ANNOTATING ART WITH TIMELINE
Students create an interactive, digital timeline using a mural featuring scenes from Spanish history. The artistic and analytical extension activity provides an active-learning opportunity through which students not only acquire knowledge, but also create meaning. By applying their knowledge of Spanish history and the process of writing history to create their own historical narrative, students think critically about cultural objects, their purposes, and their construction.
Project Overview:
- Spanish
- Intermediate (High)/Advanced
- Semester-long project
- Website
- No costs involved
- knightlab.com
Lesson Plan and Materials:
Project Description:
These activities are designed to:
• reinforce knowledge of these events.
• provide a concrete example for considering how the portrayals of events and the inclusion and exclusion of events shape the story that is told.
• apply knowledge of the construction of history to identify gaps in the historical narrative.
• utilize Spanish language skills in a historical context.
STEP ONE:
Each group of students is responsible for annotating one portion of Josep Renau’s mural “España hacia America”
• Cave paintings of Altamira
• Augustus
• Reconquista
• Literary figures
• Explorers
• Conquest of the Americas
• The Americas
For their assigned segment, students should:
• identify the year(s) represented in the scene
• identify the historical figures included
• explain the importance of this moment in Spanish history (what happened)
Students’ contributions to the timeline are informed by relevant course readings and may utilize additional reference materials as necessary.
At the end of the project, the class will have generated an annotated timeline of how Renau imagined the progression of foundational moments from Spanish history.
STEP TWO:
Individually, students will identify an event that has been excluded from this telling of Spanish history.
NARRATIVE: Write a 3-to-5-page analysis in Spanish in which you explain:
• What event did you choose?
• When did the event transpire?
• Who was involved?
• Does this event provide representation or context for a traditionally marginalized population?
• What happened at this event?
• How does the event contribute to the Spanish historical narrative: Would the inclusion of this event change the mural’s message? How?
• What does including this event in the narrative contribute to our understanding of how history is composed?
• Why did you choose this event?
Students then present their events and artwork during the last class session.
COPYRIGHT & CREDIT
Melanie Forehand
Vanderbilt University
March 14, 2019
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