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Lucille Grindhammer, "Hollywood in the English Language Classroom: ‘The Dead Poets’ Society’"
in: Neusprachliche Mitteilungen aus Wissenschaft und Praxis, Heft 4, 1993,
     S. 244 - 250

Grindhammers Aufsatz ist praxisorientiert und stellt den Film in den Mittelpunkt des Unterrichtes: Sie teilt ihn in acht ca. 15minütige Abschnitte, die dann in acht 45minütigen Unterrichtsstunden besprochen werden sollen. Für jeden Teil nennt sie Vokabeln, die den SchülerInnen vor der Filmvorführung bekannt sein müßten. Dann listet sie jeweils eine Reihe von Fragen auf, die besprochen werden sollten. Diese Fragen beziehen sich auf Inhalt und Interpretation, teilweise geht es auch um Filmanalyse im eigentlichen Sinn. Die Vokabeln, die im Aufsatz selbst etwas unübersichtlich in den Anmerkungen erscheinen, sind hier in übersichtlicher Form aufgelistet worden. Grindhammers achtstündige Unterrichtseinheit ist anscheinend nicht ausprobiert worden. Ein Einsatz ist wohl vorgesehen für Klassenstufen 10 oder 11. Allerdings dürfte der veranschlagte zeitliche Rahmen von acht Unterrichtsstunden illusorisch sein.

Introduction
Considering the increasing availability and affordability of videos outside the classroom, the movie habits of young people nowadays, and the sound pedagogical reasons for using films in English language teaching 1 , one can only be surprised at the minor role the commercial film continues to play in English teaching today. When used at all, feature films come at the end of the term once all the serious work has been done or as the filmed version of a literary piece already used in class. The English language classroom and probably the foreign language classroom remain text bound rather than multi-media. The written text still dominates though film, video, and audio cassettes challenge the written word everywhere else.

Undoubtedly, this has to do with teachers not being comfortable with the field of film, an area with sturdy academic credentials since the 70s, their general skepticism regarding this Janus-faced media, their reluctance to see how a 120 minute film can be adapted to the classroom, and the resulting insufficiency of video machines in schools. I want to persist, however, in making the case for commercial videos in the English language classroom, hoping, of course, to gather more readiness to employ the approach. English language teachers can, in fact, use films in much the same way as we use any written text when we accept that we are employing them to foster and expand language skills while introducing students to an awareness of film as medium and not necessarily to develop highly technical film related analytical abilities. Though film obviously is a different medium than literature, employing different techniques dictated by the camera, the classical Hollywood feature film in particular is and always has been governed by definite norms quite similar to those in fiction. Like novels and short stories, the Hollywood feature is story bound, character focused, and theme oriented. It has also been unexperimental in its use of story-telling techniques, making those as unobtrusive to the narrative as possible, and very conservative in its handling of time and space 2 .

The kinds of questions and exercises, therefore, appropriate to the treatment of literary texts apply just as well to movies. It does not require entirely different pedagogical treatment in the language classroom; the experienced classroom teacher can handle a film as well as a short story, novel or play. He or she merely has to find the movie to use and employ it in much the same way as they would a narrative text.

Hollywood has produced a great deal of feature film material from which to choose. Between 1915 - 1960, fifteen thousand feature films came out of Hollywood. More have followed. Most of the films fall into genre groupings with definite conventions governing structure and form. The teacher only has to select which film they want to use and then adapt it to the specific needs of the classroom. That process naturally involves critically viewing a film to assess its linguistic and motivational suitability for the class, watching it again to note down all of the individual scenes, dividing those scenes into digestible 15 minute segments, selecting the interesting and/or difficult vocabulary in each segment, and designing on language skill exercises which primarily focus on developing a fundamental language skill while drawing attention to critical content, structural patterns and stylistic elements in each segment. That this procedure requires time is clear; however the motivational, linguistic, cultural advantages accruible from using films in the English language classroom more than justify the investment in preparation time.

I want to discuss the American teenpic and describe methods of using it in class, not as a supplement to a literary work but as a legitimate language teaching material which, of course, has to be adapted to the particular needs of the English language classroom which will always be primarily language skill oriented with a strong bias in favor of materials which transfer cultural awareness be that informational, attitudinal, emotional. I will first introduce this material and then focus on one such film, the very recent and popular Dead Poets' Society describing methods of using it in the special environment of the intermediate-advanced English language classroom.

