Italian (ITAL)

ITAL 0010 Italian Survival Kit: The Language and Culture of getting around in Italy

This course provides content that is taught efficiently in order to be used practically. If you are going to Italy and questioning how you will survive your total immersion experience, this course will provide you with the linguistic and cultural skills you will need to effectively function in Italy and fully enjoy its wonders. In this course, you will learn and practice the language you need to talk about: yourself; others; travel; public transportation; housing; food; shopping; technology; health; money, etc. Students participate in conversations that replicate day-to-day life in Italy thereby developing the skills needed for face-to-face and online situations. This course does not count toward fulfillment of the language requirement. Students wishing to continue in Italian 0200 should register for Italian 0100 rather than Italian 0010. This course is open to students who have never taken Italian and who don't intend to satisfy the language requirement by taking courses in Italian.

Spring

0.5 Course Units

ITAL 0050 Sicilian Language and Culture

Occupied over the centuries by the Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Normans, French, and Spaniards, Sicily is a region of many histories and many traditions. Birthplace and crossroad of cultures and artistic movements, the Sicilian land has shaped the imagination of its inhabitants and has never ceased to fascinate its visitors. Its language and culture have also been exported abroad, through the many Sicilians who left the island and settled all over the world. This course is an introduction to Sicilian Language and Culture. We will study spoken Sicilian and cultural artifacts ranging from film to literature, to music and food, in order to learn to recognize and understand the unique sounds and features of "siciliano" and to converse in Sicilian with native speakers and with one another. Class sessions include lectures and interactive discussions. Between classes, the learning experience is extended through assignments, lectures and discussions.

Fall

0.5 Course Units

ITAL 0088 First-Year Seminar: Italian Histories

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0088

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0089 First-Year Seminar: Italian Music

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0089, MUSC 0810

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0090 First-Year Seminar: Italian American Studies

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0090, ENGL 1299, GSWS 0090

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0091 First-Year Seminar: Contemporary Italy

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0091

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0092 First-Year Seminar: Italian Film and Media Studies

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0092, GSWS 0092

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0093 First-Year Seminar: Race and Ethnicity in Italy

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0093, GSWS 0093

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0094 First-Year Seminar: Italian Gender Studies

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0094, GSWS 0094

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0095 First-Year Seminar: Italian Fashion

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0095, GSWS 0095

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0096 First-Year Seminar: Italian Visual Studies

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0096, GSWS 0096

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0097 First-Year Seminar: Italian Foods and Cultures

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0097, GSWS 0097

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0098 First-Year Seminar: Italian Literature

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0098, GSWS 0098

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0099 First-Year Seminar: Italian Innovations

Topics vary. See the Department's website at https://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses for a description of current offerings.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 0099, GSWS 0099

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0100 Elementary Italian I

A first-semester elementary language course for students who have never studied Italian or who have had very little exposure to the language. Students who have previously studied Italian are required to take the placement test. Class work emphasizes the development of spontaneous discourse skills and interactional competence. Out-of-class homework required.

Fall or Spring

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0120 Accelerated Elementary Italian

An intensive two-credit course covering the first and second semester of the elementary year for students who have never studied Italian before but have already fulfilled the language requirement in another modern language, preferably a romance language. Students who have fulfilled the language requirement in a language other than a romance language will be considered on an individual basis. All students must have departmental permission to register. Class work emphasizes the development of spontaneous discourse skills and interactional competence. Out-of-class homework required.

Fall or Spring

2 Course Units

ITAL 0200 Elementary Italian II

This course is the continuation of the elementary-level sequence designed to develop functional competence in the four skills. Class work emphasizes the further development of spontaneous discourse skills and interactional competence. Out-of-class homework required.

Fall or Spring

Prerequisite: ITAL 0100

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0300 Intermediate Italian I

Italian 0300 is the first half of a two-semester intermediate sequence designed to help you attain a level of proficiency that will allow you to function comfortably in an Italian-speaking environment. The course will build on your existing skills in Italian, increase your confidence and your ability to read, write, speak and understand the language, and introduce you to more refined lexical items, more complex grammatical structures, and more challenging cultural material. You are expected to have already learned the most basic grammatical structures in elementary Italian and to review these. The course materials will allow you to explore culturally relevant topics and to develop cross-cultural skills through the exploration of similarities and differences between your native culture and the Italian world.

