Romance Languages (ROML)

ROML 0100 Beginning Haitian Creole

This course serves as an introduction to communicating in the Haitian Creole language ("kreyol," for short), which we will use to explore the complex narrative of Haiti and its people. The class is designed for students with no prior knowledge of Haitian Creole and draws on a variety of methods and media utilizing the Penn Language Center's innovative online learning platform. Using these tools, students will develop their abilities in oral and written communication throughout the semester, establishing a firm foundation for further study of the language. Students with research, professional, or personal interests in Haiti or the Haitian Diaspora are encouraged to enroll. Haitian Creole is spoken by over 12 million people around the world (including many in cities across the Eastern seaboard) and serves as a wholly developed language with a complete orthography capable of fulfilling the full range of expressive and communicative needs of its speakers. It is also a language with a relatively recent history, dating back to the French colonization of Haiti (then called "Saint-Domingue") in 1697, and has thus been shaped by the same cultural and social forces that define Haiti's situation today. Students should, therefore, expect our immersive study of Haitian Creole to extend to historical examination of the economic, political, sociological, and spiritual spheres within which the language was borne. This course is intended for students with no past exposure to Haitian Creole. While prior experience with French, the language from which Haitian Creole derives most of its lexicon, may be advantageous, it is neither assumed nor preferred.

Not Offered Every Year

1 Course Unit

ROML 6010 Language Teaching and Learning

Please check the department's website for the course description. https://www.sas.upenn.edu/french/pc

Fall or Spring

Also Offered As: FREN 6010

1 Course Unit

ROML 6160 Approaches to Literary Texts

Most seminars focus on literary texts composed during a single historical period; this course is unusual in inviting students to consider the challenges of approaching texts from a range of different historical eras. Taught by a team of literary specialists representing diverse periods and linguistic traditions and conducted as a hands-on workshop, this seminar is designed to help students of literature and related disciplines gain expertise in analysis and interpretation of literary works across the boundaries of time, geography, and language, from classic to modern. Students will approach literature as a historical discipline and learn about key methodological issues and questions that specialists in each period and field ask about texts that their disciplines study. The diachronic and cross-cultural perspectives inform discussions of language and style, text types and genres, notions of alterity, fictionality, literariness, symbolism, intertextuality, materiality, and interfaces with other disciplines. This is a unique opportunity to learn in one course about diverse literary approaches from specialists in different fields.

Not Offered Every Year

Also Offered As: CLST 7601, COML 6160, EALC 8290, ENGL 6160, REES 6450

1 Course Unit