During the third century AD, Plotinus, who was a Neo-Platonist, changed the traditional view of Beauty accepted earlier in antiquity. Beauty had been considered to be the symmetry of parts, but Plotinus defined Beauty differently—a Principle created and emanated an Idea, which could also be called Beauty. Additionally, he argues that each part of a whole does not specifically have Beauty; instead, the individual parts combine, contributing to make the final product beautiful. However, he continues, if the whole is considered Beautiful, the parts must also be beautiful because the whole could not be made of ugly parts. Plotinus wrote his views concerning his contemporaries, and there is a connection between his aesthetic theories and Roman art of the time.
The aesthetic theoretical implications of Roman art, specifically of the kind outlined by Plotinus, have not been explored thoroughly, according to Thea Ravasi. In Roman art, there are a few portrayals of Omphale, the queen of Lydia, and Hercules, the demigod, which are seen in sculpture, fresco, and mosaic. Although a variety of mediums are used, analyzing the various representations of Omphale and Hercules presents what Romans prized aesthetically—or the combination and juxtaposition of the ideal and the real, the feminine versus masculine—revealing the play between male and female gender roles during the Roman era.
To begin, understanding the depictions of representations of Hercules and Omphale depends on knowing the myth. While there are numerous versions, in the telling used for the purpose of this paper, Hercules desired to atone for murdering one of his friends, Iphitus. After consulting the oracle Apollo, the god advised Hercules to serve Omphale, Queen of Lydia, even though Hercules, a son of Zeus, was famous because of his exceptional strength. Despite the change in status from a son of a god to a slave, Hercules still completed the tasks Omphale gave him, which she, as the queen, tailored for him specifically. There were numerous tasks, such Hercules being forced to do women’s work and wear women’s clothing. For example, he had to hold a basket of wool, while Omphale and her maidens worked on the spinning. Moreover, while Hercules wore women’s clothing, Omphale wore the Nemean Lion skin.
In Greek mythology, the Nemean lion was a vicious monster. Because of its golden fur, it could not be killed by humans’ weapons and its claws were extremely sharp. Hercules killed the Nemean lion as the first of the twelve labors that King Eurystheus required. Omphale not only wore the lion skin but also carried the club of Hercules’. Tertullian (c. 155–240), an early Christian author who lived in a Roman province in Africa, writes about the pagan myth, which is surprising given his Christian background. He reasons that the skin must have been “softened, smoothened, and freed from stench for a long time, as had been done, so I presume, in Omphale’s house, by means of balsam and fenugreek oil” because Tertullian believed that not even the strongest of women could have held up, let alone wear, the mighty lion skin. Nevertheless, over time, Omphale fell in love with Hercules because of his strength and handsome features, and the couple married. This myth was used in Roman political maneuvering. Yet artists throughout time have explored the gender roles of the myth in art. The following sections will explore various Roman artistic representations of the myth through the mediums of sculpture, fresco, and mosaic.
A unique sculpture is Portrait Statue of Woman in form of Omphale, which is located currently in the Vatican Museum (Fig. 1). In funerary Roman art, the deceased individual’s portrait sometimes included a mature face juxtaposed with an ideal body comparable to the gods, which was popular among the Roman nobility and the wealthy. This sculpture shows a middle-aged woman with an elaborate hairstyle, indicating the Severan period, which occurred from AD 193 to AD 235. The hairstyle is parted in the middle, with two braids in the front, framing her face; there appears to be slight waves in her hair that cover her ears. There is the Nemean lion head covering, although no Hercules is included. The figure is almost completely nude; the claws of the lion reach towards her nipples, and a cloth, coming from behind, rests by her side, and her right hand holds it closely to her body in front of her genitalia. Quite a bit of skin, which appears smooth and tangible, is showing, and her left arm cradles the club.
With this sculpture of Portrait Statue of Woman in form of Omphale, the ideal and the realistic are portrayed. There is a great contrast between ideal body type, such as one of a goddess like Venus, and realistic facial portrait of this middle-aged woman. She stands serene and divine looking with elegant contrapposto, while her face is clearly aged older than the rest of the body. The nudity of statues becomes a type of costume, which gives resemblances of divinity to the portrait of the deceased. Visually, these juxtaposed styles of the old and the new look strange and even incoherent for modern viewers; however, Plotinus and other Romans of this time would have found these portrayals to be aesthetically pleasing. Beauty, during this time, was the unity of the composed individual parts. Therefore, because the parts are beautiful, here the idealized body as well as the aged face, the whole is considered beautiful. Additionally, the parts considered masculine (e.g., the lion skin and club) juxtaposed with the parts considered feminine (e.g., the long hairstyle, the goddess-like body, the smooth skin, and graceful elegance) combine to create an object of Beauty.
It is unclear why this woman would have chosen to be shown in the form of Omphale. Of course, Omphale is a woman of great authority, as her country’s sole leader. Therefore, the woman whose portrait was being made may have desired to be associated with that strength and resilience. Another juxtaposition is the sophisticated, detailed hairstyle, indicated earlier as a style from the Severan era, versus the lion skin. The hairstyle is meant to be seen because the lion skin is placed quite a bit back on her head. If this occurred in real life, the skin would probably fall over from the weight of the head; therefore, this woman obviously wanted her hairstyle to be visible. During the Roman period, beauty was connected with physical features as well as feminine virtue. If a women had an elegant hairstyle, she was seen as being both beautiful and virtuous. Therefore, unique and elaborate hairstyles showed women, especially of the upper classes, as having traits of the ideal Roman woman while also being stylish and affluent.
Hairstyles were used by the upper-class women to push political or social agendas, depending on who was ruling at the time. Perhaps the woman depicted as Omphale desired to present herself as an ideal Roman woman and citizen by following the hairstyle trends of the time. At the same time, this sculpture emphasizes her strength or even maybe her position of power if she belonged to the upper classes, which would make sense given the quality of this statue.
Another reason this woman may present herself as Omphale could be to associate herself with the goddess Venus. When creating portraits and life-size statues, the body type and overall portrayal reflected trends in politics, religious affiliations, and personal taste. For Roman women, the selection of the body type portrayed reflected a particular role. It was important as well as difficult for Roman women “to fashion themselves as fit but amply endowed, wealthy but modest, elaborately coiffured but capable of working with wool, and sensuous but models of correct behavior.” These roles were portrayed through the selection of body types; the body type became a type of façade that was connected with various Roman goddesses, who were recognizable by the general populace. By choosing a particular body type, the bearer also took on the characteristics of that goddess.
For example, the goddess Venus was associated with not only attractiveness but also fertility. Here this woman has the body type of Venus, with a flawless figure, perhaps to present herself as desirable and fertile. Her aged face, in contrast, emphasizes her wisdom and experience, which could be associated with Omphale, a wise and competent ruler. This contrast of hyper-feminine with the naturalistic features shows that wealthy, upper-class women of the time had a great say in how they wanted to be presented.
The decision to not include Hercules is an intriguing one. Of course, no Hercules could be shown because perhaps the woman shown here is unmarried or desired a representation of only herself. With the patriarchy of Roman society, women were expected to fulfill values—chastity, fertility, beauty—that men desired. This portrait of the woman as Omphale stands in contrast to patriarchal expectation of Roman women.
She seems to associate herself with Queen Omphale, who had political power typically associated outside a Roman woman’s world, and Venus, who was a goddess of great beauty and fertility, which are associated with the child-bearing and the home. Additionally, she maintains a realistic portrait for her face, therefore combining different worlds into one thoughtful presentation. This portrait is a deliberate decision in complex, multi-referential representation. This woman does not need a cross-dressing Hercules because these juxtapositions in style and references emphasize her own power and decisions in how she presents herself and how she wants others to see her.
Another example of a statue, quite different from the portrait statue discussed above, is included in a marble statue group of Hercules and Omphale, now located in Naples at the National Archaeological Museum (Fig. 2).