Fall or Spring

Prerequisite: ITAL 0200

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0340 Accelerated Intermediate Italian

This course is the intensive and accelerated course that combines in one semester the intermediate sequence (0300 and 0400). It will build on your existing skills in Italian, increase your confidence and your ability to read, write, speak and understand the language, and introduce you to more refined lexical items, more complex grammatical structures, and more challenging cultural material. The course will allow you to explore culturally relevant topics and to develop cross-cultural skills through the exploration of similarities and differences between your native culture and the Italian world.

Fall or Spring

Prerequisite: ITAL 0120

2 Course Units

ITAL 0400 Intermediate Italian II

This course is the second half of a two-semester intermediate sequence designed to help you attain a level of proficiency that will allow you to function comfortably in an Italian-speaking environment. The course will build on your existing skills in Italian, increase your confidence and your ability to read, write, speak and understand the language, and introduce you to more refined lexical items, more complex grammatical structures, and more challenging cultural material. The course will allow you to explore culturally relevant topics and to develop cross-cultural skills through the exploration of analogies and differences between your native culture and the Italian world. The course will move beyond stereotypical presentations of Italy and its people to concentrate on specific social issues together with cultural topics.

Fall or Spring

Prerequisite: ITAL 0300

1 Course Unit

ITAL 0800 Italian Conversation

The course materials and nature of assignments and projects complement the Italian Studies curriculum by supporting the cultural content, linguistic functions, and types of assignments students may have already been exposed to in other Italian courses. This course will serve not only as a gateway to inspire students to take Italian Studies courses in the future, but will also accompany classes they may be taking simultaneously. The learning objectives of the works studied in this course will mirror and support the goals of the Italian Studies Curriculum while paying particular attention to oral expression, communication, and fostering a community of students of Italian both inside and outside the classroom.

Two Term Class, Student may enter either term; credit given for either

0.5 Course Units

ITAL 1000 Advanced Italian I

This course will focus on contemporary Italian culture following its development since the 1960s. Pertinent films, literary texts, articles, as well as material in other media will complement the analysis of films and allow in-depth discussion. The cultural material explored in the course will be also used as a basis for a review of linguistic structures and vocabulary. Audiovisual materials develop students' comprehension and production in Italian and enable them to function in an academic setting. Class work will center primarily on conversation to improve students' fluency, vocabulary, and accuracy in speaking. Homework will consist of research and writing assignments in written Italian. Additionally, students will be required to prepare presentations. Students will write a final essay.

Fall or Spring

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1200 Advanced Italian II

In this course, students will strengthen their communication skills, while continuing to explore significant aspects of contemporary Italian culture and history. Students will take further steps towards being able to understand in depth and to contextualize authentic Italian documents. Films, songs, and a variety of readings, will be used as windows on particular historical periods, cultural movements, political issues, and social customs. They will serve as a tool to investigate the many facets of Italian identity and, at the same time, as a way to prepare those students who will continue their study of Italian literature and culture in higher-level courses. Students are expected to participate in conversations and all other class activities in order to improve their oral and written ability to narrate, express opinion, hypothesize, and discuss a variety of topics, using rich, appropriate vocabulary and grammar, and organizing well-structured discourses, be they oral presentations, weekly compositions or the final essay. To reach these goals, speaking, listening, reading and writing activities -- role plays, discussions, oral presentations, journals, grammar reviews -- will be based on audio-visual material and written texts and/or proposed by the students themselves, based on their independent explorations and research.

Fall or Spring

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1211 Business Italian

The course is conducted entirely in Italian and should be taken after completion of Italian 1000 or equivalent. It is designed to enable students to acquire language proficiency in the current Italian business and labor world. Business terminology will be used in specific business situations such as banking, trade, communications, etc. The course will examine Italian business practices, cultural differences such as the attitude towards money, work, leisure and consumerism through websites, newspaper and magazine articles and video clips. Students will learn to read business publications, write and compose business texts, and participate in business-related conversations. Additionally, guest lecturers from the local business world with ties to Italy will provide students with information about internship and job opportunities and the knowledge necessary to navigate international and Italian commercial routes. All reading and lectures in Italian.

