Twenty-first International Conference on New Directions in the Humanities

Abstract

Globalization, colonial heritage and debt, diversity, equality and inclusiveness have become trendy terms in both the academic and political worlds. But how can students of French gain a concrete understanding of these ideas while learning a new language and culture? The arts have always been a powerful tool to teach language and culture. In addition, the past can be a guide to better understand the present. When combined, these two approaches can be an even more effective pedagogical method to teach language and culture. This paper shows how students in an intermediate-level French language course traded their regular classroom with a museum to explore Belgian culture, to refine their French language skills and to contextualize concepts such as globalization, colonial heritage and debt, diversity, equality and inclusiveness. Lessons learned from this change of classroom for a language and culture course are discussed. Finally, suggestions for increasing the effectiveness of using the arts as pedagogical tools to teach language and culture are offered.