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Reinventing Sanskrit study
McComas Taylor is reviving study of an ancient language around the world
McComas Taylor, an expert in the classical
Indian language Sanskrit, has given students across the globe access to a world-first online course, sparking renewed interest in the ancient tongue.
This year, for the first time ever, the entire content of the first-year Sanskrit curriculum was packaged into an eTextbook, which is helping the material reach a new demographic.
Offered by Australian National University, the entire course, including materials, was preloaded onto iPads and couriered out to students worldwide – all over Australia and as far as Singapore and the US.
“ All over the world, Sanskrit departments are in decline,” Taylor said.“ But my program reaches out to a new demographic – Hindus, Buddhists, yoga teachers and students and people who have deep engagement with different facets of Indian art, music, dance and song.”
He explained that there will never be more than a handful of students wanting
I always loved the idea of teaching one of the oldest languages with the newest technologies.
to learn Sanskrit in any given location. He said the trick was to find ways to reach out to this scattered demographic.
“ I spent three months last summer teaching Sanskrit to my iPad, so the iPad can teach Sanskrit to my students. This frees me up to spend quality time interacting with them, practising conversation, chanting and helping out with questions.
“ I always loved the idea of teaching one of the oldest languages with the newest technologies.”
Each week, students view introductory videos, watch Taylor model the pronunciation and patterns in Sanskrit conversation, practice a short poem and listen to a series of mini-audio lectures. Taylor then meets with all the students for
Name: McComas Taylor
University: Australian National University
Position: Head of the South Asia program
Faculty: Asian Studies
90 minutes in a virtual classroom so they can interact with him and each other.
Today, Taylor teaches 52 students across five classes, a jump from the six enrolled when he first began teaching in 2006.
“ The result has been remarkable … Early indications are that overall learning outcomes have improved,” Taylor said, adding that there are now students from Europe, the US and south Asia in his classes.
Taylor’ s passion for Sanskrit began 20 years ago when he first read the Indian epic the Mahabharata in a potted translation. He pledged that he would spend the next 10 years studying Sanskrit so he could read it in the original.
Sanskrit is an Indo-European language and the key to classical Indian civilisation, which can be traced back as far as 300BC.
Reinventing fly ash
A common waste material is being converted into engineering gold thanks to the research efforts of UNSW researcher Sri Bandyopadhyay.
For the past seven years, Bandyopadhyay has been working to promote the use of fly ash – a freely available by-product from coal-fired power stations – in Australia.
To make the fly ash more attractive to Australian consumers, Bandyopadhyay and his research team developed a technique to turn the powdery material from black to near white.
“ People call it a waste material. I do not like this notion,” Bandyopadhyay said.
In fact, fly ash is a cost-effective alternative to calcium carbonate( mineral used as filler in plastics in huge quantities) and can be used to
Sri Bandyopadhyay has found a way to make a cheap by-product of coal power attractive to many industries
strengthen commercial polymers, such as plastics, ceramics, cement, potteries and even white paints.
Bandyopadhyay is committed to getting Australia to use 100 per cent of all fly ash material, not only because it is cheap, but also because using it in the manufacture of products and energy storage could stop it from being dumped back into the environment.
Australia now uses only about 40 per cent of its fly ash, whilst China, for example, already use 67 per cent of the amount it produces.
“ Our near-whitened fly ash will save lots of other valuable minerals such as calcium carbonate.”
Bandyopadhyay worked closely with Cement Australia to advance the technology that can take fly ash from black to nearly as white as calcium carbonate.
Name: Sri Bandyopadhyay
University: The University of New South Wales
Position: Associate professor
Faculty: Science
The whitening might encourage coal power stations, the utility industry and governments to use fly ash in whitethermoplastics / thermosets, cement, concrete, non-load bearing bricks, non-ferrous metals and geo-polymers.
Fly ash also has potential in dielectric and capacitor applications. The project is now ready to be adopted for large-scale applications and has already drawn the attention of India, Singapore and China.
Bandyopadhyay plans to set up and lead a fly ash recycling engineering centre to further promote the use of the material.
“ I would like to see that this is done for Australia,” he said.“ It is not my personal gain but it is my personal love and dream.”
10 | Issue 8 2013