RCAH ILO Projects Fall 2019
Integrated Language Options (ILOs) constitute the core elements of the RCAH CLAC Program. ILOs provide language immersion opportunities for students. In an ILO, students use the language to collaborate with each other and their language mentor on a semester-long project. Fall 2019 topics and projects are listed below.
American Sign Language
Title: ABC’s of ASL Poetry
Description: Although it is not spoken, poetry in American Sign Language (ASL) utilizes conventions of poetry such as repetition, rhyme, meter, etc. However, some of these conventions change with the modality. Rhyme, for example, does not depend on phonetic repetition at the end of words, but repetition of hand shapes. For the ILO this semester, the students explored ASL poetry through creating their own ASL poems in the form of “Alphabet Poetry” where each phrase of the poem uses a different hand shape in the order of the English alphabet (A, B, C, etc.).
Participants: Anna Bassett, Olivia Haberichter, and Addison Walton with fellow Mark Berardi
Chinese
Title: An Exploration of Chinese Desserts
Description: In this video, I first introduce my background and connection to China. Then I demonstrate how to make two Chinese desserts: 芒果雪媚娘, mango and cream wrapped in a sweet rice flour dough, and 芒果椰奶千层糕, a coconut and mango gelatin cake. Come and learn to make your own Chinese desserts!
Participants: Hana Bernard with fellow Xuehong (Stella) He
Costa Rica
Title: Descubriendo Costa Rica
Description: The student interviewed people from Costa Rica and, at the same time, did an intensive research of the rich culture of Costa Rica. As a result, the student crafted a couple of fanzines to present typical legends, sayings, and music from Costa Rica. Especially something called “Bombas tipicas” which is a traditional form of expression, a bomba is a tradition thrown like a verbal firecracker into the midst of any good fiesta.
Participants: Payton Miller with fellow Silvana Peralta Bogarin
French
Title: Santé Publique: Exploring public health perspectives and programs in France and the United States
View Project HereDescription: Through research on public health programming aimed at improving nutritional outcomes in France, discussion of our experiences with such programs and perceptions of public health both in the United States and abroad, and an interview with Yasmina Bouraoui, a French-speaking director of public health for the State of Michigan, we explored public health in these two countries. Our discussion focused on the various systemic and contextual factors that influence public health outcomes, perceptions related to the state of public health in the two countries, and their approaches to solving public health issues, specifically in nationwide nutrition.
Participants: Abigail Kuplicki, Kate Williams, Fatoumata Sacko with Visiting Scholar Weloré Tamboura
Korean
Title: K-pop으로 한글 배우기 (Learning Korean alphabet (Hangul) with K-pop)
Description: Learn the Korean alphabet (hangul) through two of the most popular K-pop groups, BTS and EXO! Each letter in the alphabet is written on the screen and is read aloud so the audience can understand how the letter sounds. This is followed by a clip of BTS/EXO saying a word that begins with that letter. Features clips from BTS/EXO performances, music videos, interviews, and conversations.
Participants: Caitlin David, Eryn Lee Savage with fellow Ezgi Ulusoy
Russian
Title: Эмигранты из России в США: Различия Между Странами (Emigrants from Russia in the United States: Differences between the Countries)
View Project HereDescription: In this project, Perry Truscon investigated the experiences of two emigrants from Russia living in the United States. During the interviews, the participants talked about the reasons why they moved to the United States, their cultural experiences, and other aspects of emigration.
Participants: Perry Truscon with fellow Dmitrii Pastushenkov
Spanish
Title: La Historia y Técnica de la Salsa.
View Video HereDescription: In this Integrated Language Option (ILO) Project, our group interviewed Erick, a friend from Mexico who shared his experiences learning salsa with family, and Francisco, who formally explored and studied different parts of the Latin diaspora which involve salsa as a social tradition, and teachers students in MSU to learn to dance salsa. The video highlights the history of salsa from its creation in the United States to its relevance in Latin American culture and our own exploration and learning process of salsa during our 2019 Fall semester in the Spanish ILO.
Participants: Sarah Jozefaciuk, Briauna Travis, Catherine Weber, Iliana Cosme-Brooks, Kaitlyn Wehner, Paige Geroux, Sophie Parks, Kamya Harrisonwith, and language fellow Romina Peña-Pincheira.