Autism, classical myth and why it can be beneficial NOT to name the man in the middle

 

Over recent postings I have mentioned a key resource I want to use for the materials I am putting together for use in the autistic classroom. It is a chimneypiece panel in an eighteenth-century room in Grove House at Roehampton, originally used as a dining room. The panel here in the picture looks quite striking: the figures are in relief so it is three dimensional. One can touch it. As people now walk into the room they don’t necessarily notice it at first, although I would say that its location – above a fireplace – would have ensured that it would have got noticed back in the eighteenth century, especially on cold London days. Thus its location would have helped make it a talking point for those who would have gathered in the room.

One thing I would like to do is hold sessions in the room, where groups of people can experience the relief and respond to it. But I am also planning on using it as inspiration for activities elsewhere. As can hopefully be seen from the photo, it is a striking artefact in its own right – and one activity I am wondering about involves creating a line drawing of the image which people could colour in. This could be a group activity, where each person takes one part of the image. For example, one person might colour in the woman on the left, another the other woman while another might colour in the fruit bowls. A further person could colour in the hillside that the woman on our left is pointing to. Or – an activity could be to create models, for instance of the fruit, or of the helmet on the bottom left of the panel, or of the club that the man in the centre is holding.

So far, I have not said who any of the people represented here are. One reason for this is as follows. As I mentioned in my previous posting in relation to Grove and Park’s exploration of the materials that they are presenting around the journey of Odysseus, it doesn’t necessarily matter if those doing the activities have little, or no, knowledge of the stories. And while it is beneficial – as Grove and Park discuss – to use the stories as an opportunity to provide access to a shared cultural heritage, this is not essential, especially when some users of the materials might find it difficult if not impossible to understand the specifics of the stories. Indeed, one challenge is around how to ensure that the materials I create can be accessible to people with a range of abilities at communication.

Thus it could feasibly be the case that some users of the materials will never get to know much if anything about the mythological stories – while others, hopefully, will find experiencing the stories rewarding, and the introductions to them provided here might potentially give a route into subsequent with classical myths. Some users, meanwhile, might come to the material with an existing knowledge of classical stories. As I discussed in a much earlier posting to this blog, there is something about classical myth that especially seems to engage autistic people. indeed, it was learning about this that prompted this whole project, as I set out in this blog’s introductory blurb.

I am going to delay saying who the figures are for a further reason. Recently, I took part in a set of workshops at Roehampton for a group of Year 10 girls (aged 14-15), most of whom know little about classical myth. My colleague Marta Gárcia had designed activities for them, who were divided into teams of about eight people. These included activities relating to various artefacts around the campus, and one was based around the chimneypiece panel. I was in the room throughout the time when the girls were doing the activities to welcome them and talk about the panel. When I began by saying something about the mythological figure being represented, what they noticed was focused around this male figure. But when the girls had started to look at the panel first, their attention was drawn to other things going on here. Indeed, what caught their interest was not the man in the middle at all - the two women. And rather than thinking about how he is responding to them, they were interested in the opposite thing - namely how they are responding to him, and competing for his attention.

What this has shown me in relation to my autism and classical myth project is just how many things can be drawn from the panel, irrespective of how much existing knowledge the viewer brings to it. Each time I look at it, I am struck by some fresh thing. But my interest has always been shaped by my awareness about the myth being represented. However, one could, equally, focus on the women – for example on how their gestures and on how they control the space around themselves. Another possibility would be to focus, too, on the objects around them – such as the abundant fruit beside the woman on our right.

I had originally through about whether to begin with an activity around how the man comes to be between the two women. But I am now wondering whether a starting point could be the panel itself, especially as there is potential for developing activities around the more basic levels of communication – and one could build from this to more advanced levels. For instance, a task could focus on the fruit in the baskets – and this could be accompanied with pictures of fruit, or models of fruit – which could be piled up in the baskets like they are on the panel. The fruit could be touched; those in the group could be encouraged to say key words relevant to the image – perhaps ‘hungry’, or ‘pretty’ – and they could reach out and touch the fruit or perhaps pretend to eat it.

It has been an interesting activity for me to avoid saying who the image is representing. And I am going to end by still rejecting the temptation to reveal who he is and who the women might be. Reading some of the other postings will disclose this information. I have written about the panel elsewhere too, including here, where I focus my discussion around the identity of the three figures (let me know if you have difficulties accessing this document). There is even a video of me talking about it with Classics Confidential. I take advantage of any opportunity to talk about it…

More soon – when I plan to say more about the activities I am considering.