Learning about the Spanish Civil War through object-based learning
I consider here the object-based learning or the tactile engagement with art or artefacts that occurs in of our core subjects, Hispanic Cultural Studies 1. This seminar is an intermediate level cultural elective that teaches students about civil war in Spain and dictatorship Latin America. In the first 6 weeks of the course, students learn about the Spanish Civil War, artistic responses to it and the Australian contribution to the Civil War. Like Spanish 1 and Spanish 7, the students visit the National Gallery of Victoria, where they are given a lecture about art and the Spanish Civil War by one of the gallery’s art educators. They also have a viewing of Picasso’s Weeping Woman (1937) and learn about its commentary on the atrocities of modern warfare, as well as its connections to Picasso’s personal life.
In addition to the visit to the NGV, one of the seminars is conducted in the special collections room at the University of Melbourne archives, where students both view and hold visual material connecting to the Spanish Civil War. I consider here the implications of teaching with visual objects such as posters, photos and postcards. Scholarship in the area of object-based learning defines objects as any “item such as a specimen, artefact or artwork that can be collectively referred to as material culture, but the term could equally apply to manuscripts, rare books and archives” (Chatterjee/Hannan/Thomson 2015: 1). Teaching with objects not only improves learning outcomes, according to scholars, but can also “inspire, inform, engage and motivate learners of all stages of their education” (Chatterjee/Hannan/Thomson 2015: 1).
The Spanish Civil War material that the students look at includes not just textual material, but also visual texts such as posters, postcards and photos. The students find the visit to the university’s archives to be exciting, with many commenting in class that it was the best aspect of the course. The Spanish Civil War comes to life for them as they embark on a journey of discovery, looking at and holding primary sources that up until that point had remained theoretical and removed from their own sense of self. As they view images relating to the war, the suffering and devastation becomes so much more real to them than other, more removed cultural texts. This is an example of the benefits of experiential learning. The physical proximity to the material is further enhanced by the fact the material relates to Australians who either went to Spain to fight or attempted to rally support for Republican or Nationalist Spain from Australia.
Many Australians tried to offer support organising events to raise awareness of the War and funds to be sent to Spain. The debate that was held at the University of Melbourne is an example of these sort of events. Of particular interest is that the infamous Spanish Civil War Debate, as it has come to be known, was held on university grounds despite the prevalent opinion of the time that universities should remain separate from public affairs, especially contentious ones like the Civil War. “The Spanish Government is the Ruin of Spain” was the subject of the University of Melbourne Debating Society’s first meeting held on 22 March 1937 and has been well documented by scholars. Staff, students and the University’s administrative body were split on whether the University should engage publicly with the enormously divisive issue of the Spanish Civil War. While the Vice-Chancellor believed that it was the University’s mission to give informed public opinion about Spain’s War, the Chancellor was appalled and believed that staff and students should remain peripheral to public affairs.
To facilitate their analysis of the University of Melbourne’s Lloyd Edmonds, Arthur Howells and Kenneth Coldicutt archival holdings, the students are provided with worksheets that ask them to focus on different aspects of the visual and discursive texts. The students only have immediate level language proficiency, so the images are particularly powerful in that they can be understood more easily than a written text, and students spend most of their time looking at and answering questions about these visual texts. For instance, the Arthur Fenton Howells collection contains photographs of the war and a postcard booklet titled Catalunya.
Students are asked to consider how these images position the viewer to feel about Spain and the Spanish Civil War. They also view the Coldicutt Collection, which includes posters and other material about the films Coldicutt showed in Australia to garner support for the Republican cause. Coldicutt travelled throughout Australia with a projector after the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936. Students were asked to analyse the posters advertising the films and the screenings of them and to consider the audiences and the purpose of posters.
Scholars point to the importance of students being actively involved in the process of learning. Chatterjee, Hannan and Thomson, for instance, write that “in order to gain real knowledge, the learner must go through a cycle of learning by being actively involved in the experience. Next the learner must reflect on the experience” (2015: 2). Certainly, the students’ learning experience at the University of Melbourne’s archival collections is reminiscent of this process, as they not only look through, inspect and examine the archival material, but also reflect on it. Not just the tactile engagement with visual sources about the Spanish Civil War, but also the fact of being actively involved in the process of learning at the special collections is clearly motivating and memorable.
Reference:
Chatterjee, Helen J.; Hannan, Leonie & Thomson, Linda (2015): Introduction to object-based learning and multisensory engagement. In: Chatterjee, Helen J. & Hannan, Leonie (Eds.): Engaging the Senses: Object-Based Learning in Higher Education. Surrey, England: Ashgate Publishing, 1‒21.