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SCHOOL OF MODERN LANGUAGES.
Spanish, Italian and Anglo-Saxon.
Professor Schele De Vere.
There will hereafter be two classes in each of the two languages,
Spanish and Italian.
The Junior Course, which will embrace the work to be done by
candidates for the degree of Bachelor of Arts, consists of lectures on
the elements of grammar and syntax, during which, by practice in reading
aloud and by numerous examples given in illustration of what is
taught, the student is trained in learning how to pronounce correctly.
He is next gradually familiarized with translations from Readers first,
and then from easy authors, while he is made to write exercises carefully
adapted to the lectures. A certain amount of private reading is
also prescribed, and an outline of the history of the language and its
literature closes the course.
The Senior Course, required for graduation and also for candidates
for the degree of Master of Arts, begins with the reading of classic
writers in each language and teaches fluent and prompt translation
into idiomatic English. In illustration and practical application of the
and fully explained to the class. The treatment of the idiom is
now mainly historical, the words, the sentences and the general structure
being exhibited as they gradually develop themselves from the infancy
of the language to its so-called Golden Age.
At stated times the Professor reads aloud so as to train the student's
ear; at others he dictates extracts from foreign writers, for the same purpose,
and to increase familiarity with the language. The course closes
with a series of lectures treating of the history of Spanish and Italian,
and explaining for each idiom its forms, its structure and its spiritual characteristics.
Opportunity is thus given to acquaint the student with the
fundamental laws of the Science of Language, Comparative Philology,
to which due attention is given. Lectures on the Literature of each
idiom finally include sketches of the successive epochs and accounts of
the lives with criticisms on the works of the leading authors. Much
attention is also given to the parallelism between the national development
of a people and its literary proficiency.
In the Class of Anglo-Saxon the study of the language is mainly
pursued in its aspect as the mother of English, furnishing the student
the means of tracing the history of his native tongue from its earliest
beginning. Much attention is given to the illustration of the history of
words, their birth, their fate under the rule of the Norman, and their
subsequent modification. Extracts from Anglo-Saxon writers are read,
and the bearing of their works on the history of our race is explained.
The following text-books are used:
Spanish.—The Professor's Grammar; Seoane's Dictionary; Velasquez' Reader;
Breton's La Independencia; Calderon's El Principe Constante; Lope's Estrella
de Sevilla; Cervantes' Don Quijote; Galdos's Trafalgar; Caballero's La Familia
de Alvareda; Ticknor's History of Spanish Literature. In default of the Professor's
Grammar, now out of print, Knapp's Spanish Grammar will be used.
Italian.—Cuore's Grammar; Foresti's Reader; Manzoni's I Promessi Sposi;
Tasso's Gerusalemme Liberata; Pellico's Le Mie Prigioni; Petrarca; Dante's La
Divina Commedia.
Anglo-Saxon.—Shute's Manual of Anglo-Saxon, or Sweet's Primer; The Professor's
Studies in English; March's Anglo-Saxon Grammar (for reference); the
Anglo-Saxon Gospels.
French and German.
Adjunct Professor Perkinson.
There will be two classes in each language.
The Junior Classes embrace the work for the degree of Bachelor
of Arts. Students who desire to enter them must possess an accurate
grammar of the language, and will be practiced in pronunciation, on
which special stress will be laid, and in translation, supplemented by
weekly written exercises, copious parallel reading, and a course in the
history and the literature of the language. The amount of parallel
reading to be done is definite, and is assigned at the beginning of the
session. Special attention is paid to reading at sight.
The Senior Classes comprise the work required for the degree of
Master of Arts. They study the historical grammar of the language,
given by lectures, continue the practice of translation and composition,
and enter more minutely into the study of certain authors and selected
periods. Candidates for graduation will be expected to translate at
sight any passage that may be assigned, and to render selections from
English authors into the foreign idiom.
The text-books in all the classes and the authors to be read vary from
year to year, and are subject to change at any time. The following are
the books for class-work in 1892-'93. Parallel reading will be assigned
in all classes at the beginning of the session.
Junior French.—Edgren's Grammar; Whitney's Introductory French Reader;
La Mare au Diable; Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme; Cinna; Un Philosophe sous
les Toits.
Junior German.—Whitney's Brief Grammar; Joynes-Meissner's Grammar;
Brandt's Reader; Hermann und Dorothea; Wilhelm Tell; Das Bild des Kaisers.
Senior French.—Whitney's Practical Grammar; Polyeucte; Esther; Le Misanthrope;
Taine's Notes sur L'Angleterre; Notre Dame de Paris.
Senior German.—Whitney's Grammar; Heine's Prosa; Iphigenie auf Tauris,
Torquato Tasso, Minna von Barnhelm.
Gasc's French Dictionary.
Adler's German Dictionary.
In the Graduate Course in this School students will read additional
foreign authors, pursue the study of Comparative Philology, and
write monthly essays on kindred subjects, which must give proof of
original research. A thorough knowledge of at least one ancient language,
and graduation in two modern languages, are deemed prerequisite.
Such students will have the choice between the two methods of
comparing idioms—either by tracing out the kinship existing between
several languages, or families of languages, such as the Romanic, the
Germanic, or the Slavic, in their lexical, grammatical, or psychological
nature; or by comparing with each other the different aspects borne
by one and the same idiom in its successive periods of life. The writings
of Diez, Hovelacque, Sayce, Max Müller, and others, are carefully
studied; and the final result of the whole course of study is to
be shown in a concluding dissertation evidencing original thought.
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