Italy

This course focuses on organization theories, with the aim of strengthening the analytical skills of the participants and enabling them to assess peoples' behavior in work environments, organizations’ forms and structures and the root causes of their performance. This is a highly useful skill to cultivate for a wide variety of managerial roles and positions (marketing, operations, HR, finance & accounting, etc.). It is indispensable for working in a start-up or in a family business, for managing a company, consulting, auditing, and even investment banking. This course includes a Group Field Project (GFP) with the aim of giving the opportunity to apply theory to reality and, in particular, to real organizations. Each group will find an interesting company or other type of organization and analyze it from an organizational frame, using the concepts and the models that are presented during the course. 

This course provides students with a sound basis for communicating effectively and accurately in oral and written Italian. Authentic materials (songs, videos, advertisements, and film clips) are used in a communicative-based approach, and emphasis is placed on the four skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Students participate in several sessions of language exchange with Italian university students, and field trips take them outside the classroom to engage with the city and Romans to reinforce the grammatical skills learned in class. The course is conducted entirely in Italian.

The course examines pre-Columbian art history in one or more areas of the American continent. The course explores the potential and limits of applying the “art” category to pre-colonial indigenous productions. The course includes an overview of fundamental elements of the current debate on the anthropology of art. The course analyzes the artistic productions of Mesoamerican pre-colonial indigenous peoples to explore their multiple aesthetic, religious, and political functions. The course discusses how such products were perceived, collected, and exhibited in museums in modern times, focusing attention on the objects’ materiality and agency, here perceived as their ability to continuously arouse new questions and discourses. The course examines topics including art and anthropology; artistic practices in ancient Mesoamerica (Olmecs, Maya, Teotihuacan, Aztecs); Indigenous American artefacts in early modern European collections; birth and transformation of the Ethnographic museum, with specific focus on the musealization of Haida artifacts; and contemporary indigenous art and politics of display.

This course provides students with a sound basis for communicating effectively and accurately in oral and written Italian. Students practice recognizing and using more complex Italian grammatical and syntactic structures such as the present and past conditional and present subjunctive verbs. Authentic materials (songs, videos, advertisements, and film clips) are used in a communicative-based approach, and emphasis is placed on the four skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Students participate in several sessions of language exchange with Italian university students, and field trips take them outside the classroom to engage with the city and Romans to reinforce the grammatical skills learned in class. The course is conducted entirely in Italian.

The millennium following the collapse of the Roman Empire saw the development in Europe of a radically new form of civilization now called "medieval." With its nuns and monks, knights and nobles, troubadours and artists, plagues and famines, crusades and cathedrals, and cities and castles, the Middle Ages left an indelible mark on the western world. Rome, the city of the Popes, played a key role in medieval western civilization and was the center of a long-lasting tradition of pilgrimage to the apostles' and martyrs' relics preserved in its many churches. This course is intended as a broad survey of medieval culture and history with a specific emphasis on Rome. The course takes advantage of the city's abundance of medieval monuments and works of art: mosaics and paintings, sculptures, and religious architecture, which are analyzed in comparison to the artistic production of the rest of Europe, the Byzantine East, and other cultural contexts such as the Islamic world. The reading of relevant historical and literary texts completes the course.

This course is intended to develop the linguistic skills of students who have completed the first year of Italian. It reviews basic grammar structures with emphasis on exceptions; it enriches vocabulary, reading comprehension, and argumentative skills on different kinds of texts, improving comprehension and conversation through the discussion of contemporary issues proposed by the instructor. Students approach longer and more complex argumentative texts of which they are asked to identify the main points. They comment on articles or reports on contemporary issues in which authors express points of view and opinions. In oral tests and group discussions, students are asked to take a critical stance on given texts, debating pros and cons of different points of view. They also research various aspects of Italian daily life, interviewing Italian people and reporting back to the class. They can understand discussions on concrete and abstract topics and follow conversations between native speakers. All four abilities (writing, speaking, listening, reading) are developed, also with the support of authentic audiovisual materials such as Italian movies, short videos, tv programs, and songs. The course uses a communication-based approach: students engage in daily role-plays, group activities, games, and class discussions. Out of class activities are designed to take advantage of the opportunities for interaction and language practice, as well as immersion in Italian culture, that the city provides.

