Master in Italian Language and Culture

Italian Language and Culture

Academic Year 2023/2024

Study plan
The master is divided into 8 MODULES:

1. Italian as a foreign/second language 1 e 2 (12 credits)
2. Business Italian (6 credits)
3. Italian literature 1 (6 credits)
4. Italian literature 2 (6 credits)
5. Italian art history (6 credits)
6. Italian history (6 credits)
7. Italian Film (6 credits)
8. Teaching Italian as a foreign language (12 credits)

The programme includes a part common to all eight modules and a part specific to each one.

Compulsory attendance   90% 

Internship/stage  20 cfu/credits 

Final Examination  Yes 

MODULE TITLE:  Italian as a foreign/second language 1 (6 credits)

Learning outcomes
Students will understand the main points of clear standard input on familiar matters regularly encountered in work, school, leisure, etc. Can deal with most situations likely to arise whilst travelling in an area where the language is spoken. Can produce simple connected text on topics which are familiar or of personal interest. Can describe experiences and events, dreams, hopes & ambitions and briefly give reasons and explanations for opinions and plans. By the end of the Course the students will have a thorough understanding of the main structures of the language and be able to understand and respond to the language in a variety of registers, through the study of areas of experience, including the following: work, leisure, daily life, travel, express needs, will and personal opinions; like and dislike, giving instructions, giving and receiving permission, giving advice, comparing, describing people/locations.

Course contents

Grammar: rules of pronunciation, alphabet, spelling and punctuation, number, nouns: plurals and gender, definite and indefinite articles, personal pronouns, use of formal and informal forms of address, adjectives: position, grades of the adjective, agreement, possessives and demonstratives, basic negations, idiomatic structures to express likes & dislikes, prepositions (restricted), verbs: present tense, regular and key irregular, simple past tense (restricted), past tense, future tense (restricted), reflexive verbs, modal verbs (restricted), the adverbs (restricted), prepositions (simple, complex and phrasal verbs).

Readings/Bibliography
Main references:

1. Ricci, Via della grammatica, Edilingua, Roma, 2011
2. La Grassa, L’ italiano all’ università 1, Edilingua, Roma, 2012

A detailed syllabus will be delivered to the students at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching methods
Lectures and class discussions, role play, assignments and readings.

Assessment methods
The overall assessment consists of:
a) WRITTEN EXAM (60 minutes)

WRITTEN EXAM
The computer-based written exam will be closed-book and administerd online. You will have 60 minutes to complete. Details (and a simulation) will be provided in the class.

GRADING
Grades are expressed on a 18-30 scale and graduated as follows:

<18 failed
18-23 sufficient
24-27 good
28-30 very good
30 L excellent

Further details on the assessment metods and grading will be provided at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching tools
We will use an e-learning platform for remote downloading of teaching materials and uploading of assigned teamworks.
Details on how to access the remote learning platform will be provided at the beginning of the course.

MODULE TITLE:  Italian as a foreign/second language 2 (6 credits)

Learning outcomes
Students will understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and abstract topics, including technical discussions in his/her field of specialization. Can interact with a degree of fluency and spontaneity that makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without strain for either party. Can produce clear, detailed text on a wide range of subjects and explain a viewpoint on a topical issue giving the advantages and disadvantages of various options. By the end of the course they will be able to: listen and respond to with ease to complex Italian spoken at natural speed, in a variety of linguistic registers; hold a fluent conversation with a native speaker on a variety of topics, speaking with a high degree of confidence, show a high degree of understanding of complex written texts and respond appropriately and effectively to them, both orally and in writing, communicate effectively in writing with a high degree of accuracy and fluency, on a range of issues, understand in breadth and depth aspects of Italian society.

Course contents
The course will consolidate all essential grammatical constructions and concentrate particularly on the following: consolidation of compound tenses, consolidation of subjunctive mood, passive form, consolidation of conditional, indirect speech, indefinite pronouns, comparative and superlative adjectives, imperative mood, consolidation of direct and indirect object pronouns; altered nouns; consecutio temporum; determining and making good use of the following links: prepositions, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs and adverbial expressions, defective and altered nouns; adjectives.