The American Teenpic
Being a commercial industry very much responsive to the tastes and financial resources of its audience, Hollywood began to produce films dealing with teenage concerns as soon as that audience emerged as an economic source of revenue. Though the rare film exists with a teenage protagonist before the 1950s, it was in that deceptively happy and harmonious decade that something referred to as "rebellious youth" films first appeared. Nicholas Ray's Rebel Without a Cause (1955) starring the since canonized James Dean, Richard Brook's Blackboard Jungle (1955) introducing Black actor Sidney Poitier, and Laslo Benedik’s The Wild One (1953) with the young Marlon Brando were Hollywood's attempts at loring adolescent viewers away from their parents' television sets which was proving to be a disastrous drain on its revenues to cultivate a potentially lucrative market. As this group's allowances and leisure time increased, more and more films dealing with its tastes, problems, and concerns arrived at neighborhood theaters. A partial list of the successful quality American teenpics done by American directors suggests the growing influence of this segment of the film-going public 3 . What began in the 50s with adult actors playing the parts of teenagers has slowly developed into a discernible film category which has its own teenage stars, themes, language, milieu, and music.

These movies portray the classic concerns of adolescents: peer group pressure, parental conflicts, school life, awakening sexuality, early romantic involvement, attraction and fear of violence, approaching adulthood, seeking of personal identity, drug use, all in a contemporary or near contemporary American setting. As a special category of the Hollywood film, these teenpics offer a highly recommendable and accessible vehicle for English language learning purposes as well as for awakening students to a critical attitude towards feature films, a staple of their entertainment world. They are linguistically, psychologically, intellectually, and emotionally within the range of intermediate-advanced German English language pupils and, exactly for those reasons, might prove to be extremely successful material with which to stimulate their willingness to exercise their English language skills. After all, language usage correlates directly with the level of interest in the material at hand. I think young German pupils will be able to relate to and interest themselves in these teenpics. In addition, the films bring the pupils into a very close indirect confrontation with their counterparts or near counterparts in the United States, closer and more multidemensionally than any written text could do. Dead Poets' Society is one of these many recent teenpics.

Dead Poets' Society
Directed by the Australian Peter Weir and starring Robin Williams Dead Poets' Society is by no means a great film. It does not initiate new film conventions or work with established ones in an innovative, groundbreaking manner worthy of imitation. But it is very much an excellent example of the Hollywood style which has governed and continues to govern the majority of the films being made and seen all over the world. Winner of the Oscar for the Best Original Screenplay of 1989, the 124 minute film is an interesting and highly recommendable film from the point of view of the English language teacher in search of motivating authentic material. In fact, from the point of view of the English language teacher, movies considered great by film historians and critics are not necessarily the best ones for the classroom. They are frequently too demanding on every level: language, plot, meaning, theme, characterization, cinematically. They exceed the abilities of most language students to describe them or talk about them.

Dead Poets' Society is though a highly respectable film which fits the needs of the intermediate-advanced English language classroom. First, very much in the tradition of Hollywood films, it has a clear, familiar and emotionally gripping story, always an important criterion for selection: it deals with one year in the lives of several teenage high school boys and their new and unusual teacher at an American prep school in the 1950s. Inspired by their teacher who does indeed awaken their latent intellectual and creative impulses, they recreate a club which meets clandestinely at night to read poetry, and each advances in his personal development. One of the boys, however, commits suicide because his father won't allow him to follow his artistic interests, discovered through the encouragement of his teacher. The teacher then becomes the scapegoat for the school and is dismissed; some of his pupils though eventually make it dramatically clear that his efforts on their behalf were not in vain.

