Learning culture through film

As students left the final class in Dee Bridgewater’s summer course on Wednesday, they shared cordial comments about how they enjoyed the class, and how their lecturer’s infectious laughter always made them laugh too.

But when the class began six weeks ago, students hardly knew what they were in for.

The class is Communication Studies 1B, “Learning American English and Culture Through Movies,” and is part of a six-week program run through the UCLA Summer Institutes.

The course, which is paired with Communication Studies 1A, “Public Speaking for Non-native Speakers,” is designed to teach international students, who have studied some English at home, how to speak American-style English successfully and communicate effectively with Americans in public, private and academic situations.

Students such as Youngmin Ju, a student at Ewha Women’s University in Korea, were expecting a standard English class that would teach the ins and outs of the spoken English language.

Instead they got a class that included “Harry Potter,” “Kung Fu Panda” and “Up” on the syllabus, and that aimed to teach English by watching movies.

Although Harry Potter takes place in a British setting, Bridgewater said by showing the movie, he was trying to expose his students to the roots of the English language, which are connected to Latin, Greek and Old English. These linguistic origins can be seen in the film through the names of characters and creatures in the Harry Potter world.

His unusual approach to teaching non-native speakers a new language caught some of the students off guard, but Bridgewater said he believes it is a very effective teaching method.

“Culture is a shared meaning. So what better way to experience a culture than to actually go there and experience their mass media?” Bridgewater said.

However, Ju said she expected a more standard approach to learning the language and was a bit disappointed that they didn’t study English more in-depth.

But she added that she learned a lot in the class and that learning English through the movies was an interesting experience because she got to learn a lot more about the culture than she expected.

There were also two American students from UCLA taking the class to study enculturation, the way people learn about a modern culture as immigrants or tourists.

Henry Chodsky, a fourth-year anthropology student and one of the two Americans taking the class, said it was interesting to see how the international students picked up on things in American language and culture that natives sometimes miss.

He noted the more classical use of words like “fantastic” as something full of fantasy, as opposed to the popular way of expressing approval by using the same word.

“They pick up on subtle nuances before even coming out here,” Chodsky said. “Movies for them are basically a guide to how to survive in America, they have an influence over them.”

But beyond teaching English, Bridgewater wanted to take advantage of the diverse range of students in his class, who came from as near as Mexico and as far as Hong Kong, to raise their cross-cultural awareness.

Bridgewater focused class discussions around universal themes to allow his students to look at each theme from many different points of view.

The discussions were lively and offered a variety of perspectives from students from all over the world.

For “Up,” the class discussed similar signs of respect toward the elderly in other cultures, and after watching “Kung Fu Panda,” they considered the differing opinions of animals as cultural symbols throughout the world.

“I learned a lot about American culture, but I also learned a lot about other cultures,” said Lisette Van Der Kraan, a third-year business communication student at Radboud University in the Netherlands.

Ju said the culture in America is very different from Korea, where they place a big emphasis on politeness.

“Here, things (have a bit too much commotion), they’re too free in some ways,” Ju said.

But she said she enjoyed the freedom she had in the classroom to make comments and discuss a subject.

“In Korea, to raise your hand while a professor is lecturing is considered a bit rude, but here I like the free discussion in class. In some ways, I began to like this style of education a little more,” Ju said.

While the class may not have been what some students expected, most of the students were pleased with the class and found learning English through the movies satisfying.

“The class was so diverse, and I loved all the different nationalities,” Sarah Salman of Dubai said. “The people were very open to others even though we were from different parts of the world.”

The final part of the class involved the students giving a short speech on a theme from one of the movies they watched.

Many of the students used these speeches to express how much they had learned about American culture through movies and how they plan to return to the U.S. to take part in it.

“My ultimate goal was to interact with other people and to learn about American culture because I want to maybe settle down here for a while,” Van Der Kraan said.