Readings/Bibliography
Main references:

1. Ricci, Via della grammatica, Edilingua, Roma, 2011
2. La Grassa, L’ italiano all’ università 1, Edilingua, Roma, 2012

A detailed syllabus will be delivered to the students at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching methods
Lectures and class discussions, role play, assignments and readings.

Assessment methods
The overall assessment consists of:
a) WRITTEN EXAM (60 minutes)

WRITTEN EXAM
The computer-based written exam will be closed-book and administerd online. You will have 60 minutes to complete. Details (and a simulation) will be provided in the class.

GRADING
Grades are expressed on a 18-30 scale and graduated as follows:

<18 failed
18-23 sufficient
24-27 good
28-30 very good
30 L excellent

Further details on the assessment metods and grading will be provided at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching tools
We will use an e-learning platform for remote downloading of teaching materials and uploading of assigned teamworks.
Details on how to access the remote learning platform will be provided at the beginning of the course.

MODULE TITLE:  Business Italian (6 credits)

Learning outcomes
This course focuses on the Italian language of business, aiming at developing students’ written and oral skills while providing them with the technical vocabulary and professional expressions that are most often used in a variety of business situations. Topics are confronted in several ways: through readings from textbooks used in business schools, the analysis of letters, office documents and newspaper articles about business, and targeted exercises and discussions. Attention is also given to culture, manners, and customs as they are related to business practices. The course is completed with stages at different enterprises taken, where students can practice what they learn during class.

Course contents
The following topics will be covered during the course:

1. Job applications: how to write a job application, useful expressions
2. Curriculm vitae: language and structure of the curriculum, kinds of curricula
3. Business letters and e-mails
4. How to face a job interview
5. Business documents: catalogues, samples, orders, payments, price lists,
6. Description of companies
7. Marketing: describe and promote a product
8. Business regulations: Italian and European laws
9. How to read a company’s budget
10. How to read/prepare a business plan

Readings/Bibliography
Main references:

1. McLoughlin, Italiano per specialisti: Italiano per economisti – edizione aggiornata, Alma Edizioni

A detailed syllabus will be delivered to the students at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching methods
Lectures and class discussions, role play, assignments and readings.

Assessment methods
The overall assessment consists of:
a) WRITTEN EXAM (60 minutes)

WRITTEN EXAM
The computer-based written exam will be closed-book and administerd online. You will have 60 minutes to complete. Details (and a simulation) will be provided in the class.

GRADING
Grades are expressed on a 18-30 scale and graduated as follows:

<18 failed
18-23 sufficient
24-27 good
28-30 very good
30 L excellent

Further details on the assessment metods and grading will be provided at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching tools
We will use an e-learning platform for remote downloading of teaching materials and uploading of assigned teamworks.
Details on how to access the remote learning platform will be provided at the beginning of the course.

MODULE TITLE:  Italian Literature (12 credits)

Learning outcomes
The course deals with Italian literature and culture from the Middle Age to the Unification of Italy. The course aims to provide students with a knowledge of the Italian culture through the reading and analysis in class of prose and verse texts by Italy’s most important writers, on which they will carry out a detailed linguistic and lexical analysis. The course aims to enable foreign students to acquire a level of linguistic competence comparable to B2 (with particular attention to grammatical and syntactic structures, as well as to vocabulary and polysemy) through the knowledge of literary and other texts documenting the most important moments in the development of Italian society and customs. At the end of the course the student will be able to:

• Communicate in the Italian language with a competence comparable to B2, expounding and discussing the topics covered in written and oral form with clarity and propriety of language:
• Orient themselves within the developmental framework of Italian literature;
• Interpret and comment on an Italian literary text, placing it in its relevant historical context and using the appropriate formal tools.

Course contents
The course offers readings and comments of canonical texts of Italian literature from the unification of Italy to the present day (Dante, Petrarca, Boccaccio, Tasso, Ariosto, etc).
Dante Alighieri and the Divine Commedy Francesco Petrarca and the Canzoniere Giovanni Boccaccio and the Decameron
Cultural and literary movement of Humanism and Renaissance (Angelo Poliziano, Lorenzo de’ Medici, Leon Battista Alberti, Michelangelo, Giorgio Vasari, Benvenuto Cellini, Niccolò Machiavelli, Francesco Guicciardini, Ludovico Ariosto, Torquato Tasso);
Neoclassicim, Classicism, Romanticism (Ugo Foscolo, Giacomo Leopardi, Alessandro Manzoni);
Poetry and novel of the newborn Italy (Giosue Carducci, Giovanni Verga, Giovanni Pascoli, Gabriele D’Annunzio, Italo Svevo, Luigi Pirandello);
20th century poetry (Umberto Saba, Giuseppe Ungaretti, Eugenio Montale, Aldo Palazzeschi)

Readings/Bibliography
Main references:
Bonazzi, Nella letteratura italiana. Da Dante al web, Carocci Editore, 2018.
A detailed syllabus will be delivered to the students at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching methods
Lectures and class discussions, role play, assignments and readings.