Second, it is a visually highly attractive and pictorially rich portrait of a special American setting, employing the classic Hollywood approach of making a film look as real as possible: it literally paints the idyllic rural setting of a small New England prep school in studied detail making it especially vivid which pulls the viewer right into the milieu. It is filled with very exact attention to the landscape, school, classroom, dormitory, and cave where the boys convene their club. Third, the dialogue is clear and intelligent without difficult regional dialects and without the distracting musical or background sound found in other movies which would be far too difficult for second language learners, but is also idiomatic and specific to younger people. Fourth, it is typically character-controlled, revolving around ca. five generally recognizable characters who are though interesting and psychologically unambiguous enough to encourage reactions and engagement: there is the young idealistic English teacher, Mr. John Keating, who wants to encourage the boys to think creatively, honestly, and courageously; there are the key boys in the Dead Poets' Society: Neil, more artistic and creative than his domineering father wants him to be; the insecure but terribly sensitive Todd whose parents don't care about him really, wanting him to live up to the record of his brilliant brother; and among others Knox who is most interested in getting Chris away from her boring boyfriend Chet, Cameron the young opportunist, Charlie the wiseass, and Keets the bespectacled egghead.

Fifth, the movie poses many important and profound issues in a simple but effective manner. The Hollywood style has never favored ambiguity. This film deals with issues of human responsibility, integrity, self-fulfillment, and poses philosophical questions such as the conflict between idealism vs. realism as approaches to life. Sixth, the film is easily available on video for sale or on rental. Though no fewer than 124 minutes, it can be used in class when divided into ca. 15 minute film segments, each segment the basis of a 45 minute classroom period intended to foster a fundamental English language skill: speaking, listening, reading, and/or writing, while introducing students to a critical but not an academic approach to a popular Hollywood movie. Each segment contains several scenes each involving one complete sketch of action. Most Hollywood films can be narratively broken down in 15 - 20 minute segments. In fact, they are becoming standardized units of film structure to allow for eventual TV broadcasting where 15 minute commercial interruptions always occur. I want to specifically describe how I would use the eight segments of Dead Poets' Society in the classroom.

The Film Dead Poets' Society in the Intermediate-Advanced ELC
Having selected a film as being motivationally, linguistically, and culturally suitable for classroom use on close viewing after having seen the film for pleasure or being made aware of it by someone else, the next step is to watch it again, making a list of all the scenes in the film, a scene being a term used to denote several frames of film involving one complete stretch of action in the same time and place. This step is imperative for teaching preparation and is obviously equivalent to reading any piece of literature one would choose to use in class and taking extensive notes on it. Having done that, the next step calls for seeing the film again and designating the 15 minute segments. Of course, the 15 minutes is an arbitrary unit and I wouldn't interrupt a scene to conform to it; however, 15 minutes is a good piece of film which usually offers enough material without being too demanding, and allows for exercises as well as discussion in a class session of 45 minutes. Having identified eight fifteen minutes segments in Dead Poets' Society I then viewed each segment individually, listing interesting difficult vocabulary which would be introduced before pupils viewed the bit of film, decided on the kind of language skill I wanted to expand, considered the issue which should be focused on in the film, be it content or film technique oriented, developed the exercise best suited to realizing the language/film goal, and envisioned formats for the students to work out those exercises. Of course, the list of scenes was also helpful here. One has to keep in mind when using these segments that classroom procedure, language skill, and focus of attention has to be varied in order to prevent monotony from setting in, but that is a consideration with any material. Here's how I would use the segments in eight consecutive 45 minute lessons.

Segment 1. The first 15 minutes of the film, as most conventional Hollywood films, introduce the setting, and main characters as well as foreshadowing or suggesting conflicts which will come later. Dead Poets' Society visually opens by focusing viewer attention on the school during the opening year convocation and address by Mr. Nolan, the Headmaster. It procedes to show the boys going to their dormitory to put their things away, and then follows them the next day to different classes, Chemistry, Latin, Trigonometry, so we understand just how different Mr. Keating is from what the boys are used to in other classrooms. Since, in fact, this is the opening of the film and introduces, as any good piece of fiction, setting, characters and themes which will be returned to and elaborated on later in the film, one can only expect the pupils to be able to gather impressions and bits of information. Therefore I would use very specific questions to elicit how well they had observed what the film wanted them to understand, how they felt about items in the film, and how aware they were of how the film got its material across to the viewer. Before showing the segment, I would go through a list of difficult and/or words-phrases which I feel would be necessary for understanding and I would read through the questions which would be used as the basis of discussion following this segment:
1. What kind of school does Welton Academy seem to be? Pay attention to how it looks, customs, kinds of kids who go. 2. Which characters interest you? Try to name and characterize them. 3. What kinds of responses do the boys have to Mr. Keating? 4. How do you feel about Todd Anderson, Neil Perry, and Mr. Keating? 5. In what ways does the filmmaker emphasize which characters are important in the film? 6. Describe your feelings toward Neil's father. 7. Why does Mr. Keating bring the boy's attention to Robert Herrick’s "Gather yee Rosebuds while yee may," "Carpe Diem," and "Seize the Day." 8. The filmmaker uses a rather long take showing a rural countryside scene with huge flocks of ducks taking off. Why? What scene follows?

