The course, comprising both social science and arts majors literally and figuratively traversed the campus, operating across disciplines and space. Considering both technical and creative aspects of each field, we interrogated physical and psychological spaces and their complex interdependence. We used a variety of texts (written, visual, and multimedia), guest lectures, site visits, activities, interventions, and fieldwork, to explore territories real and imagined and consider the interaction of place and human culture. Students experienced an immersive orientation and reorientation in these disciplines and learned to represent, interrogate, and meaningfully engage with the physical and social environment. The course concluded with a residency by public artist Ed Woodham, founder of the annual New York festival Art in Odd Places, and legendary feminist performance artist Linda Mary Montano, who gave workshops and curated an AiOP festival on the campus, with students creating site specific work and artist statements that connected the themes of the course. This case study addresses the themes of interdisciplinarity and the pedagogy of civic, political and community engagement through the interdisciplinary potential of humanistic education.
Reimagining the Humanities with Technology: Culture, Language, and Virtual Reality/Augmented Reality
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Aditi Samarth, Daniel Dao, Hasmik Gharaghazaryan
"Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn." - Xunzi In the current era of technological dominance, where the dependence on gadgets leads to the deterioration of memory and short attention span, it is imperative to shift from traditional courses to interdisciplinary approach, taking advantage of technological advances. An innovative approach would be an interdisciplinary course of digital humanities and language. Learning a new language relies on the culture, beliefs, and the worldview of the native speakers. It brings the learner closer to the new language by alleviating anxiety and creating a multidimensional and comfortable space. The advantages of the Virtual Reality/Augmented Reality, such as simulation of real-life situations, offer virtual cultural and linguistic immersion, a space for experiential learning that fosters awareness of diversity, critical thinking, memorization, language acquisition and internalization. Studies have shown that the psychology of effective language learning is based on the teaching methodology and learner’s motivation. Putting the new language in action in mind-expanding virtual activities, such as analyzing art, hearing music and song, exploring architecture while learning relevant vocabulary, will create an emotional attachment to the task, a memorable experience and will keep learners highly engaged through interdisciplinary studies. The possibilities of combining language with digital humanities courses are endless and can be offered at various levels.
Featured ‘After Language’ Conceptualizations of Communication: Language Educators’ Attitudes Towards a Digitally-informed ‘Grammar’ for Meaning Making
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Eleni Karantzola, Roula Kitsiou, Evangelos Intzidis
Based on a digital discourse perspective as described by Schismenos (2021), the present paper explores to what extent language educators realise how the digital transforms our conceptualisations of language. Towards this aim we draw on ‘after language’ conceptualisations of communication prioritizing the role of digitality in reshaping human interaction, i.e. in creating a new “grammar” for meaning making (Cope & Kalantzis, 2020a, 2020b). Specifically, we examine language educators’ attitudes towards digitality and language as expressed in five (5) 5-membered focus groups during a postgraduate class on language analysis and teaching in multilingual contexts. Van Leeuwen’s (2008) social actor and social action distinction is used to map how participants’ make sense of language and if and to what extent they acknowledge the importance of digitality in reimagining languaging and consequently the art of language teaching. We conclude with some suggestions and ideas about the importance of further raising language teachers’ awareness around issues of digital discourse and its implications for theorizing on communication and language.
