Name: Jose Pablo Villalobos

Institution: Lewis and Clark College Language Area: Spanish

Status: Assistant Professor

Project Type: Summer Fellowship

Project Title: Linguistic Acquisition and Cultural Comprehension through Song (II)

Duration: May and June 2000

Description: This project is a continuation of what I began last year through a NWLC Mellon Project Summer Fellowship. Last summer I started the "Immigration Corrido Project" (please see http://www.lclark.edu/~jvillalo/301-2.htm) which I related to the "Aquí estamos: los hispanos en EE.UU." chapter in the ¡A que sí! textbook used in Spanish 301 at Lewis and Clark. The "Corrido" project as it stands, was undertaken throughout the semester and culminated in student projects consisting of interviews with Spanish-speaking immigrants regarding their experiences in coming to the U.S. and their lives as immigrants in this country.
Once again, I plan to utilize multimedia materials, mostly Web based, to allow an integrated approach to help students acquire language and cultural proficiency through the use of songs. As part of the language-learning, these activities will allow for listening comprehension, grammar exercises, vocabulary building, content based questions as well as questions for further analysis and research. Cultural proficiency will be gained by use of songs that address specific issues with regard to the different cultures addressed. As part of the exercise, each of these web pages will contain appropriate links to pages which address these issues and/or cultural groups.
This time I would like to update the project to include materials relevant other sections of the textbook. I plan to use songs by Ricardo Arjona and Los Tigres del Norte to situate consumerism and the U.S.-based mass mediatization of Latin America. To foreground these songs appropriate links to other advertisement and marketing pages referring to Latin America will be set up. Both of these songs can be used for the units titled "Tradición y cambio" and "Contrastes culturales." Also, I will select two songs from "rock en español" groups (Maná, Maldita vecindad, or Café Tacuba) to address Latin America's "marginal" groups for the chapter titled "Los marginados."
This type of task, done mostly outside of class, will allow for well-informed class discussions, oral presentations, and short writing assignments. As with the immigration corridos project, these exercises may lead to final projects involving extensive writing and a formal presentation.

Outcome: The purpose of this project is to advance students' linguistic ability (reading and listening comprehension, writing and speaking), and to enhance their cultural awareness with regard to the Hispanic World. By using music that is both folksy and contemporary to them, I hope to lower any affective filter students may have with regards to other cultures. Also, by making the approach to certain topics more interactive and entertaining, I hope to make the learning experience a more pleasant journey for each student. The ultimate assessment of this method will be measured by the students progress toward better reading, listening, speaking, and writing skills.

Timeline: I will work on a total of four songs, with all necessary attachments, links, glossaries, etc. to be used and fully integrated in a third year level Spanish course I'll be teaching again in the Fall Semester. The true test will come in the context of this class, therefore the project itself will be ongoing once the Fall semester begins.

Amount: $3000