Teachers' Consortium Seminar Schedule, 2021-22
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Teachers’ Consortium Seminar Schedule, 2021-22 Please Note: All Fall NTC seminars (October - December 2021) will take place virtually (via Zoom). We will commence in-person NTC seminars at the Newberry Library (60 W Walton St, Chicago 60610) in January 2022. Literature & Drama (United States) Teaching Film Dr. Andrew Owens (University of Iowa) Tuesday, October 5, 2021 3:30 - 5pm (1.5 CPDUs) VIRTUAL This workshop serves as an introduction to using film as a pedagogical tool in the high school classroom, particularly for instructors teaching in the fields of literature, politics, and critical identity studies (i.e., gender, race, sexuality, etc.). Instructors will become acquainted with the vocabulary and analytical skills necessary to train media literate students not only in examining individual films, but more importantly in how students can apply those skills to key historical/cultural settings and theoretical debates. More broadly, our emphasis on media literacy will address how mainstream, independent, and international cinemas have intersected, and continue to intersect, with issues of race, gender, sexuality, national history, globalization, and new media technologies. History (United States) The Black and Native Civil War West Dr. Alaina E. Roberts (University of Pittsburgh) Thursday, October 7, 2021 3:30 - 5pm (1.5 CPDUs) VIRTUAL Most people are familiar with the Cherokee Nation and the Trail of Tears they endured as part of their forced removal from their Southeastern homelands. But did you know that the Cherokees and four other Indian nations owned Black slaves? What about the fact that members of these slave-owning nations fought in the Civil War to maintain the institution of slavery, as well as their land claims in modern-day Oklahoma? In this seminar, you will learn about these parallel histories of slavery, military battle, and freedom, and identify primary sources you can use to teach your students about the complex relationships between Black and Native people in the trans-Mississippi west. Teaching & Learning Teaching What Historians Do Dr. Catherine Denial (Knox College) Monday, October 18, 2021 3:30 - 5pm (1.5 CPDUs) VIRTUAL How historians think about the past, and use primary sources to offer interpretations of key movements, events, and ideas, is often hard to convey. This seminar focuses on two exercises which Newberry Library Teachers’ Consortium Seminar Schedule, 2021-22 2 introduce students to historical thinking. The first, an exercise particularly well-suited to the beginning of a unit, asks students to interpret primary sources to build a story, then compare their stories and puzzle out where (and why) they differ. The second uses drawing (no artistic talent needed) to convey the ways in which the authors of primary sources might see similar events from radically different perspectives. Together, these activities ask students to think about biases, cultures, perspectives, and other influences that shape the sources they read and the historians from whom they learn. Literature & Drama (British) International Hamlets: On Film, Around the Globe Dr. Casey Caldwell (Independent Scholar) Tuesday, October 19, 2021 3:30 - 5pm (1.5 CPDUs) VIRTUAL Teachers often rightfully turn to international adaptations of Shakespeare’s Hamlet to help students connect with the play; a foreign culture’s reaction to a well-known play can defamiliarize the play and help it feel fresh, strange, and compelling. International adaptations offer insights into the play, into the artistic style of a modern direction and actors adapting it, as well as into the culture and history that these films often seek to exhibit, celebrate, and/or critique. While Akira Kurosawa’s Throne of Blood and Ran are his most famous Shakespearean adaptations (of Macbeth and Lear, respectively) and both offer excellent resources for teaching Shakespeare’s plays, Kurosawa’s adaptation of Hamlet (The Bad Sleep Well) is both far lesser known and just as excellent as a resource. In our seminar, we will survey a variety of international adaptations of Hamlet and discuss what pedagogical value “International Hamlets” offer in the classroom. Possible films we will sample and discuss include Kurosawa’s The Bad Sleep Well; Hamile: The Tongo Hamlet; Johnny Hamlet (Italian); The Banquet (Chinese); Haider (Hindi); and Gamlet (Russian). History (United States) Addressing Anti-Asian Racism and Stereotypes through Educational Materials Andrea Kim Neighbors (Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center) Thursday, October 21, 2021 3:30 - 5pm (1.5 CPDUs) VIRTUAL This session will introduce participants to educational resources, created by the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center, that address