After viewing, we would discuss the points together, collecting the details which they recall. It is important that this kind of background information is firmly established since it is a prerequisite for continued involvement in the remaining seven film segments. As homework, one could, of course, ask them to describe Todd, Neil, and/or Mr. Perry or give their impressions of Mr. Keating.

Segment 2 is dominated by two important sequences though the first few minutes of the segment give assorted briefer scenes which reveal additional information about some of the boys, especially Knox Overstreet who we recognize from the previous segment and the final minutes show the boys asking Mr. Keating about The Dead Poets' Society, a club he had founded as a pupil at Welton years before. In the first longer scene when the boys are in Mr. Keating's class for the second time, we see further proof of the English teacher's uniqueness in a surprisingly humorous and genuinely lively example of the man's attempt to get the boys to understand how vital creativity, ideas, self-expression are. He literally forces the attentive, cautious, conscientious, but very hesitant pupils to rip out the introduction to their poetry texts because he thinks the author, though a renown scholar, has written rubbish on what is obviously a topic about which he feels passionately. The second longer scene takes place in the dining hall where we first witness a telling conversation between Mr. Keating and Mr. Calister, who teaches Latin, parlaying the philosophical question of realism versus idealism. Mr. Calister presents his philosophy in the following bit of verse: "show me a heart unfettered by foolish dreams, and I'll show you a happy man" to which Mr. Keating retorts: "But only in their dreams can men be truly free. Twas always thus; and thus will always be." The camera crosscuts to the boys' table and we see Neil, who we already know from the previous segment, showing the group a copy of an old school year book which includes a picture of Mr. Keating, an alumni of Welton, in which it mentions a club he formerly founded: The Dead Poets' Society, dedicated to sucking out the marrow of life. In addition to going over the vocabulary in this segment before viewing, I would ask pupils to jot down the important scenes, a piece of narration which takes place in one time and place, in the segment, so we could discuss the relative importance of each of the scenes and their function in the narration. My expectation would be that after viewing they would have a short list which would look as follows: 1. kids leaving class, 2. boys talking about evening in the showers, 3. Knox Overstreet being picked up and driven to Chet Danberry's house where he meets Chris and the Danberry family, 4. study hall at school and Knox's return, 5. boys going to bed, 6. next day in Mr. Keating's class, 7. the evening meal at school, 8. the following day on campus talking to Mr. Keating. My approach would be to write the scenes they designated up on the board and use the remaining time to discuss the issues of time, place, content, and relative importance of each scene along with questions of how film scenes are connected, how transitions seem to be established, how the film establishes changes in time and place. One could also introduce some of the important film terms which enhance film discussion but in no way serve as a prerequisite for it . After all, film reviewing on very sophisticated levels has done without the elaborate film terminology which has now become available. Discussing film in the English language classroom can also follow the more traditional and less academic approach.

Segment 3, though again having the ca. 15 minutes of all the other teaching segments, contains only two main scenes, the boys convening their first Dead Poets' Society meeting and back in Mr. Keating's class. The purpose of this session is to discuss the importance of the latter scene because it says so much about Mr. Keating, his ideas, and the boys' relationship to him. In addition, Mr. Keating has the boys do something in this scene which becomes important again in the concluding minutes of the film. The pupils would, of course, see the whole segment and have the accompanying vocabulary explained, but would have very specific questions relating just to the classroom scene which they could deal with after a second viewing of that scene. After seeing the segment once and before the second showing of the classroom scene which takes ca. five minutes, I would ask them to notice the following:
1. How does the filmmaker and Robin Williams the actor represent Keating in this scene? 2. Assess Keating's rapport with the students, giving evidence from the film. 3. How does the camera deal with verbal exchanges between Keating and different pupils? 4. Describe the mood in class. 5. How does the filmmaker establish mood? 6. Explain why Keating gets all the kids on the desk. 7. What is it that Keating wants the boys to learn? 8. What kinds of camera movements do you notice?