This course is designed for students interested in an in-depth exploration of the artistic production of Italy from the 14th to the 16th centuries, with a special focus on Florence and its social, political, and devotional context. Starting with the Gothic, the course follows the development of different forms of art – painting, sculptures and architecture – up to the middle of the 16th century, thus covering the period known as the Renaissance. The course analyzes how the recovery and study of ancient sources and the work of contemporary humanists inspired and stimulated painters, sculptors, and architects. For the analysis of the Early Renaissance and its continuity with and renovation of Medieval art, special emphasis is placed on such figures as Giotto, Ghiberti, Donatello, Brunelleschi, Masaccio, and Fra Angelico. Moving on to the High Renaissance in the second part of the course, the works of Botticelli, Leonardo, Michelangelo, the young Raphael, and Giorgio Vasari are considered in the light of the Medici family political rule and artistic patronage. Through lectures, class discussions, and frequent site visits, the course aims at training students to study works of art in their original context, to recognize iconographic features and subjects, and distinguish the different styles and techniques used by the artists.

This is a special studies course that involves an internship with a corporate, public, government or private organization, arranged with the Study Center Director or Liaison Officer. The special study projects generally involve teaching a mini-course on American culture (literature, music, art, or history) and/or English as a second language in a local school or private organization under the supervision of an experienced teacher. Internships vary each term and are described on a special study project form for each student. A substantial paper or series of reports is required along with actual lesson plans. Units vary depending on the contact hours and method of assessment. The total units for the academic year cannot exceed 12.0. Pass/no pass only.

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 provides critical and cultural awareness in contemporary Italian literature and civilization. Literary texts are analyzed as open shapes, focusing on the relationships between tradition and cultural legacies. The course discusses a corpus of selected prose works through comparative analysis and practice on different methods of interpretation. The topic of the spring term of the 2018-2019 academic year is: Italian Noir. The course aims to present contemporary noir representations, such as transmedia narrative examples that incorporate entertainment experiences on multiple multimedia platforms. Noir has been compared to the Italian realist novel, for its search for the representation of the reality and its ability to describe the dark aspects of a social community. The course highlights the features that allow the “noir all'italiana” genre. The analysis of the production shows how the traditional genre is resumed or reconfigured in texts confronted with a cultural production increasingly dominated by visual culture. In different ways the case studies reflect on how other media, and the relationships with them, give rise to an inquiry into the Italian society that portrays literature as civil engagement. Required readings: ROMANZO CRIMINALE by De Cataldo, LA FEROCIA by Nicola Lagioia, IL SOGNO DI VOLARE by Carlo Lucarelli, CATTIVI SOFFETTI by Daniele Brolli, CINACITTÀ by Tommaso Pincio, NARRARE AL TEMPO DELLA GLOBALIZZAZIONE by Roberto Rossi, and CRIMINI E MISFATTI LA NARRATIVA NOIR ITALIAN DEGIL ANNI DUEMILA by E. Mondello. The course is based on traditional lectures with student participation in discussions. Students are invited to present specific materials of some of the texts and authors. The course also includes the use of audiovisual materials, and a guest lecture series on specific topics related to course topics. Assessment is based on a final oral exam whose aim is an evaluation of the student's critical and methodological ability. Students are invited to discuss the texts on the course and must demonstrate an appropriate knowledge of the bibliography in the syllabus.

This course explores human rights as embedded in specific historical circumstances, and looks at their codification in international law as the product of heated political debates. The first part of the course examines the topic from a historical perspective. Students trace the genealogy of the concept paying particular attention to its continuity or discontinuity with respect to the notion of natural law, and focus on the birth of the “human rights regime.” The second part of the course involves the examination of specific case studies. In the third and final part of the course students look at critical readings of human rights as possibly an instrument for “Western hegemony,” or as inadequate in other ways.