Not Offered Every Year

Prerequisite: ITAL 1000

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1212 Business Italian: Italian for Special Purposes

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1213 Business Italian: Italian for Professions

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1214 Business Italian: Translation and Interpreting

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1320 Composers: Opera Composers 1600-1900

This course will center on the biography, works, and cultural context of a specific composer or group of composers. As well as introducing students to the musical works of the composer(s), the course will examine issues such as reception history, the canon, mechanisms of cult formation, authorship and attribution, identity, historical and social contexts, and nationalism and patriotism. Fulfills Arts and Letters Requirement. The course centers on a group of composers who created or developed opera as a successful genre by setting texts in Italian: Monteverdi, Handel, Mozart, Verdi, and Puccini. We will explore how these musicians were involved in opera as a business model, how their careers took shape, how their music interacted on stage with words, bodies, and sets (enhancing narratives based on literature, mythology and history), how their works were products of larger social contexts, and finally, how and why these operas are presented today by American theatres (also adapted as Broadway musicals) or in film versions. The course is intended for non-majors, but music majors are welcome. Knowledge of Italian is not necessary.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: MUSC 1320

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1322 Composers: Mozart/DaPonte

This course will center on the biography, works, and cultural context of a specific composer or group of composers. As well as introducing students to the musical works of the composer(s), the course will examine issues such as reception history, the canon, mechanisms of cult formation, authorship and attribution, identity, historical and social contexts, and nationalism and patriotism. Fulfills Arts and Letters Requirement. Mozart’s meeting with Lorenzo Da Ponte in Vienna in 1783 sparked one of the most successful collaborations in opera history between a poet and a composer, generating three works that are frequently staged in today’s theatres worldwide, The Marriage of Figaro (1786), Don Giovanni (1787), and Così fan tutte (1790). We will study the literary sources of these operas, the poetic and operatic conventions of the time, and the issues (such as love, power, and gender) that these works raise, by also comparing different versions on video. The course is intended for non-majors, but music majors are welcome.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: MUSC 1322

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1440 Film Music in Post 1950 Italy

An exploration of cinematic sound through the lens of specific composer/director collaborations in post-1950 Italy, examining scores, soundtracks, and the interaction of diegetic and non-diegetic music with larger soundscapes. Composers Nino Rota and Ennio Morricone serve as case studies, in partnership with directors Fellini, Visconti, Leone, Pontecorve, Pasolini, and Coppola. Highlights include several excerpts form the Fellini/Rota collaboration, including The White Sheik, I vitelloni, The Road, Nights of Cabiria, La dolce vita, 8 1/2, Juliet of the Spirits, Satyricon, The Clowns, Roma, Amarcord, Casanova, and Orchestra Rehearsal. Rota's music for Visconti will be examined in Senso, the Leopard, and Rocco and his Brothers, along with his Transatlantic collaboration for The Godfather. Morricone's work with various directors will be discussed in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, The Battle of Algiers, and Teorema, as well as for American films such as Malick's Days of Heaven and Tarantino's The Hateful Eight. Weekly screenings required. Open to all: music majors, minors, and non-majors; will count toward requirements for music minor. Knowledge of music and Italian helpful but not required. All readings and lectures in English.

Also Offered As: CIMS 1440, MUSC 1440

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1890 Masterpieces-Italian Literature

This course surveys the history of Italian literature through its major masterpieces. Beginning with Dante's Divine Comedy, Petrarca's love poems, and Boccaccio's Decameron, we will follow the development of Italian literary tradition through the Renaissance (Machiavelli's political theory and Ariosto's epic poem), and then through Romanticism (Leopardi's lyric poetry and Manzoni's historical novel), up to the 20th century (from D'annunzio's sensual poetry to Calvino's post-modern short stories). The course will provide students with the tools needed for analyzing the texts in terms of both form and content, and for framing them in their historical, cultural, and socio-political context. Classes and readings will be in Italian. ITAL 1890 is mandatory for Majors in Italian Literature and Minors in Italian Literature. If necessary, ITAL 1000 can be taken at the same time as ITAL 1890. Prerequisite: Open to students who have completed ITAL 1000 or equivalent.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: COML 1890

