Our family has long known the real story of native-settler relations, which encouraged my mother to get inventive with her ESL students as part of the curriculum also included enculturation, which meant explaining the meaning behind the unique blend of US national holidays. Thanksgiving is an odd one for several reasons as it's closely r…
Our family has long known the real story of native-settler relations, which encouraged my mother to get inventive with her ESL students as part of the curriculum also included enculturation, which meant explaining the meaning behind the unique blend of US national holidays. Thanksgiving is an odd one for several reasons as it's closely related to the Christmas shopping season, and in many respects was a way to supplant Octoberfest as the main harvest holiday observance as everything German was cancelled during WW1, which was very dramatic as German was the #2 language and many schools were all-German as were many publications and communities. The massively intense British propaganda dehumanizing Germans and all things German was copied by American publications as the aim was to get in the war so Bankers and the Merchants of Death could make their killing. There's more to all that of course. Generally, all US federal holidays promote some sort of propaganda--national or consumeristic. My ESL teaching was more tutorial-individual so I didn't need to do the same sort of inventing as my mom did; and yes, I helped her with it occasionally.
Our family has long known the real story of native-settler relations, which encouraged my mother to get inventive with her ESL students as part of the curriculum also included enculturation, which meant explaining the meaning behind the unique blend of US national holidays. Thanksgiving is an odd one for several reasons as it's closely related to the Christmas shopping season, and in many respects was a way to supplant Octoberfest as the main harvest holiday observance as everything German was cancelled during WW1, which was very dramatic as German was the #2 language and many schools were all-German as were many publications and communities. The massively intense British propaganda dehumanizing Germans and all things German was copied by American publications as the aim was to get in the war so Bankers and the Merchants of Death could make their killing. There's more to all that of course. Generally, all US federal holidays promote some sort of propaganda--national or consumeristic. My ESL teaching was more tutorial-individual so I didn't need to do the same sort of inventing as my mom did; and yes, I helped her with it occasionally.
that is fascinating and it makes sense.. i remain largely ignorant of this.. thanks for the info and insights!