L’escape room com a eina educativa per treballar la literatura a secundària: una proposta pràctica de Romeu i Julieta

INTRODUCCIÓ: En els darrers anys, la tendència educativa de ludificar les classes ha esdevingut un canvi important en l’ensenyament. Aquest article tracta sobre l’ús de l’escape room com a eina educativa per introduir la literatura en llengua anglesa a secundària. En concret, s’hi descriu una proposta per a 4t de l’ESO on es treballa l’obra Romeu i Julieta de William Shakespeare, amb l’objectiu principal d’endinsar l’alumnat en l’estudi literari. MÈTODE: El punt de partida d’aquesta proposta va ser la visualització de la pel·lícula Shakespeare in Love de John Madden, llargmetratge que il·lustra la vida de l’autor i que descriu el procés de creació de Romeu i Julieta, així com l’estudi sobre els aspectes principals de l’època i del gènere dramàtic. Un cop assolits aquests coneixements, l’alumnat havia d’aplicar allò après i treballar cooperativament per resoldre una sèrie d’enigmes relacionats amb l’obra de Romeu i Julieta. RESULTATS: L’alumnat va adquirir nous coneixements sobre l’autor i l’obra d’una forma lúdica i va valorar la proposta de tipus escape room molt positivament. DISCUSSIÓ: Considerant que actualment l’alumnat a qui s’adreça desconeix molts aspectes de la vida i obra de Shakespeare, aquesta unitat ens permet desenvolupar les competències de la dimensió literària d’una manera activa i motivadora.

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel: international retirement migration on film

ABSTRACTThe two movies aboutThe Best Exotic Marigold Hotel(2012 and 2015) were directed by John Madden. Starring a cast of famous British older actors, the narratives are set in a faded hotel in India. These are individuals who have relocated because their retirement dreams cannot be realised in their home country. They reflect the growing phenomenon of international retirement migration (IRM): the quickly growing upsurge of financially independent individuals seeking an affordable old age. In India they can claim a position of relative comfort and privilege. For a generation that grew up in a consumerist culture, upward mobility in the senior life stage has become a purchasable commodity through exodus to a developing country. This generation of retirees is generally in better health compared with prior seniors, with a longer life expectancy. Many have a background of travel experience, and an ethos that places their own pleasures in life as pivotal. While global numbers are unavailable, it is estimated that there are millions of retirees relocating to less-developed countries for an affordable retirement. At retirement locations such as the Marigold Hotel, the discrepancies that continue between nations, and local poverty, enable this practice. The events in these movies might be read as a recapitulation of imperialism expressed through retirement migration.

Sensations of the Past: Identity, Empowerment, and the British Monarchy Films

Royal bio-pics have always enjoyed a high priority among cinematic representations of British history and taken a lion’s share in defining Britishness to audiences at home and abroad. These historical narratives never render national identity by capturing the past of historians, instead reconstruct the past as a mirror of contemporary reality and in a way as to satisfy their audience’s demand for both romantic qualities and antiquarian nostalgia, for sensations they regard their own. The author’s basic assumption is that such cinema does not represent history but exploits spectatorial desire for a mediated reality one inhabits through the experience of an empowered identity. The first part of the article examines how private-life films (a subgenre of royal bio-pics) mythologized and idealized Tudor monarchs in the 1930s, while in the second part, contemporary representatives of the subgenre are analysed as they portray the challenges of the Monarchy in its search for a place within modern British identity politics. Analysed films include The Private Life of Henry VIII (Alexander Korda, 1933), The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (Michael Curtiz, 1939), Mrs Brown (John Madden, 1997), The Queen (Stephen Frears, 2006), and The King’s Speech (Tom Hooper, 2010).1