This Roman statue comes from first century AD. Omphale is shown wearing Hercules’ cloak and lion-skin headdress, which is further up on her head than the woman’s portrait as Omphale. The claws of the lion do not come down her chest here, and she does not attempt to make herself modest, as seen previously. Instead, the cloak wraps around her left thigh, and her genitalia is completely exposed. Additionally, she leans on the club of Hercules, which is in her left hand this time. In contrast, Hercules, who is dressed in a woman’s tunic that slips off his shoulder in a Venus-like manner, wears wears a woman’s snood and holds skeins of wool in his hands with wool basket at his feet. Hercules’ cork-screw curls create a prominent beard, and both of them stand in contrapposto that are a reflection of the other—Omphale’s left leg bends, and Hercules’ right leg bends. While classical in style in many ways, Hercules’ legs look stubby and shorter than expected. However, these shorter legs make the couple close to the same height and, consequently, the same level.
In this sculpture, Hercules does not appear to be ashamed of being dressed in women’s clothing, which could be because there are other Greek and Roman stories with cross-dressing men. For example, Achilles’ mother hides her son from the Greeks, who are preparing for war and want Achilles, the great warrior, to join them. Because his mother is concerned that he might die, she hides him in a palace of young women, and he is dressed as a woman to fit in with his surroundings. However, when Odysseus pretends to be a peddler and goes to the palace to catch Achilles, Odysseus places swords underneath the other trinkets in order to catch Achilles, who is interested in weapons. As depicted in the Sarcophagus of Alexander Severus and Mammaea, the scene in the sarcophagus shows Achilles reaching out to grab and examine the weapons with his female clothing falling off, revealing who he is (Fig. 3).
One reason that Roman artists may not show Hercules and Achilles as being ashamed of dressing in women’s clothing is because it is only momentary, since the viewers know that men will go back to their traditional clothing. Another reason could be that both of these men are renowned for their fighting and masculinity; even though they dress in women’s clothing, it is easy to see that Achilles and Hercules are actually men—not women—with ripped muscles and hyper-masculine, idealized forms.
Both the man and woman are portrayed positively in the marble statue group. Silberberg-Pierce discusses that Roman art conveys a positive portrayal of women in paintings, writing that “[t]his model can profitably be applied to all Roman art production: it represents a woman’s view, one which, until recently, has been effectively suppressed.” This work is a sculpture and not a painting but still depicts women, specifically Omphale, positively. Hercules and Omphale are quite close to being the same height, which suggests a type of equality, since one is neither higher nor superior over the other. Standing quite close together, Omphale’s arm wraps around Hercules with her left hand on his shoulder in a posture of consultation and mutual admiration.
Additionally, she is confident in her sexuality and in her strength. The viewer sees Omphale looks towards Hercules, who gazes off into the distance, as their bodies appear to be melding into one. Because of the mirroring poses and touch between each other, they are shown as a unified couple, and no hierarchy of one being greater than the other is suggested. Rather that suggesting a power play dynamic here, the couple looks supportive and united because despite their separate parts, their concord and union exhibits Beauty.
This section addresses another medium—frescos—depicting Hercules and Omphale. During the Imperial Roman period from 27 BC to AD 284, a portrayal of Hercules and Omphale was painted in a basilica in Pompeii, which is now in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli in Naples, Italy (Fig. 4).
The viewers see Hercules standing before Omphale, shown as an enthroned, regal queen with a laurel-wreath crown. Nike, the winged goddess representing victory, is shown floating above him. Additionally, a small boy, which could represent the god Pan, holds pipes and stands behind Omphale. There are an eagle and a lion on either side of Hercules. In the left-hand corner, the viewers see Hercules’ son, Telephos, who is sucking on a doe. This depiction contrasts greatly with the previous two examples examined in the sculpture section.
This portrayal presents a power dynamic between Hercules and Omphale. Omphale sits above him powerfully and looks off into the distance while placing her hands on her face with a contemplative look, as if considering the tasks that she will require of him. Therefore, this scene foreshadows the task of cross-dressing that will later take place because of the lion in the bottom right-hand corner (e.g., since Omphale will wear the lion skin that Hercules had killed) and the imbalanced power of master versus slave.
His shame is evident and reflects the fact that he will soon have to wear women’s clothing as part of his atonement for killing his friend, since he must obey whatever she orders. There is no freedom or liberation for Hercules, and Omphale’s gaze suggests one of independence and supremacy. In contrast to Omphale’s dominance, Hercules looks down in shame rather than looking Omphale in the eyes, which contrasts to the statue of the couple. His backside is exposed, revealing round buttocks and muscular back, arms, and legs.
Eve D’Ambra argues that male full-frontal nudity “appears active and aggressive” when compared to the modest nude of Venus; however, male nudity here does not exude confidence or “personal agency” for Hercules, perhaps because it does not depict full-frontal nudity. Therefore, if male nudity suggests aggression, then female nudity would be considered passive or less active because the Venus figure is not always completely nude but tries to cover herself partly in order to be considered beautiful.
By being clothed, Omphale could be seen as taking on a more active role. Another reason could be reflective of female responses to prostitution in Pompeii because immodesty was associated with prostitution. Women, who were wealthy and belonged to the upper classes, actively exhorted for a return to propriety and written engravings even appeared on the walls of the Triclinia in Pompeii. While impositions of enforced morality may seem strange to modern viewers, it still presents active and involved women in Pompeii, which is reflective of the active, strong depiction of Omphale.
This portrayal shows an exception to Roman Beauty because of how this strong, powerful-looking woman still follows a very classical style, such as how the drapery rests against Omphale’s body. The viewer sees the suggestion of her body underneath, the shading on the arms and her face, and the perspective of the three-quarter view of her serene, goddess-like face. The individual parts independently all have Beauty with the idealized parts contributing to Beautiful, idealized figures of the whole, even though the scene or event may seem somewhat mismatched, such as the male being naked and exposed before the woman.
Another fresco in Pompeii depicting Hercules and Omphale dates from the first century BCE, now located in Naples at the National Archaeological Museum (Fig. 5). In this depiction, Omphale holds a leaf-fan and looks down at Hercules with a mystified expression on her face. Hercules is already wearing the woman’s dress with a wreath on his head, reclining drunkenly with one of his arms in the air. Hercules’ strange depiction could explain the puzzled expressions on the women’s faces.
Surprisingly, while Hercules already wears the women’s clothing, Omphale is still wearing her own feminine clothing and not Hercules’. Perhaps one reason this portrayal is shown this way could emphasize the humor of the event. Hercules is not ashamed but rather inebriated and acting and looking ridiculous, while Omphale maintains her dignity. Omphale is placed at a higher level, emphasizing her position of power and her sober status, rather than having them on the same plane. Another reason for this portrayal could be showing why Omphale decided to dress in male clothing. The viewers see the putti figures attempting to lift the heavy club of Hercules up to the level where Omphale is sitting. Hercules is reduced to a comical, lower level by dressing in women’s clothing, but Omphale will be empowered even more by dressing in his clothing because it shows her strength and grandeur. Although the four putti figures can barely lift the club, but she will not only carry the club but also wear the heavy lion skin.
In this fresco, Omphale is not alone or only with Hercules but has female companions. The tunic slips off her Omphale’s shoulder, similar to Venus, as seen with the marble statue group of Hercules and Omphale; however, with that statue, it was Hercules’ shoulder that was exposed from the women’s clothing slipping off on that side. Yellow and greyish-purple tones mark Omphale’s clothing. On her sides, Omphale not alone here but surrounded by two young girls. The one maiden on Omphale’s left also mimics her queen, since her shoulder is also bare, and she wears white. This girl is much smaller than Omphale, although it is unclear whether or not she is supposed to be younger or the same age.
On the other side, the maiden on Omphale’s right holds her hand up to her face and looks with a quizzical expression on her face. Her clothing is in nude and green colors, and her navel is visible through the transparent clothing. This maiden is taller than the other one, but her proportions are strange and curved, making her appear serpentine instead of human. In contrast, Omphale appears to have the best proportions and follows the classical style the most with natural drapery and goddess-like elegance and beauty.
