BARTELS, Anna; HADEL, Laida; NEUGEBAUER, Daniel, STEIN, Eva (eds.)
The New Alphabet/DNA #23: Talkback Circuits: New Alphabets At School

The language of tomorrow originates in the schools of today. This book looks at (colonial) alphabets in the school microcosm, centring on a Spanish course at Johanna-Eck-Schule in Berlin and the project work carried out with Santiago Calderón and Aliza Yanes. The two artists present their own animated film images as a counter to the Eurocentric narratives offered by the class textbook which are rooted in colonialism. The students’ everyday lives are also determined by the informal use of language; here we are able to look into the pages of books and get to listen in on break-time conversations. How do the exchanges between the students, which are typically multilingual, tally with the monolingual transfer of knowledge? How does online hate speech affect people’s thinking? How can a syntax of body language be found? And how can the creative potential of memes and chat shorthand be transferred to educational practice? [publisher's note]

With contributions by Santiago Calderón García and Aliza Yanes, Leila Haghighat, Franziska Pierwoss and Siska.

Published by Spector Books / Haus der Kulturen der Welt, 2024
Artists' Writings / Education / Postcolonial Studies