Goethe’s Italian Journey is a voluminous text. More than 500 pages long, it provides a sometimes very detailed account of Goethe’s two-year journey to Italy (1786-88). The travelogue is written in the style of a diary, whose entries cover everything from seemingly mundane weather reports to quasi-ethnographic descriptions of contemporary Italian people and culture.
The German version of Goethe’s Italian Journey
Although there are quite a few things that students may find interesting–How did one actually travel in the late 18th century?–there’s also a lot–and I mean a LOT–of information that leaves a 21st century reader puzzled. (Why, for instance, should I read at length about Goethe’s encounter with some Italian prince, whom he seems to not like very much but with whom he nonetheless spends several days only to then mock this prince’s worldview or uncultured behavior, or both?)
Yet, it was for these very reasons that I decided to use the travelogue in my first-year seminar, which focuses on developing essential academic skills as part of ASC’s global and leadership curriculum. Precisely because Goethe’s Italian Journey is a text not easily accessible, it is ideal for a semester-long “object lesson” on what meaningful, self-directed learning can be and how it can benefit from the integration of digital technology.
The Italian Journey challenges on multiple levels:
- it’s difficult to read; the language is “old-fashioned,” as my students would say;
- it requires a lot of historical and cultural context;
- it challenges students to critically think about ways to categorize and evaluate information;
- no one person can pay attention to all the details, so the text almost by default invites a collaborative approach;
- as a reflection of Goethe’s multi-disciplinary interests, the Italian Journey is a case study for experimenting with digital technology both for research and presentation;
The tool I decided would work best is called Story Map Journal. It’s an online web application that allows the integration of maps, multimedia items, and narrative (text). Working in groups, we will annotate specific passages of Goethe’s Italian Journey and thereby practice research, critical thinking, writing, and communicating information in a digital environment (more on the specific goals in a later post).
We started the mapping process last week and so far have a pretty good basis for our further design:
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