The women’s appearances emphasize Pompeii standards of beauty. Their hair is piled up on top of their heads. Roman women used hairpins, typically made out of bone, ivory, glass, gold, or silver, to style their hair, which were described as being tapered at the end (Fig. 6 and Fig. 7).
For hairdressing, hairpins were also used to separate locks and to pin up and hold the hair in place once the style was completed, and these devices could range from simple to elaborate. Because hairpins are not often shown in depictions, it is believed that Roman women typically preferred the pins to be unseen and hid them in their hair. In this fresco, little white, shiny dots are seen in the women’s hair, which would suggest a decorated end of the pin. These hairpins were the most common way of adorning hair in Pompeii.
All three women wear gold necklaces and bracelets and earrings that appear to have pearls, which was considered precious in Pompeii. Ancient sources called the S-shaped hook with the pearl pendants as stalagmium, which had precedents from the Hellenistic Grecian period (Fig. 8).
This style continued until the third century AD—well after Pompeii was destroyed. In Western society, we often associate jewelry with femininity, so it is interesting that Omphale wears not only her feminine clothing but also jewelry, which emphasizes her femininity instead of when she cross dresses and takes on the masculine role. In the previous section with the sculptures, no jewelry or hair accessories were shown, which presents something unique here that reflects Pompeii beauty practices and emphasis on the feminine beauty in contrast to other Roman women.
The labors of Hercules are frequently depicted in Greek and Roman art, but this section on mosaic will examine a depiction of Hercules with Omphale in the center of a floor mosaic found in Llíria (i.e., Valencia), which is now in the National Archeological Museum of Spain in Madrid (Fig. 9).
Spain was part of the Roman empire at this time of the third century AD. Figure 10 shows a close up of the mosaic, and Hercules is shown holding a ball of wool and dressed in women’s clothing; although most of the dress is damaged, the bottom reveals different colors of blue limestone that represent the dress. Omphale wears the lion skin, which is difficult to tell, except for the two pointy ears sticking out. She holds the olive-wood club of Hercules, as well, while reclining on a throne, which had been damaged with several tiles missing.
The figures are not proportionate because if Omphale stood up, she would be considerably taller than Hercules. Additionally, there appears to be drapery of sorts covering the bottom half of her body, but her breasts and navel are uncovered. The bubble-looking object in Omphale’s right hand is unknown. In this mosaic, no setting is shown with white and cream-colored tiles being the only background. The piece is more abstract than the sculptures and frescos; for example, Omphale’s fingers as rows of brown and white tiles.
Facial expressions are difficult to determine, given the nature of mosaic tiles and the relative level of abstraction here, making it impossible to determine whether, for instance, Hercules is embarrassed or Omphale is empowered. Their direct gaze towards each other is at the same level, suggesting a type of equality. This mosaic shows the cross-dressing of both Hercules and Omphale together at the same time, which marks ambiguities concerning gender roles in Roman society. Because of the abstraction, the psychological and emotional impact on both of this change in roles and clothing is indeterminable, making this mosaic unique when compared to the sculpture and fresco examples.
This paper has considered various representations of Hercules and Omphale in mediums, such as sculpture, fresco, and mosaic. Sometimes only Omphale or Hercules is portrayed or only one cross dresses. A strength of sculpture is that the viewers are able to walk around and examine the work from multiple angles, while mosaic and fresco present only one perspective. However, for fresco, it is easier to present more of the narrative, multiple figures, and setting, which is how the viewers understand more of what is happening in the story. In contrast, the mosaic appears to be the most limited, given the damages and abstraction. These mediums reveal what is emphasized in Roman aesthetics, not only the ideal versus the real, but also the representation of interactions between men and women. Sculpture presents strong, powerful women as having Beauty, while the mosaics focus on feminine beauty for Omphale. However, Omphale is depicted as serious when wearing Hercules’ clothing, while Hercules is humorous to look at or looks preposterous when wearing women’s clothing.
Plotinus believed that if the whole is considered Beautiful, the parts must also be beautiful because the whole could not be made of ugly parts; hence, the masculine parts of women and feminine parts of men—often shown by clothing—are not actually ugly but have Beauty because the whole is beautiful. These depictions justify representing women in masculine clothing, which presents a less rigid view of gender and gender relationships recognized in contemporary Roman society.
Brilliant, Richard. Visual Narratives: Storytelling in Etruscan and Roman Art. London: Cornell University Press, 1984.
D’Ambra, Eve. Roman Art. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
D’Ambrosio, Antonio. Women and Beauty in Pompeii. Trans. Gram Sells. Naples:<<L’erma>> di Bretschneider, 2001.
D’Avino, Michele. The Women of Pompeii. Trans. Monica Hope Jones and Luigi Nusco. Napoli: NA, NA.
“F26.1 Herkales & Omphale.” Theoi. Accessed February 18, 2016. http://www.theoi.com/Gallery/F26.1.html.
Fantham, Elaine, Helen Peet Foley, Natalie Boymel Kampen, Sarah B. Pomeroy, and H. A. Shapiro. Women in the Classical World: Image and Text. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994.
Kleiner, Diana E. E. and Susan B. Matheson. “‘Her Parents Gave Her the Name Claudia.’” I Claudia II: Women in Roman Art and Society. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2000.
Koortbojian, Michael. Myth, Meaning, and Memory on Roman Sarcophagi. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.
McManus, Barbara F. “Index of Images, Part XIV.” Vroma. Accessed February 15, 2016, http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/index14.html.
Pomarède, Vincent. “Hercules and Omphale.” Department of Paintings: French painting.
Louvre Museum. Accessed March 28, 2016. http://www.louvre.fr/en/oeuvre-notices/hercules-and-omphale.
Ravasi, Thea. “Displaying Sculpture in Rome.” A Companion to Ancient Aesthetics. Eds. Pierre Destrée and Penelope Murray. Sussex: Wiley Blackwell, 2015.
Silberberg-Pierce, Susan. “The Muse Restored: Images of Women in Roman Painting.” Woman’s Art Journal 14 (1993): 28–36.
Tertullian. De Pallio. Ed. Vincent Hunink. Tertullian website (2005). Accessed March 28, 2016. http://www.tertullian.org/articles/hunink_de_pallio.htm.
Tuck, Steven L. A History of Roman Art. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, 2015.
 Diana E. E. Kleiner and Susan B. Matheson, “‘Her Parents Gave Her the Name Claudia,’” I Claudia II: Women in Roman Art and Society, (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2000), 11.
 For example, Augustus’s wife, Livia, wore her way in order to contrast to their Egyptian enemy Cleopatra and her intricate hairstyle because Livia sought to promote simple Roman values and morality and Roman-ness. See ibid., 12.
 Ibid., 12.
 Ibid., 13.
 Barbara F. McManus, “Index of Images, Part XIV,” Vroma, accessed February 15, 2016, http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/index14.html.
 Like Achilles, Hercules is often shown on Roman sarcophagi. One of the most renowned myths, of Hercules retrieving Alcestis, is commonly depicted. See Michael Koortbojian, Myth, Meaning, and Memory on Roman Sarcophagi, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995) 112. Another example of Hercules depicted on Roman sarcophagi includes the Velletri sarcophagus. See Steven L. Tuck, A History of Roman Art, (Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, 2015) 264.
 Susan Silberberg-Pierce, “The Muse Restored: Images of Women in Roman Painting,” Woman’s Art Journal 14 (1993), 35.
 “F26.1 Herkales & Omphale,” Theoi, accessed February 18, 2016, http://www.theoi.com/Gallery/F26.1.html.
 Eve D’Ambra, Roman Art, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998) 109.
 Michele D’Avino, The Women of Pompeii, translated by Monica Hope Jones and Luigi Nusco, (Napoli: NA, NA) 72.
 Barbara F. McManus, “Index of Images, Part XIV,” Vroma, accessed February 15, 2016, http://www.vroma.org/images/mcmanus_images/index14.html.
