LOTE - Italian and Indonesian

Year 8 Italian Incursion

Commedia Dell’Arte and The Masked Workshop

On Tuesday 18th February, all the Year 8 students of Italian participated in their annual cultural incursion with Dennis Murphy.  In period 1 and 2, we had a performance by Dennis Murphy. He performed for us many of the different masked characters and we learned about their personalities and background. He also talked to us about the history and origins of the Commedia dell’Arte. He put on different costumes and gave us a performance of the masked characters from the Commedia dell’Arte. Some of the characters he performed were: Pantelone, Arlecchino, iL Capitano, bufetto and Il Dottore.

 

 

In period 3 and 4 we watched Shrek 2 in Italian with subtitles. In the movie, Shrek and Fiona get married and her parents the King and Queen invite them to stay over and meet their new son-in law. But it doesn’t go as planned for Fiona because her father disapproves of Shrek and tries to persuade her to marry Prince Charming. The Commedia dell’Arte, which dates back to the 16th Century,  has influenced many television shows and movies and the key factor is exaggeration, exaggeration, exaggeration, as we saw with the characters in Shrek, a contemporary form of the Commedia.

 

During period 5 and 6, one person in each pair put on a mask and the other person had to direct them to act out a storyline in character in the Commedia dell’Arte style. Each pair then performed their roleplay to the rest of the class in turn. All in all it was a fantastic day where  we learned all about the history & origins of the Commedia dell’Arte and we also had the opportunity to act in Commedia dell’Arte style. Thank You to the Ms Gallo & Ms Urban for all your organisation and for a great day.

Year 8 Indonesian Incursion

 

 

On the 18th of February 2020, Year 8 students had an Indonesian incursion. Nita from Baguskan was our guest, who is a traditional Indonesian dance teacher. She taught two Year 8 classes two traditional Indonesian dances. Our group learnt a warrior dance and the other learnt a fan dance. It was very challenging to learn a whole dance from a whole different culture but it was fun to perform it in front of the other class. While performing we wore traditional clothing with props. Our class had archery bows as props. We felt tough like a warrior while wearing the costume. It was very exhilarating and a great experience. We would like to thank the teachers and Nita for organising this and for making the day very enjoyable!

Therese Licanda and Jenny Le

Year 8 Indonesian