Prerequisite: ITAL 1000

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1900 Italian History on Screen: How Movies Tell the Story of Italy

How has our image of Italy arrived to us? Where does the story begin and who has recounted, rewritten, and rearranged it over the centuries? In this course, we will study Italy's rich and complex past and present. We will carefully read literary and historical texts and thoughtfully watch films in order to attain an understanding of Italy that is as varied and multifacted as the country itself. Group work, discussions and readings will allow us to examine the problems and trends in the political, cultural and social history from ancient Rome to today. We will focus on: the Roman Empire, Middle Ages, Renaissance, Unification, Turn of the Century, Fascist era, World War II, post-war and contemporary Italy. Lectures and readings are in English.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 1900

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1910 Sicily on Page and Screen

What images come to mind when we hear the words Sicily and Sicilians? Often our thoughts range from scenic vacation spots, delicious seafood and cannoli, and sweet grandmothers dressed in black, to mafia violence, vendettas, and the deep-rooted code of silence, omerta. But, how did these ideas get to us? Is there truth in them? Is there more to this island and its people? Through careful analysis of literary and cinematic representations of this Italian region, and those that do and have inhabited it, we will trace and analyze how Sicilians have represented themselves, how mainland Italians have interpreted Sicilian culture, how outsiders have understood these symbols, how our own perceptions shaped what we thought we knew about this place and, finally, how our own observations will have evolved throughout our studies. We will watch films such as Tornatore's Cinema paradiso and Coppola's The Godfather II, and read texts such as Lampedusa's The Leopard and Maraini's Bagheria. This course aims to increase students' understanding and knowledge of the Sicilian socio-cultural system. It will help students develop their ability to understand and interpret Sicilian culture through close analysis of its history, values, attitudes, and experiences, thereby allowing them to better recognize and examine the values and practices that define their own, as well as others', cultural frameworks.

Summer Term

Also Offered As: CIMS 1910

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1920 Italian History on the Table

"Mangia, mangia!" is an expression commonly associated with the American stereotype of Italians, whose cuisine is popular throughout the world. But is the perceived Italian love of food the same in the United States and in Italy? Is it an issue of quantity or quality? Of socioeconomics, politics, education, health ...? Global, local or maybe, glocal? In this course, we will explore the role of food in Italian culture and in the shaping of the Italic identity, in Italy and abroad since antiquity. We will trace its evolution through literary documents, works of art, music and film, as well as family recipes and cooking tools; from ancient Rome to Dante and Boccaccio, to Stanley Tucci's Big Night; from court banquets to food trucks that, while always a feature at Italian fairs and open air markets, are now being "Americanized" under the influence of American cooking shows on Italian television. This course will be taught in English. It is an OBL (Object Based Learning) Course and will include class visits, in person and/or virtual, to the Penn Museum and to the Rare Book and Manuscript Library. It counts also as a credit for the minor in Global Medieval Studies.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: ENGL 1295

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1930 Fascist Cinemas

Cinema played a crucial role in the cultural life of Nazi Germany and other fascist states. As cinema enthusiasts, Goebbels and Hitler were among the first to realize the important ideological potential of film as a mass medium and saw to it that Germany remained a cinema powerhouse producing more than 1000 films during the Nazi era. In Italy, Mussolini, too, declared cinema "the strongest weapon." This course explores the world of "fascist" cinemas ranging from infamous propaganda pieces such as The Triumph of the Will to popular entertainments such as musicals and melodramas. It examines the strange and mutually defining kinship between fascism more broadly and film. We will consider what elements mobilize and connect the film industries of the Axis Powers: style, genre, the aestheticization of politics, the creation of racialized others. More than seventy years later, fascist cinemas challenge us to grapple with issues of more subtle ideological insinuation than we might think. Weekly screenings with subtitles.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CIMS 1070, COML 1071, GRMN 1070

