Italy

The course offers a study of contemporary theories and best practices of gender mainstreaming in education; cultural facets of socialization to gender roles and how they interact with the organization of school and with hidden curriculum, also in an intersectional perspective; and comparing projects and actions in gender mainstreaming in education, both inside and outside the classroom. The course examines topics including: sociological perspectives on sex, gender, and sexual orientation; major theories and empirical research on socialization to gender roles; fender mainstreaming in education; anti-gender campaigns across European countries; and best teaching practices on gender mainstreaming in education in an intersectional perspective.

This course requires permission from the UCEAP Faculty Director to enroll. The course addresses four main topics (climate change and health, urbanization and health, water and health, and food and health) strictly linked to UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030 and related to distal and proximal determinants of health. The course provides the basis of systemic thinking for the improvement of surveillance programs, timely response to emergencies, and economic savings by applying the One Health (OH) approach. The course demonstrates the need for an integrated and cross-sectoral approach toward the achievement of the Agenda 2030 SDGs and provides basic knowledge on the main issues related to health at the human/animal/environment interfaces. The course asserts that health is a precondition, an outcome and an indicator of sustainable development.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. This course aims to study classic topics in Public Economics and Policy, including taxation, education, and policy instruments but accounting for the shortcomings of the standard neoclassical model and supplementing the neoclassical treatment of these topics with insights from behavioral economics. The course begins each topic of the course with an introduction to the neoclassical treatment of the topic. The course then explores the implications of the neoclassical model and asks what identifies potential limitations of the assumptions of the standard model. The course then identifies a current public policy related to the topic and discusses how to analyze its effectiveness. The course covers both theoretical foundations in behavioral public economics and the design and testing of public policies. The course also highlights the link between theory and practice. The course achieves this with one or two guest lectures from individuals who span this divide between academia and real-world policy design. The course discusses topics include: introduction to behavioral public economics; theory of welfare; theory of policy interventions: taxation and nudges; health issues and policies; environmental issues and policies; savings and retirement; education and labor market (e.g., minimum wage policies, discrimination); and experimental design, RCTs, and policy evaluation. A solid foundation in microeconomics and applied mircoeconometrics is a prerequisite for attending the course.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. The course starts with introductions into the concept of monumentality and memory in archaeology. The topics are addressed and discussed into detail mainly using examples from Pharaonic Egypt (3000 B.C.E – 300 B.C.E.), a culture which is due to its long duration and the long-lasting traditions on the one hand, and the presence of a large monumental record, especially well suited as a case study. While the major focus is laid upon the emic perspective, presenting and interpreting processes within the Egyptian culture, the course also includes the etic perspective from antiquity until today. The course shows how ancient monumentality and the cultural memory are still being used and how they affected and still affect archaeology. Topics covered include: monumentality – What does it mean and why does it matter; an introduction to the concept of memory within archaeology; monuments of Pharaonic Egypt; what makes a monument a monument in Pharaonic Egypt, the concept of the monumental discourse; cities and residences as expressions of monumentality; the heydays of monumentalism: the pyramids of the Old Kingdom and the time of Ramesses II; Damnatio Memoriae: the Amarna Period and its reception; the structure of the Ancient Egyptian history: how monumental records shaped the later idea of Ancient Egypt; reuse and usurpation; Archaism in Ancient Egypt; monumentality and memory in the Mayan Culture; the construction of memory and identities in the European prehistory: monuments and megalithism; the memory and monuments of Ancient Egypt from Roman times until the decipherment of the hieroglyphs in 1822: what remained without the knowledge of the Ancient Egyptian language; and the memory and monuments of Ancient Egypt today.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. This course examines the origin and the evolution of these differences in health over the life cycle. The course studies how to measure these differences from conception to old age; and how these differences have been connected to the individual, family, neighborhood, national, and global phenomenon’s. The course analyzes different policies and interventions that have tried to alleviate these differences; and sees how these differences contribute to the rising inequality in the last century. The course discusses topics including: measurement of inequality (statistics); mortality, fertility, and birth outcomes; (demographics); health behaviors (economics); mental health (psych); the early origin hypothesis (epidemiology); and social genomics (behavioral genetics).

