Italy

The aim of this course is to help students review and learn advanced structures of Italian grammar and vocabulary and to explore contemporary aspects of Italian culture. The course is strongly focused on communication: students learn the language they need to interact with Italian speakers in real-life situations. Students can understand a wide range of complex, longer texts, and recognize implicit meaning. They can express ideas fluently and spontaneously without much obvious searching for words expressions. They use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic, and professional purposes, and they produce clear, well-structured, detailed texts on complex subjects, showing controlled use of organizational patterns, connectors, and cohesive devices. Readings, homework, and in- and out-of-class activities are designed to help students expand their knowledge of Italian language and grammar. At this level, students are considered proficient users who can handle a wide range of elaborate ideas, and communicate fluently and spontaneously on personal, work-related and academic topics. They can demonstrate an understanding of the diversity of Italian culture within the broader framework of global perspectives in a multicultural world. 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 discusses the biological bases of principal cognitive processes, emotions, and human behavior. The course discusses topics including an introduction of psychobiology; psychopharmacology; genetics and evolution of the brain; movement; emotions, reward, and stress; and psychological disorders. The course recommends students have completed courses in general psychology and psychophysiology as prerequisites.

This is a graduate level course that 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 is designed to explore the frontiers of interaction between politics and markets. It addresses the factors underlying cross national variation in economic performance and income inequality by investigating the ways in which the international economy affects state autonomy, the welfare state and the politics of income redistribution. The course is structured around two key questions: to what extent do differences in institutional settings shape fundamentally different models of democratic capitalism; what is the role of institutions, firms and labor unions in determining the different arrangements in capitalist countries. This course examines cross-national evolution and variation in welfare states in industrialized countries and especially in Europe. Topics covered include: a comparison of the political economy of welfare states; differences in welfare state models; the extent to which differences in institutional settings, coalition politics, and economics shape fundamentally different models of welfare states. The methodology is comparative with a focus on theoretical models.

Family firms - firms that are owned, managed and controlled by a family, or a limited number of individuals – represent the vast majority of all firms, and major contributors to a country’s employment, GDP, wealth, and business knowledge. This course aims at developing students’ skills in analyzing the specific features of family firms, assessing their key problems and opportunities, and creatively proposing strategic and organizational solutions. The course is targeted to the next generation of controlling-family members, to students who may be willing to start their career in a family or private firm, and to those who plan to consult or provide professional services to family-controlled companies. Understanding the unique features of these firms is essential to develop a successful leadership career in such organizational settings or, more broadly, to understand the strategic logic of family-controlled competitors, suppliers, and customers. Participants are challenged to improve their personal skills in the areas of communication, conflict resolution, diagnostic assessment, solutions finding, and writing academic papers or case-based materials. This highly interactive course includes active simulations, role plays, videos, guest speakers, and real-case discussion. 

The course presents the major areas of Clinical Psychology. The course explores the main theoretical perspectives in Clinical Psychology including how to define the field of Clinical Psychology, and being able to identify the differences from neighboring disciplines; evaluating how the concept of mental disorder changed over the course of time; and the main theoretical perspectives in Clinical Psychology, and being able to identify the fundamental features that differentiate perspectives from one another. The course discusses multidimensional assessment including the main instruments and procedures used in clinical assessment, and the reasons for their use; and the reasons for, and the importance of, integrating different dimensions/indices during assessment. The course reviews research methods in clinical psychology including the main research methods used in Clinical Psychology, and their contexts of use; interpreting the results of correlational and experimental research, and of single-subject designs; and the basic characteristics and the usefulness of meta-analytic procedures in Clinical Psychology. Lastly, the course discusses psychopathology including identifying the clinical features of some main mental disorders, and evaluating the etiopathogenetic models of the mental disorders described during the course.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by permission of the instructor. There are two versions of this course; this course, UCEAP Course Number 180A and Bologna course number 81779, is associated with the LM in Language, Society, and Communication degree program. The other version, UCEAP Course Number 180B and Bologna course number 75074, is associated with the LM in Sociology and Social Work degree program.
By the end of this course, students are able to distinguish and analyze the different notions of globalization, and how information technologies affect everyday life, markets, and the process of consumption. In particular, the student is able to: develop an understanding of globalization through a sociological lens; understand the culture of the Internet and the relationship between globalization and web society; analyze the impact on individual behaviors and society at large within Social Networks & Online Communities through the mainstreaming of private information posted to the public sphere; frame the emergence of a new rhetoric of democratization and participation in the web society; understand the changing relationship between producers, consumers, and prosumers in the web society; recognize consequences and effects of the Digital Divide nationally and worldwide.

This course is organized around four interconnected thematic modules that explore the tensions, contradictions, and transformative potential of the digital age within a globalized context. Rather than merely offering a chronological or technical overview, the course engages students in a critical reflection on how digital technologies are reshaping contemporary society—bringing new opportunities for participation and innovation, but also exacerbating inequalities, eroding privacy, and consolidating new forms of control.

Module 1 – Globalization: Histories, Theories, and Social Transformations

Module 2 – Digital Society and Media: Platformization and the Reconfiguration of Social Life

Module 3 – Production, Consumption, and Prosumption in the Digital Economy

Module 4 – Digital Divides and Global Inequalities

This course examines the literary history of the period at stake, and discusses literary tools to analyze fictional productions and question them in relation to the complex and heterogeneous North American realities. The course topic varies each year, review the course information in the University of Bologna course catalog for the topic for a specific term.

This course is part of the LM degree and is intended for advanced level students. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. The course consists of lectures and visits and is divided into two parts. Part one provides an overview of the history of art, mainly Italian, from the end of the fifteenth century (High Renaissance) to the beginning of the nineteenth century. It focuses on artists, movements, and main topics, particularly seen from the point of view of the revival of antiquity; and at the same time provides the tools for understanding and analyzing the works of art, studying them within their cultural, social, and political context, and in their style, iconography, and technique. Part two deals with the spiritual “infrastructure” and visual network created in the fifteenth to sixteenth centuries in Italy by the Benedictine Cassinese Congregation (1419 – 1570 ca).

The course deals with the wide theme of the skills necessary to form citizens who are able to face the challenges of contemporary life and to meet and interpret forms of citizenship that are much broader than national or European ones, including global ones: a citizenship, therefore, aware and active, oriented to the values of civil coexistence and the common good, to the relationship with the environment according to sustainable approaches. In this perspective, active citizenship education is linked to the concepts of empowerment, the recognition of one's own and others’ identity, autonomy, cooperation, the values of social solidarity and respect for the other, overcoming the discrimination of gender, to the possibilities of change. In particular, the course presents some fundamental concepts of citizenship education and active participation (identity, community, belonging, stereotypes/prejudges, etc.) and, starting from these, the course focuses on the role of the student and her/his active participation in civil society, school, and university contexts as a "training gym" to exercise her/his citizenship rights and duties.