 Antonio D’Ambrosio, Women and Beauty in Pompeii, translated by Gram Sells, (Naples: <<L’erma>> di Bretschneider, 2001) 16.
 Ibid., 38.
 Ibid., 40.
 The Twelve Labors of Hercules is shown on the metopes of the Temple of Zeus at Olympia. See Richard Brilliant, Visual Narratives: Storytelling in Etruscan and Roman Art, (London: Cornell University Press, 1984) 37. On the Roman Velletri sarcophagus, Hercules is shown performing the twelve labors. See Steven L. Tuck, A History of Roman Art, (Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, 2015) 264.


Different Drummers: Using Music to Teach History
Try to imagine life without music. No rock ‘n' roll, no blues, no country, no classical, no rap, no jazz, no folk. No way! Music does not just entertain or refresh us, it also helps to establish who we are. According to ethnomusicologist Bruno Nettl, "One cannot really understand a culture without taking into account the almost inevitably great importance of its music." 1
We have only to glance at our students and listen to them to understand that music is important to them. Music, musical styles, and music videos permeate their consciousness; their dress and vocabulary reflect their dedication to the culture of popular music. They are more familiar with music than they are with books. One day it struck me, as I was considering ways to enliven my classes in world history and Western civilization, that I could turn my students' passion for music into an asset. In fact, the time they spend in the classroom is probably the only time in their day when they are not exposed to music. This may be a good thing, but it can also make the classroom seem less exciting than life "on the outside," and it limits the tools teachers have to stimulate classroom participation. When professors teach about Mughal India or Renaissance Italy they often show slides of the Taj Mahal or of Michaelangelo's sculpture to illustrate abstract ideas, but pictures are two-dimensional representations, and sculptures and buildings don't move. When I play an Indian raga or an Italian madrigal, my students begin to think about past cultures in a new way and with unexpected excitement.
I myself do not read music or play any instruments, nor am I "musically inclined." I say this to reassure readers that musical skills are not needed to use music in class. All that is needed are the same reflective and critical skills we employ when we read a book. There is nothing mysterious about using music to teach history, even if the music itself arouses a sense of mystery and curiosity.
As history teachers, we often use documents to introduce our students to the values, practices, ideals, and conflicts that inform and structure a historical culture and the social relations within it. Music is also a primary cultural source that can provide teachers with a novel way to engage students with historical issues, to get them to practice skills of analysis, and to promote cross-cultural understanding. Musical selections should be treated like any other historical document: they should be regarded as creations of a specific time and place that we can use to illustrate points about class, gender, cultural values, politics, and economic life. Of course, we should be careful not to overgeneralize about a culture on the basis of a few musical selections, just as we must use caution when discussing a document.
What makes music a wonderful primary source for students to investigate is its accessibility, especially if the instructor provides historical context and some questions to guide their inquiry. Students can listen to a Confucian court song and get a sense of what it expresses. Such direct access to written cultural artifacts in the classroom is impossible. Students are thrilled by the immediacy of music, even if a song communicates little about a society that has long since disappeared and in which students have no other interest. Music grabs their attention; it is expressive and arouses emotional states of awareness. It has been used by most cultures to accompany and enhance such diverse activities as worship, contemplation, storytelling, mourning, healing, consumption, and social criticism. Societies also use music to endow abstract ideas with sensuality and form, and music can give even metaphysical concepts a physical and immediate presence in the classroom. Because it engages students' minds and emotions, music is a powerful instructional tool that helps students remember information and theories.
Playing music, then, is a way for instructors to spark student interest and to introduce a culture or an era in a new and memorable way. The kinds of music one includes in a history course depend upon the nature and scope of the course and the goals set by the instructor, but teachers can introduce music successfully at any grade level, from primary school through university. What follows is focused on introductory college world history courses that I have taught. The content of these courses allows great scope in exploring a wide variety of musical styles and sounds. The major exceptions to this claim are in the areas of ancient history: we do not know what ancient Greek, Roman, Egyptian, Babylonian, Mayan, or Olmec music sounded like. Many of their instruments exist and some musical notations survive, but since we do not know how to read the notations, there are no completely accurate reproductions of this early music. We do have some idea, however, of how ancient Chinese and Indian music sounded. The earliest Chinese musical text comes from the 10th century c.e. (Song dynasty), but many scholars believe that oral tradition preserved, with a great degree of accuracy, some of the songs from the sixth century b.c.e. (the later Zhou era of Confucius) until they were written down later. Religious chants for the Rig Veda, which are performed today in India, are probably fairly accurate presentations of music that is over 2,500 years old, because there is and was an emphasis on perfect performance: believers thought the slightest mistake in singing could harm the universe and have serious consequences for life on earth.
Most history instructors can use music for a variety of purposes. It can help refresh material for students before introducing a new unit or on the eve of exams. For example, before completing a segment on slavery in the United States or before an exam containing questions on slave culture and resistance, a teacher could play slave spirituals like "Steal Away to Jesus" or "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," ask students to recall specific details about slave life, and explain how the words or melody of the songs reflect aspects of slave culture on 19th-century plantations. The music helps the ideas stick. Music can also reinvigorate lectures, or at least provide interesting breaks. An Indian raga, which was music for the upper class, can illustrate a lecture point on the opulence, sensuality, and religious mysticism of the early Mughal Empire more effectively than a picture of the Taj Mahal can. It can also provide a transition between a point on the growing importance of Sufism and devotional bhakti cults in 16th-century Indian cultural life and on their influence on the imperial Mughal court and its style of rule. For help in understanding Indian classical music, see A. Daniélou's The Ragas of Northern Indian Music (1968), A. Prajnananda's A Historical Study of Indian Music (1965), and Bonnie Wade's Music in India: The Classical Traditions (1979).
Music also works as a starter for small- or large-group discussions. The kinds of questions you ask students to consider as they listen to the music depend on the grade level of the class, your own expectations of their work, and the limitations time always imposes. I tend to ask general questions that can be used over and over again and that allow students latitude as they formulate their responses: What do we know about the society that produced this music? What mental picture does it create? What mood does it set? How does it set it? How does it fit (or not fit) with what we have learned about the culture or era that created it? I keep the questions simple and few so all can be addressed. Complexity can be added through follow-up questions based on the diversity of responses received. Repeating the same questions familiarizes students with the procedure, relaxes them so they can concentrate on the music, and gets them used to thinking about certain key issues when they listen to music in class.
Finally, music can stimulate a writing project. I usually use the same questions I employ for discussion, and this recycling has comparable advantages of familiarity and simplicity. The writing project can take more than one day; it can also be assigned as homework, as an in-class exam, or as the centerpiece of a take-home exam. I sometimes have students write down their responses to the music I play and my questions about it before I start a discussion, because writing helps them focus their thoughts and gives them more time for reflection.
Musical excerpts should be short (three to four minutes) for a couple of reasons: they can be repeated if necessary and brevity leaves time for discussion. Brief excerpts also maintain students' interest and attention better than half-hour segments from concerts, which often inspire students to count holes in ceiling tiles. Short excerpts of many of the musical selections discussed below can be found on a cassette tape entitled "Experiencing World Music" that comes with the Instructor's Manual for Peter Stearns et al., World Civilizations: The Global Experience (1992).
