Italy

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.

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. Students develop the critical and historical tools to appreciate the link between art and social engagement, particularly but not exclusively, in relation to the politics of representation and around the role of contemporary art practices in activating processes of gathering, assembling, and communing. The course matures the skills to analyze and contextualize the main artistic currents within visual and conceptual art, both within the western context and regarding wider decolonial processes. Students are also able to critically assess artistic practices, carry out independent research, and activate their knowledge in the urban context, in critical dialogue with existing cultural and social institutions.

The course is dedicated to the comparison with current themes of the history of women, such as: participation in political and social life, inclusion and exclusion, the role of women in the family, education, and violence against women. Group work and group readings are planned in class to debate different viewpoints. The course investigates the history of women as a fundamental aspect of Ancient History, with special reference to the roman period, with the awareness of the specificities of the female condition in each period and of the transformations carried out over the period under consideration. Issues connected with ancient source analysis do not require knowledge of Greek and Latin, since a translation in Italian is always be provided. A basic knowledge of classical languages is however recommended. The course discusses topics including: gender history and some of the main aspects relevant for classical studies: work, culture, religion, and marriage; the condition of women from the Roman Republic to the Early Imperial period; the legal status of women; women's wealth; the (public?) space of women in roman imperial courts; stereotypes in womens’ stories: the need to identify interpretative categories, structures, and models through the analysis of historical and historiographical sources; inclusion and exclusion: women and work, case study: work at home, work outside; and case studies: women, body and sex, and abortion and the violence on women (from Lucrezia to Metoo).

This course illustrates marketing sustainability models and contributions, describes new relationships that marketing needs to support emerging sustainable business models, and depicts and discusses fundamental variables of the marketing process that allow students to define an operating green marketing strategy. The present scenario shows the advent of a new paradigm at a global level, encompassing customers, markets and companies and based on the concept of “Green Economy.” As a consequence, all managers are faced with new challenges: to fully understand the new paradigm’s rules on the one hand, to infer which might be the new paradigm’s impact in terms of managerial implications and market strategy, on the other hand. The green marketing course’s specific goals are to: single out the most relevant green economy theories and practices, having a deep impact on customer choices and companies’ marketing strategies, such as, for instance, the Cradle-to Cradle approach; develop knowledge as to green products and services’ “go to market,” in particular by identifying which are the key value-drivers generating “green demand;” analyze the green marketing’s key drives for growth and key drives for value; review “Marketing Fundamentals” ( STP, 4Ps, etc.) under the new “green perspective,” in order to make participants able to define a Green STP and a Green 4Ps; single out and analyze the most important, innovative Green Business Models along with their peculiar Marketing-mix; investigate green marketing strategies in selected contexts (B2B,B2C,B2G) and industries (e.g. automotive, retail and e-commerce, building, city planning, food and beverages, "controversial industries"...); and explain how to build up a resilient and successful eco-system, able to deliver a relevant added value to green stakeholders. It is recommended to have attended a course on basic marketing. The knowledge of the pillars of marketing as a discipline is expected.

This course provides a general and base knowledge of modern industrial organization based on strategic interaction among firms and consumers. The course examines the functioning of the markets by analyzing the behavior of non-competitive firms, also with the tools of modern game theory. Industrial policies and regulation are discussed together with the principles of competition policy. The course discusses topics including introduction and microeconomics background; game theory and oligopoly; market structure; non-price strategies; and competition policy and regulation.