Assessment methods
The overall assessment consists of:
a) oral exam

GRADING
Grades are expressed on a 18-30 scale and graduated as follows:

<18 failed
18-23 sufficient
24-27 good
28-30 very good
30 L excellent

Further details on the assessment metods and grading will be provided at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching tools
We will use an e-learning platform for remote downloading of teaching materials and uploading of assigned teamworks.
Details on how to access the remote learning platform will be provided at the beginning of the course.

MODULE TITLE:  Italian Art history (6 credits)

Learning outcomes
The main aim of the course is to provide international students with a high level of expertise in European arts and architecture from Classical to Contemporary art. At the end of the course the student will be able to:

Thanks to the combination of different teaching and learning techniques (frontal lectures; group discussion; group-work; guided tours) students will learn:
– to describe and compare works of Italian architecture, painting and sculpture;
– to set them in their historical context and within the development of the History of European Art and Architecture, with peculiar attention to the legacy of Classical Art in Western Culture.

Course contents
Medieval arts

• Michelangelo and Raphael in Florence and Rome
• The Renaissance
• Classicism and Naturalism in Italian Painting: the Carracci and Caravaggi
• Spectacle in Rome of Pope Urban VIII: sculptural and architectural innovations of Bernini and Borromini
  Topic 5. From Rococò to Neoclassicism: Giovambattista Tiepolo, Canaletto, and Antonio Canova
  Topic 7. The Macchiaioli in Tuscany and the relationship with the French Impressionists
  Topic 8. Two Italian avant-garde: Futurism and Metaphysical

Readings/Bibliography
Main references:

1. Bertelli, G. Briganti, A. Giuliano, Storia dell’arte italiana, Milano, Electa Mondadori.

A detailed syllabus will be delivered to the students at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching methods
Lectures and class discussions, role play, assignments and readings.

Assessment methods
The overall assessment consists of:
a) oral exam

GRADING
Grades are expressed on a 18-30 scale and graduated as follows:

<18 failed
18-23 sufficient
24-27 good
28-30 very good
30 L excellent

Further details on the assessment metods and grading will be provided at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching tools
We will use an e-learning platform for remote downloading of teaching materials and uploading of assigned teamworks.
Details on how to access the remote learning platform will be provided at the beginning of the course.

MODULE TITLE:  Italian Film (6 credits)

Learning outcomes
The aim of this course is to achieve a good knowledge of Italian cinema exploring its key moments starting from the stylistic revolution of Neorealism, one of the most important moments in the history of cinema, then we will move up to the Sixties (Federico Fellini, Michelangelo Antonioni, the commedia all’italiana, and the youngest generation: Marco Bellocchio, Bernardo Bertolucci), the Seventies (Pier Paolo Pasolini, Sergio Leone, the Taviani brothers), the Eighties (Nanni Moretti); special attention will be paid to contemporary filmmakers and to contemporary female directors.

Objectives

• Students acquire a knowledge of the history of post-war Italian cinema to the present day;
• They acquire a broad overview of Italian socio-historical context;
• They are exposed to Italian cultural history and its main issues such as the role of family, religion, politics; broader themes such as gender issues, emigration, employment, are also explored;
• They gain an awareness of how film represents social and cultural history and of how one can use film as an historical source.

Course contents
After a brief review of the early decades of Italian film, this course will focus on the first two decades of post-war cinema, beginning with neo-realism, continuing through the boom years of the 1950s, and ending with the new introspection of the 1960s. Looking at the movies of five great directors, Rossellini, De Sica, Fellini, Antonioni, and Visconti, the course will consider their evolving aesthetic and their engagement with both History writ large and the social and political issues that informed Italian life as the nation struggled to reinvent itself in the aftermath of Fascism and the Second World War. Readings include brief essays on the movies studied and some of their literary sources.

