This was recommended by several students in my Grade X1 (IB1) Class. It's placed here for pure enjoyment - it's not on our course - and is also listed in our online Book Club. Just to praise Jeremy Irons' wonderful reading and note that this book has been on the NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER LIST for 25 years!
Friday 28 February 2014
Tuesday 25 February 2014
Friday 21 February 2014
Wednesday 19 February 2014
Friday 14 February 2014
IB ENGLISH LITERATURE -INTERACTIVE ORAL at BD Somani International School
BD Somani students
enjoy their interactive oral as part of the process for the Works in Translation Written Task.
Monday 10 February 2014
IB ENGLISH LITERATURE INTERACTIVE ORAL REFLECTIVE STATEMENT SAMPLE
Note: My students are encouraged to use Dorfman's afterword and the videos on Chile and the Cold War to inform their discussion.
SAMPLE INTERACTIVE ORAL Question:
How was your understanding of cultural and contextual considerations of the work developed through the interactive oral?
Work used: Fathers and Sons
by Ivan Turgenev
During the discussion, several articles were presented to the class. The subjects brought to light were the Russian economy during the 1850s, serfdom, and the question of whether Turgenev was obsolete or not. The articles on the Russian economy explained the state of transition the Russian economy was in during the mid-1850s. Prior to this period, there were members of the society called serfs. These were essentially slaves who worked on the fields of rich peasants, or the upper class. However, at this time Russia began to move away from serfdom.
After this discussion, it would appear Turgenev places great importance on the time, place, and culture of his novel, as serfdom and the existence of social classes are a predominant feature in Fathers and Sons. I found this discussion interesting, as it clarified some aspects of the novel. For example, in Fathers and Sons, Nikolai is a relatively well off land owner, and he ‘owns’ many serfs. However, as the system begins to evolve, the serfs and their owners have some trouble adjusting to the new system of land ownership. The serfs are misbehaved and irresponsible, and these aspects of the culture and context form the setting of the novel.
The article on the ‘Turgenev Question’ was interesting as well, because it highlighted some of Turgenev’s techniques, and what he’s famous for. According to the article, the art of Turgenev is in understatement: he manages to capture large philosophical, social, and historical movements as manifested in everyday life.
This can indeed be seen in "Fathers and Sons". Turgenev paints a picture of commonplace Russian life with characters like Nikolai Arkady, Pavel, Bazarov and Fenichka, using barely any overly dramatic devices. Yet, through the characters’ thoughts and interactions with each other Turgenev explores ideas such as familial relationships. Furthermore, he portrays other aspects of Russian life, including the wide gap between social classes and the idea of young people rejecting all authorities.
Monday 3 February 2014
CIA, Chile & Allende GRADE X1 HOMEWORK MONDAY 10TH Feb
Using this video and the AFTERWORD in "DEATH AND THE MAIDEN", each student will post a comment of 100 to 150 words on the question 1. In what ways do time and place matter
in the text?
Here are 2 extra short videos to help explain the fear in the USA during the 1950s which lasted until the fall of the Berlin Wall and the fall of the Soviet Union in the 1980s. But in the 1950s Americans had a real fear of communism spreading through all parts of the world as a virus. In the video below, we see and hear President Eisenhower 1955-1959, President Kennedy (JFK 1960-1963), President Johnson (1963-1968) and President Nixon (1968 - 1973), all are warning of the danger of world domination by communism.
It is this fear and paranoia that created the moral compromises of American Foreign Policy which led to Pinochet and Vietnam. Americans saw supporting corrupt dictators as the lesser of two evils. (A great British novel dealing with this paradox is Graham Greene's "The Quiet American" which I have just added to our book club list.)
So fear of communism was a real fear, whether it was well-founded or paranoid imaginings depends on which historians you read. Certainly Stalin had an expansionist agenda in Europe but the USSR and China disliked each other even more than they disliked the capitalist countries. Nixon's visit to China in 1972 underlined that international politics were more complicated than a simple communist versus capitalist world.
Here are 2 extra short videos to help explain the fear in the USA during the 1950s which lasted until the fall of the Berlin Wall and the fall of the Soviet Union in the 1980s. But in the 1950s Americans had a real fear of communism spreading through all parts of the world as a virus. In the video below, we see and hear President Eisenhower 1955-1959, President Kennedy (JFK 1960-1963), President Johnson (1963-1968) and President Nixon (1968 - 1973), all are warning of the danger of world domination by communism.
It is this fear and paranoia that created the moral compromises of American Foreign Policy which led to Pinochet and Vietnam. Americans saw supporting corrupt dictators as the lesser of two evils. (A great British novel dealing with this paradox is Graham Greene's "The Quiet American" which I have just added to our book club list.)
So fear of communism was a real fear, whether it was well-founded or paranoid imaginings depends on which historians you read. Certainly Stalin had an expansionist agenda in Europe but the USSR and China disliked each other even more than they disliked the capitalist countries. Nixon's visit to China in 1972 underlined that international politics were more complicated than a simple communist versus capitalist world.
Also here is a short advert from the USA in 1964
showing how dangerous communism was in the minds of the American people.
Some commentators argue that a kind of national paranoia engulfed the
USA as seen in the McCarthy 'witch hunt' against communists. There was a
fear that even one communist country in South America or Asia could
infect others and they would then fall like 'dominoes'. This was the
'Domino Theory'.
So how did the VIETNAM WAR END?
We
haven't considered the power and position of the non-aligned countries
including India. Were they neutral during the Cold War?
Sunday 2 February 2014
Post-Modernism: Deconstruction and Derrida Pt. 1
This video is a good introduction to Literary Theory and the Academic Discourse surrounding Literature, meta-narratives and micro-narratives. All Grade X1 HL Students are recommended to purchase a copy of this book which will help you contextualise your explorations of our reading list.
This book is available from Flipkart .
This book is available from Flipkart .
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