School Matters 36

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SPANISH FILM STUDY DAY AT THE BFI IMAX VI Spanish pupils attended a conference at the BFI IMAX on ‘The shadow of the Spanish civil war’ led by Professor Sarah Wright and Dr Lidia Merás of Royal Holloway University.

winning director helped them further their understanding of the film’s themes. The afternoon’s screening of the film at the IMAX was definitely a step up for these pupils who had been first introduced to this wonderful work of art via a buffering shared screen over Zoom during our period of remote learning! Mr Bruno Kaczmarek, Teacher of Modern Foreign Languages

EL DÍA DE LA HISPANIDAD El Día de la Hispanidad is celebrated in all Spanish speaking countries on 12 October. It not only commemorates the date on which Christopher Columbus claimed discovery of the Americas in 1492, but also celebrates the legacy of Spanish culture to the wider world. For many, it is a day when the strong links that exist between Spain and Latin America are celebrated, through the bonds of language, history and culture. The day is known by many names including Día nacional de España, Día de la Raza, Día de las Américas and Día de las Culturas . Our pupils appreciated how this conference, supported by a plethora of clips and images from the fertile mind of the Mexican award- Conducted mainly in Spanish, this study day focused on Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth (2006), the critically acclaimed film we study at A-level. The lecture concentrated on the language of film as well as the Civil War (1936–1939) and how Franco’s dictatorship shaped Spanish society.

At IPS, pupils had the opportunity in Spanish lessons to explore and

they remain heroic conquerors, for many the conquistadores were ruthless killers responsible for a genocide of indigenous peoples. In many Latin American countries, statues of the Conquistadores have been brought down and put in museums, in a similar manner to the statue of Edward Colston, the slave trader, torn down in Bristol as part of the Black Lives Matter movement. Mrs Silvia Downey, Teacher of Spanish

understand the meaning of this day, and our native-speaker pupils celebrated in our weekly Club de Hispanohablantes. It is a day also linked to the colonial past of the Hispanic world. La Conquista and the actions of the conquistadores are seen from two different historical perspectives; for some

HISPANIC GASTRONOMY SESSION

The UVI Spanish class brought México and the Hispanic world to IPS, as we recreated some classic Hispanic favourites in honour of Tita De La Garza, the protagonist of our literary studies. Carefully following extravagant recipes set out in Laura Esquivel’s Como Agua Para Chocolate , we produced a delicious display of ‘Codornices en pétalos de rosa’ (quails in rose petals), alongside ‘Tortas de lentejas’ (lentil cakes) and topped off with ‘Patacones’ (fried plantain). Despite a slight malfunction with the flipping of the lentil cakes, and a long wait to cook our quail (aka chicken) to perfection, our feast was surely ‘un placer de los dioses’, as Pedro attests in the novel. Many thanks to Señora Downey and the MFL Faculty for putting together the wonderful evening, made even better by some tasty tapas and, of course, a good sing along to some great Spanish hits. Ella Peters, UVI