Readings/Bibliography
Main references:

A detailed syllabus will be delivered to the students at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching methods
Lectures and class discussions, film, assignments and readings.

Assessment methods
The overall assessment consists of:
a) Oral exam.

GRADING
Grades are expressed on a 18-30 scale and graduated as follows:

<18 failed
18-23 sufficient
24-27 good
28-30 very good
30 L excellent

Further details on the assessment metods and grading will be provided at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching tools
We will use an e-learning platform for remote downloading of teaching materials and uploading of assigned teamworks.Details on how to access the remote learning platform will be provided at the beginning of the course. 

MODULE TITLE:  Teaching Italian as a Foreign Language (6 credits)

Learning outcomes
The course is dedicated, on the one hand, to the transmission of theoretical knowledge relating to linguistic and intercultural skills in teaching Italian L2 and, on the other hand, to the application of this knowledge to daily practice, with the use of audiovisual and digital.

The various linguistic, extralinguistic and intercultural skills of language learners and users will be examined in the light of current research developments. Particular attention will be paid to the study of intercultural communicative competence and to the comparison between cultures. At the same time, analysis techniques will be presented for the identification of individual sub-skills through the use of multimedia resources and tools.

Objectives

1. a) to clearly understand the role of the teacher (in plurilingual classes, with adult learners, abroad or in Italy)
2. b) to be able to design exercises (multiple choice, multiple selection, cloze, scrambled texts, matching, puzzles) and learn to judge whether exercises proposed in textbooks are suitable for a certain class
3. c) to be able to discern possible causes of errors (interference of L1 or other languages, analogy, etc).
4. d) to be able to explain linguistic features (and errors) to students
5. e) to find and use proficiently specialised literature

 

Course contents

• A review of Italian grammar with special attention to effective presentation
• Lexical fields, including an update for expressions and current usage
• How to teach culture, and which culture to teach
• Class management
• Evaluating the five skills

Readings/Bibliography
Main references:
Ferrari, A. , Zampese L. Grammatica: parole, frasi, testi dell’italiano, Carocci Roma 2016
A detailed syllabus will be delivered to the students at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching methods
Lectures and class discussions, role play, assignments and readings.

Assessment methods
The overall assessment consists of:
a) oral exam

GRADING
Grades are expressed on a 18-30 scale and graduated as follows:

<18 failed
18-23 sufficient
24-27 good
28-30 very good
30 L excellent

Further details on the assessment metods and grading will be provided at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching tools
We will use an e-learning platform for remote downloading of teaching materials and uploading of assigned teamworks.
Details on how to access the remote learning platform will be provided at the beginning of the course.

MODULE TITLE:  Italian Culture (6 credits)

Learning outcomes
The course aims at introducing students to the Italian culture and history. At the end of the course students will acquire a basic knowledge of crucial aspects of the Italian cultural heritage across different disciplines and an awareness of the complexities of Italian history and society.

Objectives

• Know Italian culture, particularly its literature, art, music, etc.

• Understand Italian culture as reflected in Italian society, politics and economics.

Course contents

• Deepening of economic and cultural aspects (differences between Southern and Northern Italy);
• Deepening of aspects of Italian history;
• Italian political system: analysis of documents;
• Discussion of aspects of “anthropology” and sociology of contemporary Italy through the figure of the “woman / mother” and complex sociological phenomenon behind others cultural subjects such as the Mafia, unemployment, and the Palio of Siena;
• The Mafia: culture, sociology and mentality;

Readings/Bibliography
Main references:

1. Guida, E. Palese. Lingua è Cultura, Lecce, Pensa Multimedia.

A detailed syllabus will be delivered to the students at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching methods
Lectures and class discussions, role play, assignments and readings.

Assessment methods
The overall assessment consists of:
a) written exam

GRADING
Grades are expressed on a 18-30 scale and graduated as follows:

<18 failed
18-23 sufficient
24-27 good
28-30 very good
30 L excellent

Further details on the assessment metods and grading will be provided at the beginning of the classes.

Teaching tools
We will use an e-learning platform for remote downloading of teaching materials and uploading of assigned teamworks.
Details on how to access the remote learning platform will be provided at the beginning of the course.