anti-Asian racism and stereotypes, solidarity movements in US history, and why the term “Asian Pacific American” is so complicated. This session will also include a historical overview of Asian Pacific American narratives and stories, and current data showing the growth of Asian American communities across the country. As Illinois becomes the first state in the country to mandate Asian American history in public schools, there will be time for a discussion about educator needs with regards to the mandate. Participants will have access to usable resources that will help educators succeed in building a more nuanced understanding of Asian American histories and stories in the classroom. Newberry Library Teachers’ Consortium Seminar Schedule, 2021-22 3 Literature & Drama (United States) Emily Wilson's Homer: Towards a Feminist Odyssey Dr. Laura Passin (St. Mary’s Academy) Saturday, October 23, 2021 9:30am - 12:30pm (3 CPDUs) VIRTUAL Please Note: This seminar is a special 3-hour Saturday virtual offering. From the moment of its publication in 2017, Emily Wilson's translation of The Odyssey was famous for being the first English translation, by a woman, of the epic. While expanding possibilities for women translators is itself a laudable achievement, one of the truly exciting aspects of Wilson's translation is how she approaches questions of gender, misogyny, and consent in the text. Instead of taking for granted that men are heroes and women are supporting characters, Wilson's translation asks us to approach characters of different genders and levels of autonomy as (fictional) people in their own right. In this seminar, we will explore some of the ways that Wilson's translation opens up lines of inquiry relevant to today's students. We will compare some key passages with their counterparts in "standard" translations, and we will also discuss the ways that writers like Margaret Atwood and Louise Glück created their own feminist Odysseys before Wilson's translation was published. Literature & Drama (United States) Bridges, Borderlands, and Nepantla: An Introduction to Gloria Anzaldúa Dr. AnaLouise Keating (Texas Woman’s University) Monday, October 25, 2021 3:30 - 5pm (1.5 CPDUs) VIRTUAL A versatile author, Gloria Anzaldúa (1942-2004) published poetry, short stories, essays, autobiographical narratives, interviews, children’s books, philosophy, and multi-genre anthologies. As the author of Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza (1987), Anzaldúa offered an innovative approach to autobiographical narrative and played a major role in shaping contemporary Chicano/a and lesbian/queer identities. And as editor or co-editor of three multicultural anthologies, including This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color (1981), she played an equally vital role in developing an inclusive feminist movement and new forms of alliance-making. This seminar offers an overview of Anzaldúa and her work, focusing on her innovative contributions to US American literature and contemporary theory. Teaching & Learning Teaching for the Good Life Dr. Evan Dutmer (Culver Academies) Thursday, October 28, 2021 3:30 - 5pm (1.5 CPDUs) VIRTUAL In this seminar, Dr. Dutmer will provide a practical, hands-on teaching seminar and workshop on teaching Ethics to young people (especially high schoolers), at a time in their lives when they are gripped by visions of their future-oriented selves. Based on Culver Academies' Ethics course for 11th graders, this seminar will explore activities like engaging students in discussion on what “the good life” might be, and what we think the virtues of which a good person might consist through Socratic Newberry Library Teachers’ Consortium Seminar Schedule, 2021-22 4 dialoguing; reading and reflecting on community virtues and values in character-oriented ethics from around the world; and combining this enriching philosophical reflection with contemporary research in philosophy, Social Emotional Learning, positive psychology, and sociology to confront injustice, bigotry, and inequity while promoting fairness, caring, empowerment, and human flourishing in our world. Together, this reflection and practice form a rich and powerful introduction to the good life and its connection to the cultivation of character. History (European) Witchfinder General Dr. Valentina Tikoff (DePaul University) Friday, October 29, 2021 3:30 - 5pm (1.5 CPDUs) VIRTUAL Please Note: This is a special Friday afternoon virtual offering. While Salem, Massachusetts is the best-known site of witchcraft charges in US history, the accusations and interrogations there in the 1690s actually occurred as the peak period of witch-hunting in the West was winding down. One of the most famous witch-hunters in English history had been active fifty years earlier. Styling himself the “Witchfinder General,” Matthew