1 Course Unit

ITAL 1982 Film Sound and Film Music

Please check the website for a current course description at: http://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: MUSC 1810

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2200 Florence in History

Florence is justly famous for its art and learning, especially during the era of the Renaissance. It was also one of the most literate states in Europe during this era; thanks to the city’s 3 abundant records, it is one of the best-studied cities in Europe from the later Middle Ages through the early modern era. Our course readings present a mix of major primary sources, synthetic summaries, and important modern scholarship. Most of our class time will focus on the information and issues they raise.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: HIST 2200

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2201 The City of Rome: From Constantine to the Borgias

The great city of Rome outlived its empire and its emperors. What happened to the Eternal City after “the fall of the Roman Empire in the West?” In this course, we will follow the story of this great city, its people, its buildings old and new, and its legacy across Italy, Europe, and beyond. Rome rebuilt and reshaped itself through the Middle Ages: home for popes, destination for pilgrims, power broker for Italy. It became a great Renaissance and early modern city, a center of art and architecture, of religion, and of politics. We will be reading a mix of primary sources and modern scholarship. All required texts are in English, though students who take this course for Italian Studies credit may choose to read some works in Italian.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: HIST 2201

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2204 Food and Diet in Early Europe: Farm to Table in the Renaissance

What did medieval and Renaissance Europeans choose to eat? What did they have to eat? Before the age of mass transportation, was all food locally sourced? In an era when most medicines were plant based, what did it mean to eat a balanced diet? “Feed a cold, starve a fever.” Why? In this course we will examine food, foodways, and diet in European culture, thought, and society with a focus on the later Middle Ages and Renaissance, and with a mix of primary sources and modern scholarship on food, cuisine, religion, and diet.

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: HIST 2204

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2500 Cultura E Letteratura

Please check the website for a current course description at: http://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 2500

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2510 Black Italy: Transnational Identities and Narratives in Afro-Italian Literature

This course focuses on how the migration movements to Italy, mainly from the Maghreb and the Horn of Africa in the '80s and '90s contributed to change Italy's status and image. From a country of emigration to other parts of the world, Italy became - as many historians, geographers, and scholars have observed - an immigration site, playing a pivotal role in the African diaspora. In the shadow of Italy's colonialist heritage (a past that Italy still has not fully confronted), these phenomena of mass migration challenge, complicate, and develop the notion of Italian-ness and undermine the fixity of an Italian identity in favor of multicultural and transnational identities. This course focuses on several Black Italian artists, writers, filmmakers, and activists of Somali, Eritrean, Tunisian, Ethiopian, and Egyptian origins (e.g. migrants or children of immigrants who were born or raised in Italy and children of mixed-race unions) who contribute to broaden the definition of Italian-ness and to challenge its racial, social, and cultural boundaries. Students will analyze short stories, novels, documentaries, songs, blogs, journal articles by Igiaba Scego, Cristina Ali Farah, Gabriella Ghermandi, Medhin Paolos, Fred Kudjo Kuwornu, Amir Issaa, Amara Lakhous, Pap Khouma, and Kaha Mohamed Aden, among others. They describe their multicultural identities, their senses of belonging, their feelings for the place that is depriving them of foundational rights (such as citizenship or a legal status), their nostalgia for their homeland or the countries where their parents were born, their fights to find or create a social and literal space where being recognized not as foreigners or worse as "clandestini." Their works offer an original, complex, and multilayered depiction of contemporary Italy and its social and cultural changes, where the African community is becoming larger and better represented. Some questions this course will ask include: what are the historical and geographical components of blackness in Italy? How, if at all, have these phenomena of migration changed Italian identity? How do black Italians live within the context of anti-blackness? How do these Italian writers and artists relate to African American histories and experiences of diaspora? How can African Italian literature contribute to a deeper understanding of the Black diaspora in Europe and elsewhere? The course will pursue answers to these questions by exploring issues of race, color, gender, class, nationality, identity, citizenship, social justice in post- colonial Italy while drawing on related disciplines such as Geography, Mediterranean Studies, Diaspora Studies, Post-Colonialism, and Media and Cultural Studies. Course taught in English. Course Material in English.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: COML 2084, ENGL 1296