Music and Cosmic Order
On the first day of my world history course I like to play songs from a recording of Australian aboriginal music. (The songs can be found on sound disks that accompany Elizabeth May, ed., Musics of Many Cultures .) Iplay the music as students enter the class, and I ask them what culture created the music and where it is from. Most have no idea; they think it comes from another world and, in a way, it does. The music is low, guttural, rhythmic, droning, and lacks harmonies. I use it to introduce hunting and gathering societies, societies that left no written record for historians to ponder. It is my way of giving paleolithic peoples some "presence" in the classroom, and the vibrating bass sounds of the didjeridu fill seemingly empty space very well. While we do not know what music in Eurasia sounded like 20,000 years ago, aboriginal music, even after contact with Europeans, provides one way to acquaint students with the musical sound and beliefs of a paleolithic people who may have migrated from south India. Some useful introductions to aboriginal music and culture are Catherine J. Ellis's Aboriginal Music Making (1964), her "Structure and Significance in Aboriginal Song" in the journal Mankind (June 1969), and Theodore G. H. Strehlow's Songs of Central Australia (1971). Aborigines believe that once the world was created, the flows of nature had to be stimulated by human rituals of music, art, and dance. This belief was and is shared by many other peoples: Aztecs, Mayas, Incas, Navahos, and Chinese Confucians, to name a few. Music was and is used by Australian aborigines, Native Americans, and Confucians to restore order and balance in the world and to maintain harmony with nature.
An example of Chinese orchestral music that is based on Confucian ideas is "Receiving the Approaching Spirit" (on the cassette tape provided with World Civilizations). It was adapted by Koreans and performed in ninth-century court rituals. It gives us an idea of how neo-Confucian culture, which emphasized order, virtue, harmony, and tradition, "sounded." The instruments used to create this music were made from the eight elements of the earth: stone, wood, leather, silk, gourd, metal, bamboo, and clay. Confucians believed that by "orchestrating" the sound these instruments made, they could influence the cosmic order and create world harmony. Music thus served political, metaphysical, and moral ends. To Westerners the music sounds disorderly, cacophonous, clangy, and atonal. Discussion of it is always lively because it thwarts students' expectations in a number of ways and gets them to rethink their ideas about cultural perceptions. Playing the song allows me to introduce a discussion of the social and ideological force that music had in Chinese and Sinophilic cultures. For further information on Chinese and East Asian music consult Kuo-huang Han and Lindy Li Mark, "Evolution and Revolution in Chinese Music," Music of Many Cultures, Elizabeth May, ed. (1980); Frederic Lieberman's Chinese Music: An Annotated Bibliography (1970); Laurence Picken's "The Music of Far Eastern Asia: China" in The New Oxford History of Music, vol. 1(1957); Eta Harich-Schneider's A History of Japanese Music(1973); and Shigeo Kishibe's The Traditional Music of Japan(1966).
Music and Politics
Like their neo-Confucian contemporaries, the leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in the European Middle Ages used spiritual music for conscious political ends. Beginning about the seventh century c.e., popes strove to unify Western Christendom by codifying rituals and asserting papal primacy in matters of church doctrine and practices. This centralizing effort, which lasted centuries, was a major feature of papal politics, and popes dispatched musical ambassadors to propagate the sanctioned form of religious service. Regulating music was just one way they tried to unify doctrine and control the practices of local bishops and monasteries. After lecturing on some of these points, instructors could play the "Agnus Dei," one of the "politically correct" songs of the eighth century, to start a class discussion of the emotional impact of music and its uses as propaganda.
Another way to look at the political role of music is to play any of the operas written by Jean-Baptiste Lully when the class reads about the era of Louis XIV. Most texts emphasize that Louis employed culture in a self-conscious way as part of his state-building project. In addition to showing slides of Versailles, one could play part of a Lully opera during a lecture on the Sun King. Lully's themes were classical and based on the tragedies of Racine and Corneille, but they also had nationalistic overtones and embodied the splendor, grandeur, and confidence that Louis wanted to project to his subjects and to the world. The music is centrally controlled and orchestrated in a way that Western ears will find familiar: one can picture a central conductor and all of the instruments functioning in unison to produce melodious sounds. Lully's pieces are powerful and symbolize harmony and national unity. They can be useful in introducing students to another facet of the centralizing tendency of the French state: the standardization of culture in the age of the baroque. There is a rich literature on European music since the Middle Ages. Some books worth perusing are Howard M. Brown's Music in the Renaissance (1976); Richard Pauly's Music in the Classic Period (1988); Donald Jay Grout's A History of Western Music (1980); Rey Longyear's Nineteenth-Century Romanticism in Music (1988); Eric Salzman's Twentieth-Century Music: An Introduction (1988); and Simon Frith's Sound Effects. Youth, Leisure, and the Politics of Rock ‘n' Roll (1981).
Music, Cultural Identity, and Critical Thinking
Teachers can also use music to introduce students to larger thought problems. For example, classical Persian music (ca. 1000 c.e.) is characterized by melodic improvisations, expressions of sorrow and desire, and free rhythmic compositions when played solo. It mixed ancient Babylonian and Greek musical practices with seventh-century Arab music. It was the music of the Sufis. They appreciated it for its melancholy sound and the sense of longing it expressed. It was music for mystics and romantics. A piece performed in the classical Persian style, "Shustari," is on the cassette that accompanies World Civilizations. Its lyrics convey profound sorrow and distress: "No one now can sacrifice my soul/ My heart is not captured by any love . . ./ Nothing can make me happy. . ./ No queen sits on the throne of my heart.2 Play it, or some other piece of classical Persian music. Ask students about the mood it sets and the culture that produced it. Ask them what they think inspired such music. You can then introduce them to the following controversy concerning the inspiration for Persian music.
Some ethnomusicologists suggest that the geography of Iran explains the sadness of its classical music: the country, mostly desert and high mountains, presents a harsh, haunting, and forbidding landscape. But for ethnomusicologist Ella Zonis the history of Iran, with its many long foreign occupations since the time of Alexander the Great, provides a more compelling explanation.3 Ask students which explanation, environmental or historical, they find more persuasive and why. Ask skeptical students what evidence they think would be needed to support one side or the other and if that evidence could be found. Students might decide that neither explanation suffices. These discussions could lead into a forum on the building and testing of theories in history and other social sciences.
Folk Music, Popular Culture, and Politics
While most of the music discussed so far has been elite music, playing popular music allows us to look at the lives and beliefs of ordinary people. A distinctive type of popular music that has influenced the music of distant continents is the folk music of Africa. African music is always stimulating to students: it has a strong beat and rhythm and usually makes them want to get up and dance. This is no accident. Much African music was created for public events and celebrations and usually involved the participation of the community. In West Africa, the Ewe people lived since the 17th century in independent communities in what is now Ghana, Togo, and Benin. They never formed a single centralized state but, given their earlier experience with slavery, they made temporary alliances in time of war to preserve their independence. "The Great Oaths War Dance," included on the World Civilizations cassette, reflects part of the Ewe's experience. Originally this music accompanied a war dance and was meant to create euphoria and inspire warriors to heroic deeds. In the 20th century the music and dance have become part of building cultural identity: they celebrate the exploits and achievements of past Ewe warriors. The Ewe excel at complex and intricate drumming; most of the instruments in the song are percussive, and the tune really "rocks." Responding to questions I pose, students usually envision a collective dance of tremendous joy and energy. Since music and dance were integral parts of traditional life in Africa, I always play music in my classroom when I introduce students to African beliefs about the cosmos, nature, and human society. Good places to start learning about African music and its social and historical context are A. M. Jones's Studies in African Music (1959); J. H. Nketia's The Music of Africa (1974); and Klaus Wachsmann, ed., Essays on Music and History in Africa (1971).
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African music has, of course, greatly shaped the music of the Americas. African songs, dances, and sensibilities were preserved by Africans who worked as slaves on plantations in the United States, Brazil, and the Caribbean. Out of African rhythms and musical motifs came Negro spirituals, blues, jazz, rock ‘n' roll, reggae, samba, and more. In tracing the influence of African music on the popular cultures of North and South America, teachers could draw attention to important themes in black history in the Americas—racial oppression, the desire for personal and social autonomy, persistence, cultural and intellectual creativity, rebellion, and resistance. Playing blues, jazz, or reggae in class can also lead to discussions of the contributions of Africans to the cultural richness of the Americas with their Native American, European, and African heritages. Books that treat these themes are James Cone's The Spirituals and the Blues: An Interpretation (1991); Jim Merod's Jazz as a Cultural Archive, a specially edited issue of the journal Boundary 2 (summer 1995); Arnold Shaw's Black Popular Music in America: From the Spirituals, Minstrels, and Ragtime to Soul, Disco, and Hip-Hop (1986); Frank Tirro's Jazz: A History (1980); John Storm Roberts's Black Music of Two Worlds(1974); and Luiz Heitor Correa de Azevedo's Brief History of Music in Brazil (1948).
