NINE FIFTEEN

Did you know that the European Union has 24 official and working  languages ? Did you know that learning foreign languages is good for your health, social relationships, and future job?  ‘The limits of my language mean the limits of my world’: do you understand the meaning of this famous quotation by the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein? Celebrate  the European Day of Languages , taste the richness of Europe!

After the long summer break, let’s start the new school year finding inspiration in a very special kind of art: street art. Read about Banksy, one of the most celebrated street artists in the world, at  this link  and then scroll down his official  Instagram account .

Exciting ‘English Cooking Demo' inspired to Jamie Oliver's recipes with the young students of IPC Tandoi Corato, class III C! #MenuOfTheDay: Starters: Shrimp Cocktail Main course: Fish and Chips with Mushy Peas Dessert: Blackcurrant Cheescake. Thanks to the excellent young cooks and Prof. Giovanni Lagreca for the supervision.  Stay tuned for the video recipe!

There was an interesting conference on food design yesterday in the school where I currently teach.  The pretext was the presentation of a book titled ‘La cucina di design. Cibo, tendenze, moda’ by a dear colleague and friend of mine, Loredana La Fortuna. The topic was food design, an issue analyzed from the critical lenses of social semiotics, definitely an unusal perspective for the students of a ‘Professionale Alberghiero’.  Food is not just what we eat. It is a language and, as such, it can express several meanings concerning family and national traditions, lifestyle, environment, hierarchies, gender roles, religion, cultural politics and ... Art, as Loredana’s book highlights.  Therefore, studying food means studying culture. I really recommend the reading of this book edited by Progedit (Bari 2016) to all the students and people interested in deconstructing the contemporary trend of ‘foodism’. Thanks a lot to all the participants to yesterday’s school even...

Have you heard the name of Greta Thunberg in the news? Have you heard of her nonviolent struggle against the climate change? Surf this  website  and read this  article  to find information about this cause... Now say if and how you are going to support the 15th March global strike.

On the occasion of this year International Women’s Day, March 8th, I have 3 reading suggestions for you all: 1.  A short history of the day ; 2. The book We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie 3. A  list  of some of the reasons why it’s always good to thank a feminist! Enjoy your reading and your day of pride and struggle!

Work in groups: answer the following questions and discuss the results with the class. Then draw differnt graphs in Excel for each question.  1. How often do you eat junk food? 2 How often do you eat out? 3.  What’s your favorite food? 4. Who do you have lunch with? 5. Do you care where the food you eat comes from?  6. What national dishes from your country would you recommend to the world?