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2512 Introduction to Italian Cinema

Topics vary. Please check the department's website for a current course description at: http://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: CIMS 2512, GSWS 2512

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2520 Contemporary Italy: Pop Culture, Politics, and Peninsular Identity

Is the land of good food, beautiful landscapes, and la bella vita really how it looks in the movies? Where do our ideas about Italy come from and how do they compare to the realities of its cultural production and its contemporary day-to-day life? This cultural survey course on contemporary Italy will investigate the similarities and divergences of these perceptions by researching current social, political, and media trends and putting them face to face with our preconceived notions. The course will cover major cultural trends from fashion and food trends, to eco-Italy, criminality and the Anthropocene, to immigration, to Black and LGBTQ Italia, to contemporary transfeminism, to Berlusconismo and Populism, to Netflix Italia and Social media culture. Through written assignments both in and outside the classroom, oral presentations, and multimedia projects we will critically reflect on these contemporary issues and gain a stronger understanding of the socio-cultural specificity of the Italian cultural landscape and its relationship to contemporary global socio-political trends and identities.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: COML 2520

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2522 Modern Italian Culture

Please check the website for a current course description at: http://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CIMS 2522, GSWS 2522

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2540 Titian and Venetian Painting

This lecture course examines the art and architecture of the Venetian Republic, with emphasis on the work of the renowned painter, Titian.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: ARTH 2540

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2541 Caravaggio

This lecture course explores the artistic culture of Baroque Rome, with focus on the life and career of Caravaggio.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: ARTH 2541, ENGL 2541

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2550 Michelangelo and the Art of the Italian Renaissance

An introduction to the work of the Renaissance artist Michelangelo (1475-1564)-his sculptures, paintings, architecture, poetry, and artistic theory-in relation to his patrons, predecessors, and contemporaries, above all Leonardo and Raphael. Topics include artistic creativity and license, religious devotion, the revival of antiquity, observation of nature, art as problem-solving, the public reception and function of artworks, debates about style, artistic rivalry, and traveling artists. Rather than taking the form of a survey, this course selects works as paradigmatic case studies, and will analyze contemporary attitudes toward art of this period through study of primary sources.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: ARTH 2500

Mutually Exclusive: ARTH 6500, ITAL 6500

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2600 Italian Theater

Please check the website for a current course description at: http://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CIMS 2600

1 Course Unit

ITAL 2950 Palermo: Urban Migration, the Built Environment, and Global Justice

This City Seminar sponsored by Penn’s Humanities+Urbanism+Design initiative explores Palermo, Italy, its migrant communities, built environment, and related questions of justice. In the first half of the semester, we will survey Palermo’s long history as one of the most “conquered” cities in the world, tracing different empires and peoples’ impacts on the city, its social life and built environment, to its recent history as a “sanctuary city” and center of diverse communities from Africa, Asia, and Europe. The class will travel to Palermo during the week of fall break, documenting the built environments of historic and contemporary immigrant neighborhoods, and meeting with leaders of city government, immigrant rights movements, and migrant community associations. Assisted by “cultural mediators” from various communities, students will produce case studies of different migrant communities, their civil society organizations, and the recent impacts they have had on the city and its built environment. Leaders of Palermo’s elected migrants’ city council, the Consulta delle Culture, will be our partners in this class and its engagement with migrant communities. During the second half of the semester, we will continue to explore contemporary topics related to migration, the built environment, and social justice in the city while students work to develop their case studies, which we will publish at the end of the semester on a web site that we build together.