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Folk music is also the music of social protest. Lower classes have always produced music that expresses their interests, desires, and view of the world. In the 20th century, a premier writer of protest songs was Woody Guthrie who was a major influence on songwriters such as Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, and Joan Baez. Guthrie's "I Ain't Got No Home in This World Anymore" was a song of social protest that dealt with issues of class. Playing it is a poignant way to start students thinking about the Great Depression of the 1930s. The song is a biting critique of America's business culture; it reflects the heightened class consciousness of the 1930s and the anger of working-class people. It also invites comparisons with our own times, with our millions of homeless, record business failures and foreclosures, farm crises, unemployment, and xenophobia. Teachers could ask if any popular singer today fills a role like Woody Guthrie's and if so how. What is similar and different about the 1930s and the 1990s? What was and is the role of media in defining, limiting, and promoting popular tastes and ideas? Such questions get students to reflect upon their own experience historically and to begin applying some of the critical techniques we use in history to understand their own lives and sense of identity. H. Wiley Hitchcock's Music in the United States: A Historical Introduction (1969) and Paul Griffiths's The Thames and Hudson Encyclopaedia of 20th-Century Music (1986) are useful guides to American music and its history.
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Since the mid-1970s, global capitalism has undergone a restructuring that has included, among other things, the concentration of ownership in the transnational music industry and the development and spread of new technologies (audio cassettes, music video, and satellite broadcasts), which have facilitated the worldwide dissemination of music. This economic restructuring and the resulting global reach of Western media corporations helped create the conditions for "world beat" or "world music," a transnational popular music in which Western pop and rock stars appropriate sounds from traditional African songs for their music, jazz musicians incorporate Indian rhythms into their melodies, and Third World musicians add Western rock and pop to their indigenous musical styles. Paul Simon's controversial 1986 Graceland album is a prime example of this synthesis. Of course, the process of musical appropriation has occurred throughout history. Classical Persian music was a synthesis of Greek, Babylonian, and Arabic music, rock n' roll and jazz are modern fusions of African and European musical forms, and South African popular music in the 1980s was greatly influenced by African American music from the 1950s and 1960s. What is new is that these functions are happening at an international rather than a national or a regional level and they are often propelled by the economic rationale of transnational corporations.
World beat offers history instructors a rich gateway to a number of contemporary issues. Teachers could use world-beat music to discuss the nature of postmodernism and cultural diversity as well as the many levels of capitalist globalization and the electronically mediated "information age." They may also want to consider in class whether the world's cultures are becoming increasingly homogenized, what cultural and political resistances there are to globalization, how national and regional identities are affected by international cultural transfers, and how equal or unequal the transfers are. Listening to world beat can stimulate a discussion of the way capitalism treats culture, whether technology is ideologically neutral, how globalization involves a growing transfer of resources from South to North (this transfer also includes cultural resources), and the place of women in world music and global economic restructuring. Good sources to begin with in learning about world beat are Steven Feld's "Notes on World Beat," Public Culture Bulletin (fall 1988); Reebee Garofalo's "The Internationalization of the U.S. Music Industry and Its Impact on Canada," Cultural Studies (October 1991); Andrew Goodwin and Joe Gore's "World Beat and the Cultural Imperialism Debate," Socialist Review (July-September 1990); and Roger Wallis and Krister Malm's Big Sounds from Small Peoples: The Music Industry in Small Countries (1984).
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There are many kinds of music that could have a significant place in history courses. I cannot, of course, highlight them all in this article. Playing Andean music, with its haunting flutes, is an excellent way to present an indigenous culture in South America, the pressures it faces, the resilience it shows, and the beauty of its customs. Similarly, recordings of Navaho music provide an entry into indigenous culture in North America. Instructors can use the melodies and rhythms of classical Arabic music to depict the richness and sophistication of the Umayyad and Abbasid empires. Teachers who are interested in these areas should consult Gertrude P. Kurath's Dance and Song Rituals of the Six Nations Reserve, Ontario (1968) and her Music and Dance of the Tewa Pueblos (1970); David P. McAllester's Peyote Music (1949) and his Indian Music of the Southwest (1961); Gilbert Chase's A Guide to the Music of Latin America (1962); A. L. Lloyd and Isabel Aretz de Ramon y Rivera's Folk Songs of the Americas (1966); Robert Stevenson's Music in Aztec and Inca Territory (1968); Josef Pacholczyk's "The Music of the Arabic Near East" in Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1980); and Henry George Farmer's "The Music of Islam" in New Oxford History of Music (1957). Music written and performed by female artists can be an important component of any history course. Janet Nichols's Women Music Makers (1992) is an excellent short study on a number of female composers in Europe and the United States since the Renaissance.
Using music in the classroom enhances students' understanding of history and makes past cultures come alive—it also makes teaching more enjoyable. The room lights up when music is played. Students are suddenly interested in cultures they were indifferent to or unaware of before. If you can operate a tape deck or a phonograph, all you need is time to review songs, to play them in class, and to discuss the music and relate it to the themes of the course. In addition to the sources I have already mentioned, there are several concise pieces on using music in the classroom that are helpful. One is "The Place of Music in Teaching World History" by Jane Adas in the Instructor's Manual for World Civilizations. At the end of each chapter in the Instructor's Manual there are short commentaries about the songs on the cassette tape that accompanies World Civilizations. The commentaries offer brief suggestions on how to integrate the songs into lectures and recommendations for long-play recordings that could be used. I have used some of these suggestions to great advantage and they, together with some of the background information provided in the commentaries, appear in this essay. Another worthwhile place to look for suggestions is the final section of the Instructor's Guide for Witt, Brown, Dunbar, Tirro, and Witt's The Humanities, 4th ed.(1993). It even offers help on how and where to find recordings. Its focus is on Western music, but it has good guides to African and African American music as well. Along with some rather technical discussions and brief histories of musical forms, Musics of Many Cultures, cited above, contains three seven-inch sound discs with recordings of African, Asian, Native American, Latin American, and Australian aboriginal music. Bruno Nettl's Excursions in World Music (1992) has excellent essays and comes with a good selection of sound recordings as well. Finally, Simon Frith's World Music, Politics and Social Change (1989) and Reebee Garofalo's Rockin' the Boat: Mass Movements and Mass Music (1992) have helpful articles on changes in recent popular music around the world and on how those changes relate to and inspire social and political movements. There is clearly a great deal of literature about the social, cultural, political, and economic importance of music that could be tapped into as instructors think of ways to make the study of history more engaging for students. So turn it on, crank it up, and let the good times roll!
—Alex Zukas is chair of the Department of Social, Cultural, and Literary Studies at National University in San Diego. He specializes in modern European social, economic, and political history. He is currently completing articles on the social condition, mentalité, and politics of unemployed workers in the Ruhr region of Germany during the Weimar Republic. An article about teaching the history of modern imperialism will appear in the winter 1997 issue of the Radical History Review. This article was developed by Robert Blackey.
Tags: Resources and Strategies
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Of all of the questions we received on homeschooling through high school with the Charlotte Mason Method, the area that raised the most concerns, by far, was composition.
I find that fact interesting . . . and a bit ironic.
Think about it. Most of us were given the traditional and typical separate classes focused on lessons in composition from first grade through twelfth grade. And most of us feel unqualified or ill prepared to guide our children to write well. Somewhere that twelve-year, isolated approach to writing failed us.
Happily, Charlotte Mason’s approach to composition is quite different. Yet many of us struggle with trusting it and find ourselves continually drawn back to the less effective methods just because they are more familiar or because our friends are using them.
