Identity Cards

 

1. How many different types of card do you use in your daily life? Do they make things easier or more difficult?

2. Do people in your country have to have identity cards? If so, when were they introduced?

3. In what ways are identity cards a good idea?

4. What personal details do you think should not be stored on personal identity documents?

5. Identity cards may be introduced in Britain soon. Some members of the public object strongly to this. What do you think their reasons are?

6. If you have an identity card, is it worded uniquely in your language, or does it also have translations? Does anyone object to the translations?

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7. Read article here: Identity Card Reading

8. What is your reaction? Do you understand the Académie Française's desire to protect the French language? If not, what is driving the demand for all-French wording on official travel documents?

9. Clément Beaune, France's European Affairs Minister, said 'We are going to stop the decline of the French language.' How do you know if a language is in decline? What criteria could you use to judge that?

10. Is there a sentiment in your country that your language is being menaced by foreign languages? Who expresses this sentiment? Is there an institution like the Académie Française designed to protect the language? What measures has it taken? If not, would you like to see such an institution created?

11. Can you think of any examples of people from your country using foreign words even though a perfectly good native word already exists? Do you know any foreign words that English has borrowed?

12. According to UNESCO, 230 languages went extinct between 1950 and 2010. Does this lend support to the idea of protecting languages? Is a language's importance related to the number of speakers it has, or the concepts it can describe?

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Situation

You are writer and musician Etienne Liebig (see article). You have been invited to take part in a radio discussion on language in the 21st century. Make your viewpoint known and answer the host's (your teacher) questions.

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Discuss quotes

"I am absolutely opposed to a national ID card. This is a total contradiction of what a free society is all about. The purpose of government is to protect the secrecy and the privacy of all individuals, not the secrecy of government. We don't need a national ID card."

--- Ron Paul

"Nations which don't find their national identities will be preyed upon by other nations."

--- Mustafa Kemal Ataturk

“Teachers are powerful enough to kill indigenous languages: they are not powerful enough to bring them back to life.”

― Andrew Dalby

"He who knows no foreign languages knows nothing of his own."

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Student Handout PDF: Identity Card

Photo: Jackmac34

Highbrow vs Lowbrow Culture

1. What do these words/phrases mean? Do you know any others that are similar?

high-handed, high-minded, high-maintenance, high-profile, low-profile, lowlife

2. Have you seen the chart from the 1949 edition of Life magazine? Which of the tastes shown appear logical/illogical? Why?

Read graphic here: Highbrow vs Lowbrow Reading

3. Do any of the examples shown still exist today as markers of low/highbrow culture? Which ones don't? How would the items of taste change if the chart were for your country in 1949/today?

4. If you had to create a chart for 2021, what would you choose for the highbrow/lowbrow categories on the chart? 

5. Which of these statements do you agree with?

a) In the past, your socio-economic status dictated whether you were highbrow or lowbrow.

b) In the present, your socio-economic status dictates whether you are highbrow or lowbrow.

6. Is it possible to become a 'cultural omnivore' and consume both highbrow and lowbrow culture? Do you do this? Which are the most striking elements of your 'omnivorous' tastes?

7. Which traditional media provides the best platform for highbrow culture? Have you noticed changes in how different medias provide platforms for highbrow culture?

8. How many of our tastes are driven by peer pressure? Are people taking part in culture because they don't want to be 'out of the loop'? Has social media amplified this feeling? Have both highbrow and lowbrow culture benefitted from social media?

9. Do you think the passing of time has blurred the boundaries between high and lowbrow? Have street art, Hip-Hop, Quentin Tarantino films changed our definitions? Can you think of other examples?

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Situation

You are the head of a private school which is holding an open evening for parents of potential new students. Describe your wide-ranging curriculum to one parent (your teacher), highlighting the benefits of the cultural canons you have chosen for the students to study.

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Discuss quotes

"No, no, I'm a lowbrow. I read Dostoevsky more out of obligation than enjoyment. For enjoyment, for me, it's a beer and the football game."

--- Woody Allen

"Nobody has ever written as many enjoyable, fun-to-read crime novels as Agatha Christie. It's all about the storytelling and the pleasure of the reader. She doesn't want to be deep or highbrow."

--- Sophie Hannah

"I can't think of anything worse than calling Shakespeare 'highbrow,' because on the one hand, it's brilliant writing. But his plays were popular. People went to see them."

--- Timothy Dalton

"The biggest myth I'd like to bust isn't about me - it's about musicals. So many people dismiss the entire art form through highbrow snobbery, but I think a lot of those people would be surprised if they actually saw some."

--- Michael Ball

"There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge'."

--- Isaac Asimov

Student Handout PDF: Highbrow vs Lowbrow Culture