ITT 3430 Masterpieces of Italian Literature in Translation – Dr. Raymond Fleming

This course offers a discussion and analysis of English translations of novels, short stories, and plays by a variety of Italian authors from the past to the present.

ITT 3501 Modern Italian Culture: From the Unification to the Present – Dr. Mark Pietralunga



This course will examine the cultural developments and socio-political changes in modern Italy: from the Risorgimento to the formation of a nation and the question of national identity; Fascism’s influence on the national culture; the importance of the “language question” in Italian culture and society; World War II; the Italian miracle of the post-war period; the North/South divide; the Mafia; American influence on Italy; Catholicism and the role of the Church; the “Made in Italy” label in fashion and design; and the social phenomenon of immigration into Italy of people coming from Eastern Europe, Africa, and Asia.

ITW 3101 Survey of Italian Literature: From Romanticism to the Present – Dr. Mark Pietralunga

This course is intended to provide a chronological survey of Italian literature from the nineteenth century to the present. The course will explore the development of modern and contemporary Italy through the study of narrative, poetry, theatre, and cinema. Particular emphasis will be given to the literary and artistic life of the twentieth century. Lectures and class discussion will consider the works within a cultural, social, and historical context.

ITA 3440 Business Italian - Dr. William Leparulo

The objective of ITA 3440 is to help prepare students to work and successfully do business in Italy and other Italian-speaking parts of Europe (Switzerland, the Republic of San Marino, Malta). Students have the opportunity to experience and examine a business culture that greatly influences international and EU business practices. In fact, Italy's impact on economics, business and politics extends worldwide beyond the European community. The Italian instruction in this course emphasizes realistic current contemporary communication and intercultural interaction in four language skill areas: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. ITA 3440 covers finance, marketing, operations management and other relevant topics. Students of this course are encouraged to explore opportunities for an internship in Italy or elsewhere in Europe through the University of South Carolina's International MBA program in Milan and Rome, Italy.

ITT 3523 Italian Cinema – Dr. William Leparulo

Concentrating on films after 1945, this course focuses on works of literature and film, analyzing historical changes of perspective. We examine films representative of major periods: Middle Ages, Renaissance (Decameron), World War II (Seven Beauties, Life is Beautiful), post WWII and Italy today (Johnny Stecchino, Amarcord, The Best of Youth). 
 
We read a number of short stories from Boccaccio's Decameron, and compare them with Pier Paolo Pasolini's film version as well as with a presentation of figurative art masterpieces. We then critique Lina Wertmuller’s Ciao professore, a clever film version of Marcello D’Orta’s Io, speriamo che me la cavo. Continuing with Wertmuller, we study Swept Away and Seven Beauties, with the specific purpose of comparing and contrasting them with Roberto Benigni's Johnny Stecchino and Life is Beautiful. Here we examine the films of these two talented cinematic artists and their evolution from comedy to tragedy, from the amusing presentation of "La commedia all'Italiana" to the tragic events of the Holocaust. Our survey of Italian history continues with Fellini's Amarcord, followed by a cluster of contemporary films that illustrate how Italy has evolved over the last decade. We witness the present-day Italian struggle against the recent influx of immigrants in Marco Tullio Giordana's Since you were born you can no longer hide. And finally we conclude our film series with Giordana's The Best of Youth, a very popular Italian saga of two brothers in their divergent paths, intersecting some of the most tumultuous events in recent Italian history.

ITW 4400/5415 – Renaissance Literature - Dr. Massimo Castellozzi

This course will study 14th and 15th century Italian literature of the Renaissance along with the developments of major issues of cultural, artistic and literary history of this period. The course is based on a selection of readings from important and significant works in a chronological perspective. We’ll start with the analysis of the poetry of Petrarch, who inaugurated the great tradition of European and Italian lyrical poetry and will conclude with an analysis of Torquato Tasso’s epic, which is traditionally «the fall of the Renaissance». Tasso expresses in his restless style a new taste close to that of the Baroque period. As part of the study of petrarchismo the significant role of women as ‘literate’ and the center of a complex cultural universe will be discussed. The course will then examine at least three general aspects. First, the multiplicity of literary genres that populate the literary scene of the Renaissance: the lyric poetry, epic poetry, drama (tragedy and pastoral fable), treatises (political, historical and cortese) and the central question of language with reference to Pietro Bembo and his fundamental theoretical treatise in the Prose della volgar lingua. Secondly, the course will try to highlight the different literary and linguistic levels in the literature of the Italian Renaissance, confronting various texts that are so-called “high” (Petrarca, Poliziano, Della Casa, Tasso) and those of the authors belonging to a “low” or “comic-realistic” (Pulci, Folengo, Aretino). Finally, we will try to understand the variety of Italian culture through an examination of the many political and cultural centers of Italy (Florence, Ferrara, Venice, Rome, Naples) and the precious variety of regional languages which, in the Renaissance, will be subject to a process of screening and selection in order to establish the canon of literature and language that essentially still remains today

ITW 4440 / 5445 - 18th and 19th Century Italian Literature: Fashioning the Italian Woman, Fashioning a Nation – Dr. Irene Zanini-Cordi

The eighteenth-century novelist and playwright Pietro Chiari defined his period “The century of Women” (Messbarger) to indicate the relevance of women in the public sphere, be it in physical presence or as topic of discussion. Illuminist culture debates the advantages and disadvantages of women’s education and tries to define their role while the booming of the print culture creates a space for female readership and grants them a voice. Female identity develops parallel and connected to the ideas and efforts that will materialize in the 19th century in the Italian Risorgimento. In the semi-public space of the salotto Italian women find fertile ground to foster their education, shape their identity and contribute in unique ways to the nation-building effort. From a literary perspective, this course aims at introducing students to both major and lesser known texts that portray the historical, cultural and social atmosphere of the period. From the point of view of material culture it considers the contribution of painting, architecture and fashion to issues of “woman” and “nation”. Finally, through the careful analysis of the salotto institution and its practices, students will draw the connections between the “construction” of female identity and of national identity. This course will develop around three major themes: 1) the 18th century debate over the education of women; 2) the political and ideological process of Italian nation-building (Cuoco, Mazzini, Pellico); 3) the literary and political role of 5 major Italian “salotti di cultura” of the 18th and 19th century and the ladies that animated them. (Elisabetta Caminer Turra, Eleonora Fonseca Pimentel, Isabella Teotochi Albrizzi, Cristina di Belgiojoso and Clara Maffei).

ITW4480/ 5485 – 20th Century Italian Literature – Dr. Silvia Valisa