So I’m glad you’re asking the questions that will help you break free from the everybody-should-sound-the-same type of writing lessons and give your children a better way—the Charlotte Mason way. Let’s take a look at how composition should be taught in high school.
High School Question #42: My main concern with high school is teaching composition and assigning grades for transcripts.
As with many things, composition in a Charlotte Mason high school is a continuation of skills that were taught and practiced in the earlier grades. Beginning in first grade, oral narration gives the student practice in the mental process of composition. In fact, Charlotte called oral narration “oral composition.” Once his handwriting is well established and he has gained skill in oral narration, the student begins to do some written narration, usually around fourth grade. Those narrations are not separated from the rest of his studies; they are integrated into his history or geography or Bible or science lessons. As the student becomes comfortable capturing his thoughts and getting them onto paper, he then becomes ready for some guidance in strengthening that skill. So the following years, including high school, add a focus on helping the student fine tune his ability to communicate on paper.
That’s the big picture. You can also watch our overview video on The Natural Progression of Language Arts to see how other aspects of a Charlotte Mason approach support composition. The questions below will dive into details.
(See the High School Questions #22 and 23 in the post, Courses, Credits, Grades, and Transcripts, for help with the transcript part of the question.)
High School Question #43: Lots of sample narration questions for high schoolers. I just get so stumped, especially when I’m not reading the book too.
By the high school years you can use a wide variety of narration requests, including narrative, descriptive, expository, and persuasive prompts. You will find sample narration questions in the narration post, Raising the Bar. And the book, Your Questions Answered: Narration, includes lots of sample questions and sample narrations from Charlotte’s students and modern-day students.
You’re right, trying to facilitate a narration without having read the book is very difficult. It can feel like asking a person to translate a sentence into German when you don’t know the language! So I encourage you to do all you can to learn along with your student and enjoy the benefits of filling your own mind with the wonderful ideas in the living books he is reading. See the narration post, An Added Bonus, for some encouragement and practical tips for making that happen.
High School Question #44: On narrating: this may be a bit if a side topic, but i would love to see a way to share narration questions that are book specific, particularly for these high school years. Many of us are not able to keep up with reading along and if the student is a reluctant narrator, it is hard to get him to share enough good material to be able to come up with challenging and book appropriate prompts for written narration. I get the idea and the huge range of possibilities for expanding these to take care of most, if not all high school composition… But I would love to have a trusted resource I could put in Victory in the Pacific, and have a few suggestions come up for upper level narration.
Book-specific narration prompts are a great help, especially for those upper level narrations. That’s why we are working on adding more titles to the Narration Notecards collection, and high school level books are high on the list. Each set of cards is book specific. The cards give beginner, intermediate, and advanced narration prompts for every chapter, any of which can be used at various times for high school students.
High School Question #45: The forms scaffolding and narration can take at the high school level.
The simplest form of narration (and don’t be deceived by that term “simplest,” it’s actually quite demanding to do) is to retell what you just read, putting it in your own words. But there are many other ways to narrate. This list of ideas may help.
Scaffolding is a term that educators use when talking about different ways to support a student in the learning process, as a scaffold is a support for those working on a construction project or large art mural, for example.
Scaffolding can include such techniques as showing an example, demonstrating how to do something, talking through a thought process, comparing a new experience to a known one, giving definitions ahead of time, using visual aids, or allowing extra time for the student to talk through something before doing it.
Scaffolding techniques can vary widely, depending on the student’s needs. But a key feature of scaffolding is that it is a temporary support, just as a construction scaffold is temporary. Your goal is to gradually fade it out of use as the student grasps the concept and demonstrates that he is able to apply it across different situations or assignments.
The next question and answer (below) give an example of scaffolding.
High School Question #46: I think my biggest problems is writing/composition, written narrations, having them read instead of me. I have a son who is an audio learner and does so much better narrating when he listens. But I want him to read more, visually see good writing, and practice writing better. It is a struggle. These are topics I would love discussed.
Some people do find it easier to process when they listen to someone talk or read aloud rather than read for themselves. But, you’re right, it is important that a student learn to read for himself—to see the words and sentences on the printed page—in order to reinforce proper spelling, capitalization, and punctuation. The more he sees it done correctly, the easier it will be to do it correctly in his own writing.
Here is an idea that might help bridge the gap and strengthen his reading-for-himself skills. You might allow him to listen to an audio version of the book he is assigned, and require him to read along with the audio in a printed copy. That way he is still getting the audio input but he is also seeing the words on paper.
Then you might alternate every other chapter: chapter 1 is listened to and read, chapter 2 is only read, chapter 3 is listened to and read, chapter 4 is only read, etc. As he becomes more comfortable with that process, you can phase it out more by using the audio only every third chapter, etc.
You want to acknowledge the way that student learns best, but you also need to help him learn skills that will be needed in his future life. He won’t always have an audio version to depend on in every situation, so try to use temporary scaffolding to help him gradually develop the skill of capably comprehending the written word.
High School Question #47: How can I encourage and motivate my very practical hands-on son to be positive about his written work?
This is another example of respecting how a person is wired while also helping him to develop skills that will be a benefit in his future life. It’s good that you recognize that your son is a “very practical hands-on” person. Those traits can help you know what direction to take with his writing.
Too many parents mistakenly hold up written work as the epitome of an educated person. They think that a student’s writing is the litmus test of whether he is well educated or intelligent. Such is not the case. Thomas Edison is not known for his essays.
Not everyone is designed to be a brilliant writer, and that’s okay. On the other hand, everyone can benefit from being able to clearly and accurately express their thoughts. So I encourage you to focus on helping your son learn to communicate in writing what is in his mind—accurately and thoroughly—without pressuring him to be another Longfellow. It might be helpful to discuss with him the advantages, and even importance, of being able to give clear instructions in writing. He may need to document a hands-on repair job or send someone an explanation of how to problem solve a troublesome engine or hard drive. He can probably see the steps in his mind, but it will be valuable to be able to communicate exactly what is in his mind to someone else’s mind. He needs motivation to work on that skill.
You might encourage him to practice writing with topics that interest him. For a simple example, if he were reading Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder, he could explain how a certain tool was constructed and how it worked for his narration of a particular chapter. (Along those lines, he would probably enjoy Diary of an Early American Boy by Eric Sloane.)
Be careful not to overload him with written narration assignments. Better to concentrate on a few well-written pieces than waste his time and yours on many poorly-written ones.
And of course, try to encourage him more than correct him. Focus on improving just one or two points at a time in his writing. And be sure to continue oral narration to reinforce the mental process of communicating clearly and accurately.
High School Question #48: My main concern is that we have so far been following a CM-ish method. My 13 yr old son is not proficient in the art of narration. He can orally narrate fairly well, but he has not written any. I have not been requiring many narrations, because we had been so bogged down with other course “requirements”. Going forward from here, I want to make sure he is prepared for a CM high school education. So I guess I need to know where I need to “catch up”.
First, don’t panic. You still have several years to fine tune his composition. The good news is that you have been working on a strong foundation with oral narration. So continue to assign good living books for him to read and continue to require oral narrations.
Then ease into the written side of things. You might require one written narration per week this year. Next year require two per week, and continue to add another one each year. By the time he graduates, he will be doing at least four written narrations every week. That’s a respectable amount.
You can also ease into the different types of narration that you require. Since he has been doing oral narrations, I assume he is pretty familiar with a narrative style (tell the story). So start with that type for his first few written narrations. After a few weeks of narrative, ask for some descriptive narrations (describe how something looks) as the chapter lends itself to that style. You can spend all of this year working on narrative and descriptive to help him get comfortable with capturing his thoughts and getting them down on paper. Next year add expository (explain how something works) to the mix, so you can ask for any of the three types—narrative, descriptive, expository—in your twice a week written narrations that year. The following year add the final type, persuasive (state an opinion and support it), as you increase the number of written narrations to three per week.
I think you get the idea. All you have to do is lay out a simple plan to gradually get to your goal. You have time. Just work the plan. The following questions and answers will give you more practical ideas.
