Dreams of an English

beyond the classics and traditional grammar

Presented byLindsay Williams

Wordsmart Consulting

Everybody hurts, sometime:

Read the lyrics…

…write your response on the slip of paper.

Who am I?• English teacher 25 years; Head of English 16 years• Worked in both state and private sector• Vice President of the English Teachers Association of Queensland• Director of educational consultancy company• Teach pre-service English teachers (UQ currently)• Educational author: a range of articles, reports, curriculum materials

(Lockie Leonard materials for the ACTF TV series, Film Australia, National Reading Day 2007, classroom guide to graphic novel version of The Merchant of Venice for Walker Books ), Teachers’Notes for newly released Odo Hirsch book Darius Bell and the glitter pool (Allen & Unwin) and for Richard Harland’s Worldshaker

• Contributing author to AATE kit, Critical Literacy: Readings and Resources (1996)and Global Learning Centre’s A world of texts (1995); sole writer: Secondary English Teacher: A Survival Manual

• Winner 2003 Peter Botsman Memorial Award for contributions to English in Qld

Aims• To explore how various

grammars can give us an insight to and appreciation of texts and how they’ve been crafted.

• To explore the notions of translation and adaptation.

• To consider how such notions might be useful as one way of encouraging students to engage with literary texts, especially ‘The Classics’.

Outline of session

• Read and respond to lyrics• Introductory comments• Looking forward: the National Curriculum• Some thoughts about adaptation• A close look at ‘Everybody Hurts’: lyrics,

song, video• A way forward with studying literature

(especially ‘The Classics’)

www.englishteacherguru.com

Electronic copy of resources

Looking forward: the National Curriculum

The interrelated, interwoven strands:• Language - Knowing about the English language: a

coherent, dynamic, and evolving body of knowledge about English and how it works.

• Literature – Understanding, appreciating, responding to, analysing and creating literature: an enjoyment in, and informed appreciation of, how English language can convey information and emotion, create imaginative worlds and aesthetic and other significant experiences.

• Literacy – Growing a repertoire of English usage: the ability to understand and produce the English language accurately, fluently, creatively, critically, confidently, and effectively in a range of modes, and digital and print settings, in texts designed for a range of purposes and audiences.

(Page 6)

Looking forward: the National Curriculum

‘The goal of teaching grammar and text patterns should be on expressing thought clearly, persuading and arguing more convincingly and reasoning more carefully. The intention is to achieve coherence, precision and imagination in speaking and writing. The overall goal is conversion of ‘knowledge about’ language into a capacity for effective listening, speaking, viewing, reading, writing and creating.’ (page 7)

Some thoughts on adaptation…

Roland Barthes (1977)“ We know now that a text is not

a line of words releasing a single ‘theological’ meaning (the ‘message’ of the Author-God) but a multi-dimensional space in which a variety of writings, none of them original, blend and clash. The text is a tissue of quotations drawn from the innumerable centres of culture.”

Maria Losada Friend (2004)

At the conclusion of a paper on adaptations of a story by Ovid: “These authors and their interest in the Latin poet prove that tradition can be taken not only as a source of inspiration, but also as a way to explore human issues with critical, revisionist eyes. Intertextuality becomes then a useful element to explain their attempts, and to understand their creative processes as a peculiar dialectic confrontation with the original source.”

Susan Hayward (2006)

“A literary adaptation creates a new story; it is not the same as the original, but takes on a new life, as indeed do the characters. Narrative and characters become independent of the original even though both are based – in terms of genesis – on the original.” (p12)

Susan Hayward (2006)“Film adaptations are both more and less than the

original. More not just because they are in excess of the written word…But more also because they are a mise-en-abîme[reduplication] of authorial texts and therefore of productions of meaning…the notion of authorship becomes very dispersed. Thus, quite evidently, the film is less because the original author is only one among many…But it is also more because of the density of new texts…clustered around the original…” (p14)

Onto the main show…

A close look at ‘Everybody Hurts’ (as ‘specimen’):

• Lyrics• Song• Video

(Translation rather than adaptation?)

REM and Web 2.0

REM and Web 2.0

Okay, but what’s all this got to do with classic literature…

Adaptation, translation and the classics

Jane Austen: Pride and Prejudice

• Books, including Pride and Prejudice and Zombies(Seth Graham Smith) and Becoming Elizabeth Bennett: Create your own Jane Austen adventure (Emma Campbell Webster)

• Movie• TV series, including recent

Lost in Austen• Game…• And more…

Et tu, Hamlet?

Conclusion“Laugh as much as you choose, but you will

not laugh me out of my opinion.” Jane Austen, Chapter 17 of Pride and Prejudice

www.englishteacherguru.com for more good ideas about teaching English and literacy.

References

Articles and books___ (2009) Shape of the Australian curriculum:

English. Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia.

Barthes, R. (1977). The death of the author. Image, music, text. London: Fontana.

Friend, M. (2004). Updating the classics: Ovid, Emma Tennant’s “Philomena” and the Intertextual Link. Retrieved from http://www.publicacions.ub.es/revistes/bells1