Also Offered As: URBS 2950

1 Course Unit

ITAL 3300 Historical Eras and Topics: Earlier Periods

Classes under this number offer a more in-depth look at historical eras and topics or repertories associated with a specific period of music history. Classes will focus on one historical epoch (Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque). The purpose of this course is to give students the opportunity to engage deeply with musical objects, both historically and analytically, as well as to expose them to a range of methodologies with which to study music. Topics include: the Italian and English Renaissance madrigal; Baroque Opera 1600-1750.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: MUSC 3300

1 Course Unit

ITAL 3328 The Holocaust in Italian Literature and Film

Please check the website for a current course description at: http://www.sas.upenn.edu/italians/courses

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CIMS 3328

1 Course Unit

ITAL 3330 Dante's Divine Comedy

In this course we will read the Inferno, the Purgatorio and the Paradiso, focusing on a series of interrelated problems raised by the poem: authority, fiction, history, politics and language. Particular attention will be given to how the Commedia presents itself as Dante's autobiography, and to how the autobiographical narrative serves as a unifying thread for this supremely rich literary text. Supplementary readings will include Virgil's Aeneid and selections from Ovid's Metamorphoses. All readings and written work will be in English. Italian or Italian Studies credit will require reading Italian texts in their original language and writing about their themes in Italian. This course may be taken for graduate credit, but additional work and meetings with the instructor will be required.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: COML 3330, ENGL 0509

1 Course Unit

ITAL 3335 BFS--Med/Red Dante in English: Creative Responses to the Divine Comedy

Dante's Divine Comedy has long been acclaimed as the greatest poem ever written, in any language. It is certainly among the most inclusive, covering every conceivable realm of human experience-- past, present, and future. In his Vita nuova ('New Life'), Dante tells of his growing love for a woman who first induces in him paralysis of feeling, then later free-flowing poetic creativity-- but then, suddenly, she dies. The Commedia, as it is known in Italian, proposes that death may not be the end; that lovers may meet again, and that their love forms part of the greater energy of the universe. This journey towards understanding comes in stages, or steps. First, led by the great Roman poet Vergil, Dante travels downwards through a lightless realm (Inferno) where people remain fixed in a single, inflexible attitude: Hell for Dante is another word for inability to change. Next, Dante and Vergil emerge into the light and climb the mountain of Purgatory. With first-hand knowledge of the worst of human nature behind them, they travel hopefully upwards and finally recover the first site of simple human happiness: the Earthly Paradise. Here, through much effort and much help from artists and poets, human beings can change, leaving destructive impulses behind. Finally, freed from worldly anxieties, Dante travels further beyond time to experience ultimate truths with his first beloved, Beatrice: Paradiso. The first English poet to be seriously inspired by Dante was Geoffrey Chaucer (died 1400). Chaucer's encounter with Dante's text and Dante's disciples (he travelled to Italy twice) led first to artistic crisis and then to his revolutionizing of English poetry. Many poets and writers since have seen revolutionary potential (Irish Dante, black Dante), across Europe and beyond. Students in this class will sample a wide range of this creativity while formulating their own, unique research project (plus one shorter, tune-up essay). This can take the form of a traditionally-footnoted final long essay, or be given a more creative spin. We will read substantial sections of the Commedia, using parallel Italian-English texts, but never more than five cantos (about 600 lines) per class. No prior knowledge of Italian needed. We'll read more of Inferno than Paradiso, but not neglect Purgatorio or the Vita nuova. It's not crucial that we all employ the same edition, since the Commedia's text is designedly stable (tamperproof). There are many excellent recent translations to choose from (plus some duds and eccentricities). For a first pass through the poem I recommend the translation of Allan Mandelbaum, that I'll likely use myself, because i) he stages a real poet's struggle with the Italian; ii) his notes are helpful, but not overpowering; iii) very cheap (Bantam classics). Anglophone writers who have been inspired by Dante, and who we might read in class, include: Geoffrey Chaucer; John Milton; Percy Bysshe Shelley; John Keats; William Blake; Alfred Lord Tennyson; Dante Gabriel Rossetti and other pre-Rapahelites; Henry Wadsworth Longfellow; Fanny Appleton; H. Cordelia Ray; Ezra Pound; T.S. Eliot; James Joyce; Samuel Beckett; Seamus Heaney; Osip Mandelstam; Amiri Baraka; Derek Walcott; Eternal Kool Project; film and video makers (since 1907); Caroline Bergvall.

Also Offered As: COML 0502, ENGL 0502

1 Course Unit

ITAL 3400 Italian American Studies