High School Question #49: I would love to see more details from SCM about how to help our high school students develop their writing skills for college. I need more guidance in how to help my kids polish their narrations and become proficient writers.
One of the key differences between a Charlotte Mason approach to composition and a typical composition course is that Charlotte Mason sought to cultivate each student’s individual writing voice. The goal is to encourage and equip each unique person to better communicate his own ideas.
So she was very careful not to squelch the student’s enthusiasm with an overload of expectations and corrections all dumped on him at once. The oral narrations and written narrations in the earlier grades encourage him in the process. The polishing aspect should happen only one or two points at a time.
Focus on one area that needs improvement. Talk about it with your student. Show him examples of how it should be done correctly. Work with him to correct that one aspect in a recent written narration. Then tell him that he is responsible to incorporate that aspect correctly in his next narration. Hold him accountable for it and continue to encourage him in it. As he shows continuous progress in that area, repeat the process with another aspect.
You’ll find more ideas in the questions and answers to follow.
High School Question #50: I’ve always struggled with the confidence and know how to teach high school writing (and know what to teach) with my children. There are often book lists of recommended living books to read, how do I use these books to teach good essay writing and other writing?
It’s important when teaching composition to differentiate between the voice of the author and the format of the written piece.
Of the two—the voice and the format—the hardest part is developing a good writing voice. So Charlotte focused on that aspect throughout the grade levels by using wonderfully written books. The living books cultivate your student’s expectations of good writing; plus, they give examples of well written ideas in various voices. (They reinforce the mechanics of spelling and punctuation and good grammar too, by the way.) Living books—read and narrated—are about the voice. As your student spends time with excellent authors, his writing voice continues to be influenced and shaped by them.
The other part of composition—the format of the written piece—is the easier part to learn. You can know what form is expected in a five-paragraph essay, but if you have nothing to say or cannot get your thoughts captured on paper you’re stuck. So cultivating that unique writing voice is the main focus. Then in the high school years, you can take a look at some specific types of papers that will most likely be expected in college and give your student practice in formatting his writing in that fashion.
Which brings us to the next question.
High School Questions #51 and 52: How do you teach high school level writing (all forms) and research?
How does one go from narration to writing different types/forms of essays, research papers etc. that colleges are looking for?
First, let’s identify what colleges are looking for. Most every paper that college professors will assign will be either a research paper or some type of essay. And lest that word essay should unnerve you, it simply means “a short piece of writing on a particular subject.”
So if you focus on just those two formats, your student should be adequately prepared. An essay can take various tones, such as a narrative essay, a descriptive essay, an expository essay, or a persuasive essay. Do those terms sound familiar? They are the four types of narrations we’ve already talked about assigning to your student (in Questions #43 and 48 above).
Other types of essay can include comparison and contrast, tracing cause and effect, and arguing both sides of a case. Those are standard critical thinking skills that Charlotte Mason recommended including in upper grade narration questions and discussions.
So about the only type of essay that is not already covered in narrations is the literary essay. For that format and the research paper format, I like to recommend a succinct, clear resource from Analytical Grammar. They have a series called Beyond the Book Report. Look for Season 3 in that series; it teaches the literary essay and the research paper. It also covers a couple of other essays and giving an oral presentation. Best of all, it is a video course, so you can rest easy that a 34-year veteran language arts teacher is doing the instructing.
High School Question #53: How to move from written narrations to more formal writing? Would you just teach so they know it and then go back to regular written narrations or do you begin to give guidance to narrations or do you use more formal on exams?
Once you have taught the essay and the research paper format, you can include those in your written narration requirements. Since the essay is a short piece, it could easily be used as a regular narration prompt interspersed with other types of narrations. Exam week would be an ideal time to assign a longer paper, such as a research paper.
Now, keep in mind that if college is not the best route for a particular student, you might not need to worry about teaching those structured formats of writing. That’s a decision that should be made intentionally for each student. (See High School Question #38.)
High School Question #54: One question I have is about reading. Obviously CM’s method is predicated on reading small amount of material at a time and processing it deeply. However in college I was often expected to read hundreds of pages a week for several different class, with the expectation that I would scan for the most important ideas and then synthesize across several sources. How can I make sure my students are prepared for college level reading without sacrificing CM’s ideals of depth? Also, I know CM asked students to do compare/contrast or synthesis etc. on her exams, but that was only at the end of the term. During the term did she really only have high schoolers narrate back from one source at a time, or did she expect them to do more analysis, synthesis, etc.?
The ideal situation is to read smaller portions of a single source and have time to digest them thoroughly. But as you point out, our students may not be given the ideal situation in college level classes. That is another reason we recommend that you use a few textbooks in high school—advanced science courses are a logical choice—and that you spend some time teaching your student how to use a textbook. (See High School Question #27.)
But you don’t need to use textbooks for every subject. You can still use living books, shorter readings, and time for processing in other subjects, like history, geography, Bible, and literature. A mixed balance is best.
Regarding analysis and synthesis, Charlotte Mason explained that narration and discussion at the upper levels can include requests to give “the points of a description, the sequence of a series of incidents, the links in a chain of argument . . . . others are to enumerate the statements in a given paragraph or chapter; to analyse a chapter, to divide it into paragraphs under proper headings, to tabulate and classify series; to trace cause to consequence and consequence to cause; to discern character and perceive how character and circumstance interact; to get lessons of life and conduct” (School Education, p. 180).
Many times discussions naturally lead into analysis and synthesis in various forms. You could ask for some narrations like that, but let me encourage you to keep the main goal in mind even as you guide your student in giving critical-thinking responses. Whatever and whenever you ask for such a response from your student, make sure he has thought deeply enough to have formed a just opinion for himself. Be on guard against the tendency (and it’s one that we may all be guilty of) of simply repeating an opinion he has picked up second-hand in order to appear knowledgeable and check off the assignment.
High School Question #55: Should we discuss things after narration or not? How do we keep from giving our opinions to teenagers? How to facilitate CM discussion? How often? What about Literary Analysis?
The older your student gets, the more interesting your discussions can become. By all means, allow time for discussions after narrations. Sometimes you may have a discussion question prepared; other times you might allow the student to initiate a discussion if desired. One family I know uses the supper table as the setting for discussions on books that family members are reading, current events, plays, art, museum visits, and anything else that they have experienced recently. Of course, make sure that such a discussion is amiable and conducive to a pleasant meal together.
You can certainly give your opinion to your students. Charlotte Mason warned against offering opinions that have no basis in principle. So whenever you give your opinion, make sure your children know the timeless principle behind it and your thought process in order to arrive at it.
Good discussions will grow from open-ended questions, rather than single-answer or guess-what-the-teacher-is-thinking type questions. And they grow best in an atmosphere of candor and respect. Encourage your students to express their thoughts openly and also to respectfully listen to others’ thoughts as they are expressed frankly and openly. Candor goes both ways and is a habit that Charlotte Mason encouraged us to cultivate in our children.
Literary Analysis lends itself well to discussions. During various discussion on a book you can use analysis terms—such as plot, character development, setting, point of view, theme, and tone—appropriately and expand on them over time rather than dissecting that book to bits and stealing all the joy from reading it.
Discussions are a great time to gauge your student’s thought processing and help guide him in logical thinking. You can also reinforce the concepts of strong and weak supportive evidence during discussions. But in order to be allowed that privilege of peeking into your high school student’s thoughts, you will need to secure an atmosphere of unconditional love and acceptance.
Good discussions include atmosphere, discipline, and life: a living idea being discussed candidly, courteously, and logically in an atmosphere of mutual love and kindness.
I hope these questions and answers have been helpful. Next time we will wrap up this series by discussing the challenge of starting with Charlotte Mason methods in high school.
More Narration Answers
Narration is a can’t-do-without method in your Charlotte Mason home school. Your Questions Answered: Narration gives you more great answers to the questions real homeschool moms ask about narration. This handy, practical reference book collects answers from years of blog posts, web pages, and conversations all in one place.