Italian
- ITA 102: Beginner's Italian IIFurther study of Italian grammar and syntax with increased emphasis on vocabulary, reading, and practice in conversation. Skills in speaking and writing (as well as understanding) modern Italian will also be further developed. Students will deepen the study of grammatical functions through the analysis of Italian culture and civilization.
- ITA 1027: Intensive Intermediate and Advanced ItalianItalian 102-7 is an intensive double credit course designed to help students develop an active command of the language by improving upon the five skills of speaking, listening, reading, writing and cultural competency in the interpretative, interpersonal, and presentational modes. The course emphasizes communication and grammatical structures through use of various forms of texts (literary, artistic, musical, cinematographic, etc.) in order to refine students' literacy.
- ITA 103: Intensive Beginner's and Intermediate ItalianThis course is an intensive beginning and intermediate language course that provides an introduction to the Italian language and culture. It covers the material presented in ITA 101 and ITA 102 and prepares students to enroll in ITA 107 or ITA 108. Activities and interactions provide the opportunity to develop intermediate speaking, listening, and writing skills using language of a concrete, conversational nature.
- ITA 108: Advanced Italian - Contemporary Society and CultureThe main goal of this course is to improve fluency in Italian and prepare students for upper level courses in the Italian program. Through film clips, film screenings, and readings, students will increase their understanding of grammatical functions and vocabulary applications, and improve their listening, speaking, reading and writing skills. The course has been enhanced with a digital platform, which allows students to actively interact with texts, films and each other through exercises and activities.
- ITA 225: Music and Lyrics: Italy in the Eyes of its Pop SingersWorking at the crossroads of American influences and the tradition of political songs, Italian cantautori merge popular appeal and literary sophistication. For at least three generations, their songs have provided an engaged soundtrack to Italy's turbulent social, political and cultural transformations in the post-WWII years. As lyrics on the page, as music to be listened to, and as performances recorded in video, Italian canzoni d'autore are part of Italian history and identity today.
- ITA 302: Topics in Medieval Italian Literature and Culture: Petrarch's Lyric PoetryConsidered by many the greatest scholar of his age, a successful rival to Dante, the revered teacher of Boccaccio, Petrarch bequeathed to posterity the most beautiful sonnets ever written in the Florentine vernacular. In the course, we will study the "Canzoniere", his collection of lyric poetry, a book which shaped the language of love in the European Renaissance, and a sample from his "Trionfi". The texts will be analyzed in relation to their historical and cultural context and for the impact they will have on modern European Literature.
- ITA 309/AFS 309/ECS 310: Topics in Contemporary Italian Civilization: Africa in Italian ImaginationThis course explores the colonial experience discussed by Italian writers who were in contact with Northern Africa between the 19th and the 20th centuries. This association between Italy and Africa has not been extensively developed neither within Italy or abroad, and it will be the primary focus of this course. The newly unified Italy (1861) looked at Africa as a colonial opportunity to expand its might and wealth. Writers soon embarked to places such as Alexandria and shared a unique perspective on Africa: they understood the continent not as a space to conquer and colonize, but rather as a surprisingly tolerant society in which to live.
- ITA 310/VIS 443: Topics in Modern Italian Cinema: New Italian Cinema: History, Politics, and Society (in English)This course looks at the way Italy has expressed its historical, cultural, political, and social individuality in major cinematic works from the 1960's to the present. Directors such as Bertolucci, Tornatore, Benigni, Ozpetek, and Sorrentino offer a panorama of a generation of filmmakers that has contributed to the renewal of Italian cinema. Topics will be drawn from current issues, and will include the Holocaust and questions of memory, terrorism, political violence, migration, gender ideologies, the Mafia. Emphasis on film style and techniques.
- ITA 319: The Literature of GastronomyWhat we do or do not eat and where we eat, are questions linked to anthropological and cultural matters. In a socio-political context, food, or the lack thereof, defines a society and its inadequacies. It becomes an agent of power, a metaphor for sex and gender, as well as a means of community. Whether as desire or transgression, whether corporal or spiritual - the representation of food is the depiction of Italian life. This course will examine translated Italian texts, along with visual art and film, in order to explore the function of eating, both as biological necessity as well as metaphor, within Italian society.