Obviously this second viewing of a small five minute bit of film is intended to encourage pupils to notice the very conscious and constructed elements in filmmaking which one often fails to cognitively experience as a viewer.

In Segment 4 we are confronted with new and important things happening to characters who have already been singled out in the viewers' minds in previous segments as leading protagonists: Neil, Knox, and Todd. To vary the procedure in class which, would, of course, begin with the vocabulary, I would divide the pupils into three groups and ask each group to explain what their assigned character experienced in this segment for presentation in class. Viewing would take 15 minutes, group preparation 15, and presentation 15. For homework, everyone would be expected to write a short summary of what happened to all three of the boys. This would not only insure that each group does its own character, but also listens as the other groups do their presentation in order to be able to do their homework assignment. It is obvious how necessary it is to vary class procedure. Viewing the film and discussing it afterwards cannot be eight similarly structured sessions devoted to listening comprehension questions and discussion in a teacher-pupil frontal arrangement. Every effort has to be made to change what one is doing with the film and how one is doing it. Since using films leads to an obvious emphasis on listening, followed by discussion, it behooves the teacher to at least discuss different elements in the film, focusing attention sometimes on character, sometimes on theme, sometimes on film technique, sometimes on acting; using smaller parts of the segment to focus on; asking that different things be done with the film bit under consideration such as listing, describing, analyzing, assessing, and doing it in various kinds of ways, group work, work in pairs, plenum sessions.

Segment 5 consists of many shorter scenes which, of course, are important to furthering the plot and character development of the film. After the first few minutes of showing the boys, coached by Mr. Keating, playing soccer, it moves into a meeting of the Dead Poets' Society in their cave where Charlie, one of the boys, begins to emerge more centrally; Knox decides "to seize the moment" and calls Chris; then it abruptly takes us into a courtyard of the school, presumably the next day, where Mr. Keating is making the boys march around in an effort to teach them to find their own pace in life, and ends with a round of alternating scenes crosscut between a meeting of the Dead Poets' Society in which Charlie brings in two rather naive girls and Knox's evening at Chet Danberry's party where he kisses Chris and is beat up for it. In addition to drawing attention to the important film technique of crosscut editing that alternates shots of two or more lines of action occurring in different places, usually simultaneously, which is so well presented in the last scenes of the segment, I would draw special attention to the first moments of the segment, when, we see the boys playing soccer. It is a scene without dialogue and one which is there simply to establish the joyous relationship and feelings of friendship and closeness which have emerged between Mr. Keating and the boys. It shows how film communicates nonverbally and touches viewers' emotions by use of color, image, movement, music, without ever reverting to dialogue. I would show those few moments a second time, asking pupils to note down what they actually see and hear, how they feel, and what they assume the filmmaker wants us to think about Mr. Keating and the boys at this point in the story. In fact, those few moments which directly follow Mr. Keating having helped Todd to feel adequate about himself, are extremely emotive and especially constructed to be so. It is important that pupils become conscious and sensitive to the manner in which film manipulates emotions in positive and negative ways.

Segment 6. The various scenes here bring the important boys in the group into sharper focus, so we understand exactly what they have learned from their teacher Mr. Keating as well as filling in details on Charlie who emerges late in the film as one of the very critical and interesting kids. It includes an especially well done scene in these 15 minutes in which Mr. Keating gets them marching again outside in the school courtyard, but forces them to find their own pace and not just to march in step, his effort being to teach them to resist conformity in their lives. I would ask the pupils to write down the names of all the characters who play an important part in this segment, noting exactly how they have begun to act out Mr. Keating's advice to them: Carpe Diem, Seize the Day, Find Your own Pace. That would involve them in summarizing how Charlie risks expulsion from school and, in fact, is severely beaten for suggesting to the Headmaster Mr. Nolan that Welton should have girls; Neil's going ahead with starring in A Midsummer Night’s Dream though his father has ordered him to quit on no uncertain terms; and Knox's bringing Chris flowers in school and reading her his love poem in her class though she's told him Chet will surely kill him. I would want them to also be able to tell me which of the boys interest them the most, which they personally find most engaging. In addition, I would ask them to notice how the filmmaker keeps Todd in the segment, emphasizing his importance to the story without, in fact, dealing with him specifically in this segment. A conceivable written assignment could involve describing and comparing Neil, Charlie, and Knox in a short sketch or writing a description of the boy each pupil finds most interesting and explaining why.

