name: Clark Colahan

institution: Whitman College

language: Spanish

status: Full-time, tenure track

project:

title: Technology-assisted exercises on the Spanish of Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quixote.

duration: Summer, 1998

description:

This project, designed for senior Spanish majors, provides direct contact with the original text of Don Quixote, contact that fills a previous gap in our Spanish
program.

The underlying concept is that a more in-depth understanding of the wonderfully expressive Spanish language used by Cervantes can be facilitated by opportunities for students actively to enter into the fabric of the original text, rewriting passages from the novel in order better to grasp its constituent elements.

This approach teaches not only Cervantine vocabulary and style, but also focuses on larger aspects of the creative process behind this Spanish masterpiece. The distinctive character of the protagonist, for one, has become so central to our culture that his name has generated a common English adjective. But, in addition to character, literary criticism has identified several other elements that contribute to the artistic effect of a novel. The following are particularly important in this case: themes, types of discourse (e.g., description, dialogue, narration), and figurative discourse (e.g., metaphors, imagery, symbolism).

Assignments call for students to rewrite episodes by changing one of these four kinds of variables, in a way specified by the teacher.

This semester, in a pilot project, four episodes from the novel are being rewritten in two different versions, each version reflecting a change in one of the literary elements. The consequences of the change are incorported in the rewrite, while the other three variables are changed as little as possible without losing coherence in the episode. Accompanying the rewrite comes an analysis by the student of what changes and/or contradictions in the rest of the novel would necessarily follow from such a recasting of the episode. The rewriters electronically submit their versions of the episodes, together with their analyses of the implications, to the instructor and a student assistant.

A listing of the four episodes and the specific changes being made in them follows in Spanish.


World Lit. 358. Reescritura de unas páginas de Don Quixote

#1. Don Quixote le pide al ventero armarle caballero. Don Quixote, primera parte, cap. 3. Desde "El ventero que como está dicho" hasta "y cuando comenzó el aseo comenzaba a cerrar la noche."

1a versión. Cambiar el discurso, de la forma narrativa que le dio Cervantes, a un discurso dramático, o sea, de diálogo con acotaciones, como si se tratara de una
comedia.

2a versión. Cambiar el carácter de Don Quixote para que sea un loco que rechaza todo consejo de otra persona, alguien incapaz de aceptar otra perspectiva o de aprender de los demás.


#2. En la venta, Don Quixote queda colgando de la muñeca. Don Quixote, primera parte, cap. 43, desde "Señor mío, lléguese acá" hasta "o arrancarse la mano."

1a versión. Cambiar el discurso figurado para que todo el vocabulario y las metáforas caballerescas queden reemplazadas por vocabulario y metáforas relacionados con el mundo del comercio de la época de Cervantes.

2a versión. Cambiar el tema (de la vanidad y las inclinaciones amorosas de Don Quixote) para que en este episodio el protagonista esté buscando el dinero, no el amor.

#3 Después de las bodas de Camacho, Don Quixote habla del matrimonio. Don Quixote, segunda parte, cap. 22. Desde "No se pueden ni deben llamar engaños..." hasta "meter su cucharada."

1a versión. Cambiar el discurso de su forma cervantina, donde predomina el soliloquio, a una conversación rápida y acalorada entre Don Quixote, Basilio, Quitería y Sancho. Discrepan enérgicamente los otros personajes de las ideas del protagonista de la novela.

2a versión. Cambiar el tema, eliminando el del matrimonio, para que Don Quixote critique ásperamente el empleo de los engaños. Así, el protagonista califica de bajeza moral el hecho de que Basilio le haya quitado a Camacho su novia - y por medio de un subterfugio con elementos casi sacrílegos.

#4 La escena de la muerte de Don Quixote. Don Quixote, segunda parte, cap. 74. Desde " - ¡Ay! - respondió Sancho, llorando..." hasta "quiero decir que se murió."

1a versión.
Cambiar el tema, para que Don Quixote no se resigne a morir, sino que, animándose, acoja con entusiasmo la idea de convertirse en explorador
marítimo de islas fabulosas todavía desconocidas. Al final de la escena no se muere, sino muestra nuevos bríos.

2a versión. Cambiar el discurso figurado para que el protagonista, aunque dice que era una locura creer en la caballería andante, siga utilizando mucho
vocabulario y metáforas típicos de la literatura caballeresca.

outcome:

These literary variables, much like the specific commands to a machine in a computer program, act together to create a forceful impact on the reader. Just as in a programming class, students - by the process of themselves choosing the commands to be sent to the computer - learn what combinations do and do not produce the desired result. Students of Don Quixote vary the ingredients and then see the effect on the work of literary art.

The final product - the filmed original and rewritten versions of the four episodes -would be an excellent classroom tool to encourage analysis of the novel's language. They could be used in two ways. Most simply, on screening the enactment of the original text, followed by a rewritten version of an episode, students would be asked to determine which of the four literary parameters had been changed and how. Alternatively, in advance of the screening students would be asked to predict how a specific change in one of the parameters would affect the rewriting of the scene. The match between their predictions and the Whitman version would then be discussed after viewing. In both uses the discussion could then move to the implications of the specific changes for the entire novel.

Another objective is to provide a map for instructors who would like to follow this process in their literature classes. A description of the procedures followed by Professor Colahan^Òs class, and the problems that arise, would be part of the outcome. In addition to the video materials, a written description of the project would be placed on the NWLC server for all those who might be considering a similar experiment with other works of literature.

timeline:

In a pilot project, these activities are going ahead in the spring semester of 1998.

To facilitate the mechanics of the rewriting process, relevant portions of the orignal text have been optically scanned and stored at Whitman's Language Learning Center for student word processing.

While the instructor evaluates each student's work for correct and typically Cervantine language use, the student assistant reads and compares all the rewritten versions for each episode studied, identifies the specific phrases and sentences that by consensus need to be changed in the rewrite to reflect the change in the given variable, then electronically brings together a composite, "by-consensus," version of each episode. These composites are placed on a list-serve for the class and used as the basis for discussions of what effects such changes might have on the novel.

In the summer of 1998 Prof. Colahan will work with the student assistant to review and revise the by-consensus rewritten versions of the four episodes from the novel. In addition, native Spanish speakers from Walla Walla Community College currently in beginning English classes (with whom Prof. Colahan has been conducting weekly classroom conversation exchanges), would perform the rewritten episodes, plus the Cervantine original of each.

In order to reduce the amount of time the actors would need to spend learning lines, the equivalent of a teleprompter will be put together. This consists of a computer screen projected onto a screen or wall in the improvised filming studio, the text being scrolled down as the episode moves forward.

The performances would be taped, using a Sony digital VX-1000 camcorder. The video and sound data of the performances would then be stored on cd-rom disks or Jaz cartridges, which would be made available to the other schools in the consortium and at Middlebury. In addition, short sections of the performances could be made available to other schools via the web.

The materials will be use-tested in Professor Colahan's literature class in the spring of 1999.

amount: $3,500.00

breakdown:
Student Assistance: $ 800
Professor's stipend: $2,700