The application of literary paraphrase and translation in teaching literature to students learning Dutch as a foreign language

Abstract

This article is intended to show how literary paraphrases of older (esp. medieval) literary texts into modern Dutch and their translations (from Dutch into other languages, here: Polish) may be used in the teaching of Dutch literature to students learning Dutch as a foreign language as part of an academic curriculum of Dutch philology. The decision of the teacher to use such texts is defined in terms of the interplay of three didactic goals (stimulating interest; focusing on language acquisition; factual content). The author then explores an array of existing handbook-type websites and printed editions offering historical literary texts paraphrased in Modern Dutch. The article goes on to show how in a classroom context, paraphrase and translation, using these materials, may be used as teaching methods to achieve all three of the abovementioned goals. An example of this is a project designed by the author, in the course of which students of Dutch at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin translated into Polish the chivalric epic Karel ende Elegast (Charles and Elegast).