The Italian film industry had its spaghetti western,
and to hear Regina Galasso describe it, the Spanish
language classroom often boasts the taco tutorial.
Galasso, a fourth-year doctoral student in the Department of Romance Languages and
Literatures, is referring to the instructional videos,
many circa 1980s, in which actors in a studio offer up
scripted and often mannered dialogues about cliched
Hispanic topics such as Mexican fiestas, bullfighting and
soccer matches.
While these films and actors attempt to portray a
"reality" of Spanish speakers and language, many
instructors believe the productions illustrate the lack of
focus in the language field on Spanish speakers living in
the United States. So lecturer Citlali Miranda-Aldaco,
joined by Galasso and Ann de Leon, now a fifth-year
doctoral student, set out two years ago to create an
American-centered audio-visual component to assist Johns
Hopkins students who are learning Spanish.
Specifically, they wanted to interview members of the
local Hispanic population and let them talk about their
experiences here in Baltimore. The result is the
cutting-edge video project called Spanish Through the
Eyes: An Exploration of Hispanic Language, Life and Culture
in Baltimore.
The group will present the project this week at the
annual meeting and exposition of the American Council for
the Teaching of Foreign Languages, being held Nov. 17 to 20
in Baltimore. The event, at the Hyatt Regency and Baltimore
Convention Center, brings together more than 5,000
teachers, administrators and students of foreign languages
from across the world to discuss topics including
assessment, curriculum, methods, standards and
technology.
For the project, Galasso and de Leon have to date
interviewed more than 100 people from all walks of life,
from construction workers to neurosurgeons, and from high
school students to doctoral candidates. They film and
interview the people where they live and work in order to
present a voice and face of the Spanish-speaking community
of Baltimore. Sergio Gutierrez, a senior chief
interoperative monitoring technician at The Johns Hopkins
Hospital, talked, for example, about his experiences as a
doctor in Cuba and raising a Hispanic child in America.
Claudia Menanteau spoke of her career as an art director at
U.S. Lacrosse and how she came to the United States from
Chile.
The edited interviews are archived on Web CT, an
online courseware package, so students can watch the clips
and then complete an attached quiz that tests their
listening comprehension. The clips also become fodder for
classroom discussions, based on the critical issues
addressed by one speaker or focused around a theme, such as
immigration. The interviews and corresponding classroom
discussions will ultimately become the basis for required
essays.
Examples of the issues raised in the interviews are
technology and progress, human rights, health care, arts
and entertainment, economy and the workplace, culinary
arts, war, gender issues and Hispanic life in the United
States. The interviews strive to create connections between
the students and the local community, addressing current
social concerns.
The collection of interview subjects is diverse, not
only in age and occupation but by ethnicity. Miranda-Aldaco
said that, partly by chance, most of the more than 20
Spanish-speaking regions are represented, including Spain,
Mexico, Chile, Cuba, Puerto Rico and Venezuela.
"We are hoping to help students see the Spanish
language class in a holistic way, not only as a place where
they learn Spanish as a tool for communication but also as
a place where they become culturally competent in the over
20 Spanish-speaking cultures that live within their own
local community," she said. "In other words, we hope that
our students will not only gain from this project a greater
command of the Spanish language and its diversity of
accents, transformations and the like, but also that they
will learn to think critically about the society in which
they live."
The project started with a Technology Fellowship
awarded by the university's
Center for Educational
Resources. Later, due to the rapid growth of the work,
the colleagues applied for and were awarded an Arthur
Vining Davis Grant for Critical Thinking in the Humanities,
which helped the group expand its efforts.
Miranda-Aldaco said the project would not have been
possible without the support of Stephen Nichols, chair of
the Romance Languages and Literatures Department, and that
the CER staff have also been "incredibly supportive."
"They are very resourceful and always go the extra
mile to help us," she said.
The video clips were piloted this summer in four
courses: Elements I, Elements II, Intermediate I and
Intermediate II. This fall, they are being used in the
Intermediate II and Advanced Intermediate courses as part
of the curriculum. Ann de Leon uses them as supplementary
material in her Advanced I course.
Previously, students in the elementary and
intermediate Spanish-language courses watched a film series
as part of the auditory comprehension component. The
episodes, filmed in the 1980s, most often had very little
or nothing to do with the unit themes and/or class
discussions.
Students now watch the Baltimore video clips as part
of homework and during class time. The clips have become an
integral part of the students' learning experience,
Miranda-Aldaco said, as the interviewees discuss a variety
of themes encouraging the students to think critically
about real-life situations.
Miranda-Aldaco said that the project has generated
much interest in the foreign language community and that
other higher-education institutions in the area, including
Goucher College and the University of Maryland, Baltimore
County are interested in using the project in their Spanish
classes.
"And other languages are interested in creating a
similar project for their language, and other areas of
study are interested in using our material in their
classes," she said.
Most of the project's subjects have agreed not only to
be interviewed again for Spanish courses but also to have
students contact them directly, whether for these classes
or research work in other disciplines, such as
sociology.
Galasso said the clips also can serve as a historical
record, as they document a time in the history of
Baltimore. If the project is successful and continues to
expand, she said, years from now students could review past
video clips in contrast with their present-time
recordings.
The dimensions of the project, the Spanish Through the
Eyes team said, are somewhat endless.
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