Segment 7 contains the dramatic climax of the story which centers exclusively around Neil. In it we see his triumph in the Shakespearean play, his father's incensed response to his performing, forcing him to leave the theatre in spite of the audience's acclaim, and later telling him that he will have to leave Welton and go to a Military Academy. Neil's reaction is to commit suicide. Interest in this segment obviously lies in what's happening and not necessarily in the film technique which though does have an interesting contrast in mise-en-scène, the world of the theatre and Neil's parents' house, repeated use of close-ups to attract audience attention to motivation: father's shoes, Oberon's crown, door knob, key to Neil's father's desk draw which has a gun, and a slow motion rendering of the father discovering Neil's body. But what primarily concerns the viewer in these 15 minutes involves the conflict between Neil and his father, the nature of it, an assessment of it, how well the film established the conflict and a critical evaluation of Neil's suicide as a response to his problems. I would let the pupils divide into groups after viewing to deal with those issues, leavi ng, of course, time at the end of the session to exchange opinions on the matter.

Segment 8 concludes the film which ends very touchingly. The boys, and by now we know them all by name, Charlie, Todd, Knox, Meeks, Pitts, Cameron learn of Neil's death, and how they respond to it and the school's effort to blame Mr. Keating is what makes this last section both suspenseful and ultimately exciting and moving. Each boy is asked by the school to sign a paper saying that Mr. Keating put inflammatory ideas into their heads which in the case of Neil resulted in his death. How they deal with this blatant betrayal of Mr. Keating is individual and different. All of them do sign except Charlie Dalton who is expelled from school, but later when Mr. Keating comes into their poetry class now taught by Mr. Nolan the Headmaster to pick up his personal belongings they have their last remaining opportunity to, in fact, redeem themselves which they do, led on by Todd. These final moments of the film are extremely moving; the boys show they have understood what Mr. Keating had to teach them, and the film has them, one by one, hesitatingly but decisively supporting Mr. Keating against the lies of the administration by standing up on their desks, recalling the earlier scene in the film when he encouraged them to come up to the front of the class and stand on his desk so they get used to seeing things from all different angles and perspectives. I would ask the pupils to notice how Richard Cameron, Charlie Dalton, and Todd responded to the school's demand that they sign the letter accusing Mr. Keating of causing Neil's death and to assess whether their response was consistent with what had been previously established about their characters. In addition, I would show those final minutes of the movie again, and ask them to notice ways in which the filmmaker has created a most dramatic and powerful ending to his film which clearly conveys the message that the boys have learned what Mr. Keating wanted them to.

Conclusions
The hesitancy to incorporate the complete full length Hollywood feature film in the English language classroom has as much to do with teacher reluctance as it has to do with lack of machines or videos. There has been too much of the conviction that feature films are too hard for pupils, films are too long for the classroom session, films require special background expertise to talk about. In fact, a well chosen Hollywood film is no more linguistically, intellectually, psychologically, pedagogically unsuitable for the English language classroom than a full length novel written for an adult audience which has been the staple material in the English language classroom to date. In fact, they can be treated in much the same way that fictional texts have been treated in the English language classroom. Time, energy and video machines are all that is needed to utilize this valuable resource. The language classroom has to become multimedia to keep pace with the outside world which means the movie belongs in there as well as the written work or the audio cassette. It's time to let Hollywood into the English language classroom. The American teenpic is one kind of Hollywood movie material which can be profitably used in the intermediate-advanced English language classroom.

Appendix: Interesting Contemporary Teenpics