This is a beginning, pre-intermediate, second semester Italian Language course offered by the University Language Center (CLA) for University of Bologna exchange students. The course is at the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) A2 level. Enrolment in this course is based on an entrance exam. The course meets biweekly for the semester. Students who pass the A2 level final exam can understand and use familiar everyday expressions and very basic phrases aimed at the satisfaction of needs of a concrete type. They can introduce him/herself and others and can ask and answer questions about personal details such as where he/she lives, people he/she knows, and things he/she has. They can interact in a simple way provided the other person talks slowly and clearly and is prepared to help. This course is available to UCEAP students in the spring semester only. The course is graded pass/no pass only.

This course trains students to use their experience abroad to reflect critically on the kind of city they would like to live in in the near future and what actions they would take to shape their ideal urban environment. To this purpose, the focus of the course is the nexus between cities, innovation, and sustainability, and the idea of smart city conceptualized and developed in the European Union as the main model for the city of the future. The concept of the smart city is approached by the six different angles and corresponding indicators commonly used to identify it: smart governance, smart economy, smart environment, smart mobility, smart living, and smart people. These six thematic areas are central to the course program, which comprehends three parts. The first part of the course sets the context by introducing concepts, tools, and policies of sustainable development and innovation in Europe and their strategic role in the development of cities and urban areas according to the indications from the United Nations 2030 Agenda. It also touches upon the historical evolution of cities as main hubs for socio-economic development. Secondly, the course concentrates on the study of the six different areas and indicators for the smart city in a European-United States comparative lens to give students different perspectives and tools to analyze an urban system and propose ideas for future developments. In the final part of the course, Florence and other case studies from Tuscany, Italy, and Europe serve as models of practical application of the previous theoretical considerations. European cities offer stimulating points of view concerning sustainability and innovative solutions. Florence in particular constitutes the main case study of the course, as the first smart city in Italy according to the ICity Rank 2022 and one of the nine Italian cities part of a European project for the development of Smart Cities. The course critically analyzes the approach towards the actual state of cities in Tuscany and their evolution towards the proposed model of a future city that the Tuscan region and its urban centers, Florence in particular, are undertaking. Key thematic issues and sustainability challenges are explored in the context of Tuscan urban environments, including mobility (electric mobility, shared mobility, AI systems), industrial development and clusters (green logistics, green buildings), innovative ecosystems (local ecosystems of innovation, startups incubators, and accelerators), and resource management (waste management, urban mining). The course includes outdoor activities (visit to local firms developing smart solutions; talking to local policy makers, public officials, or representatives of workers’ and firms’ organizations) and guest speakers that offer unique opportunities to engage with the local environment.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. This course examines the development and distribution of the diversity of life on Earth, with a special emphasis on plants. The course explores the spatial scaling of biodiversity, the role of biogeography, and the different levels of assembly organization, from the local to the global scales. Students shall become acquainted with methods for the measurement of biodiversity and its partitioning across scales, as well as the role of biodiversity for ecosystem functioning and stability and relations between biodiversity and climate. The course studies the use of biogeographical and macroecological theories and methods to understand the present strategies for biodiversity conservation. Students gain the capacity to investigate natural systems by means of data collection and analyses and preparation of a written report. The course discusses topics including: an introduction and historical overview; patterns of species distribution and range size; historical biogeography; ecological biogeography; spatial patterns of biodiversity in relation to latitude, climate, and area; relation between energy, productivity, and biodiversity; taxonomic and functional measures of biodiversity; data sources in biogeography and macroecology; partitioning of biodiversity in space and time; island biogeography; and human impacts on biomes and ecosystems; conservation biogeography.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. This course provides a general understanding of the use of archaeological methods and data in the context of the study of the Roman economy and critically assesses relevant archaeological evidence. The underlying questions in this module are: what was the nature of the Roman economy? What has archaeology contributed to our picture of the Roman economy? The module is organized thematically and largely focuses on the Roman imperial era, with comparisons to earlier and/or later periods as appropriate. Topics covered include transmarine trade, different types of production activities, and technological innovation. The course discusses topics including agricultural processing facilities; evidence for the production and trade in wine and olive oil; the exploration of marine resources; the use of water power in production processes; and technological innovation.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. This course offers a study of the history and development of mass communication. The main topics are the development and growth of media from the past to the present; the role of media under various political systems and the influence of communication on national building; and the relationship between media and politics within different historical environments, in order to understand the importance of media to mass communication both past and present. Particular attention is given to several case studies to explain the role of media in the states propaganda.