Italian Major
Italian Majors at Georgetown are required to complete 10 to 12 courses taught in the Italian language, depending on the results of the student's placement exam (12 if they begin at the Intensive Basic Level and 10 if they begin at the Intensive Advanced Level). Italian Majors are also required to spend a semester or an academic year in Italy studying at an Italian University.
They can pursue a second major (or a minor) in other departments of the College to help prepare them for successful careers in their chosen profession.
Student Learning Goals for the Major
Students who complete a major in Italian reach a level of proficiency corresponding to the profile defined in the ACTFL guidelines as Advanced High for speaking and writing and Advanced High/Superior for reading and listening.
They are expected:
- to be able to communicate fluently with native speakers and use the language in both everyday and formal situations on a wide variety of topics going from personal to abstract;
- to understand not only the main ideas but also deeper meanings expressed in a variety of textual genres and the pragmatic elements that characterize communication in those genres;
- to acquire a good grasp of sociolinguistic differences in Italy (for example to be able to clearly distinguish different registers, regional accents, and typical gestures);
- to choose the language register appropriate to different genres and forms of interaction;
- to understand the role of form (its politics and ideology) in each individual text and its evolution;
- to understand the relationship between a) the individual text and the genre it belongs to and/or transgresses; b) the individual texts and its broader context;
- to incorporate literary and critical theories in written assignments;
- to explore connections and understand the Italian literary and cultural tradition from past to present;
- to show familiarity with different theoretical approaches to literature and culture.
Required Courses:
12 General Education courses
4 Second Language courses (intensive track recommended) except if a student pursues a double major, pre-medical studies, or business coursework.
10 to 12 Courses in the Major + 1 Gateway course in English taken second semester of the first year. This course satisfies one of the two Literature and Writing requirements of the College.
I. The Gateway Course:
ITAL-042 Gateway to the Major (taught in English)
II. Italian Language Courses:
ITAL-011 Intensive Basic Italian
ITAL-032 Intensive Intermediate Italian
ITAL-111 Intensive Advanced Italian I
ITAL-112 Intensive Advanced Italian II
ITAL-231 Contemporary Italy (before overseas study) or another 200 or 300-level course
ITAL-233 Writing: Literature/Culture
ITAL-239 "Sono solo canzonette"? Love and Politics in Italian Songs
III. Italian Literature and Culture Courses
Students must take one course from each of the following groups:
a) From the Origins to the Renaissance
ITAL-311. Italian Art, Literature and History 1200-1500
ITAL-368. Politics, Society & Culture in Renaissance Italy
ITAL-374. Theater, Politics and Art in the Italian Renaissance
ITAL-379. Poetry of Courtly Love in Italy
ITAL-383. Love, Religion, and War
ITAL-391. History of the Italian Language
ITAL-412. Boccaccio
b) From Baroque to the Age of Realism
ITAL-358. Literature of United Italy
ITAL-370. Modern Italian Theater
ITAL-382. The Fantastic in Nineteenth & Twentieth-Century Italian Literature
ITAL-384. Theater and Opera
ITAL-385. Madness in Italian Literature and Theater
ITAL-388. Sex and Politics in Italian Theater and Cinema
ITAL-392. The Theater of Power: Dynasties, Politics, and Theater, 1500-1800
ITAL-452. Theater of the Sacred: Between Faith and Politics
ITAL-467. Italian Theater
ITAL-473. Farewell to Realism: Decadence, Avant-Garde, Modernism
c) From Modernism to the Present
ITAL-315. Le Altre Italie: Italy and the Culture of Contemporary Ethnic Identity
ITAL-321. Poetics of Lightness: Italo Calvino and Post-War Italian Culture
ITAL-337. Italian Cinema: Adventurous Journey
ITAL-359. Bella Ciao! Women’s Identity in Twentieth Century Italy
ITAL-360. Giallo! Italian Detective Fiction
ITAL-380. Identity and Resistance in Fascist Italy
ITAL-381. Italian Contemporary Poetry
ITAL-390. Mafia: Realities and Fiction
ITAL-393. Modern Italian: dialects and other varieties
ITAL-404. The Twentieth-Century Italian Novel
ITAL-411. From Novel to Film
ITAL-425. From Mazzini to the Euro: The European Consciousness in Modern and Contemporary Italian Literature
ITAL-426. Encounters with the Other: The Ethnographic Imagination in Italian Literature
ITAL-445. The Betrayals of Translation
ITAL-471. The Writing Factory: Science, Machines, and the Technology of the Word in Twentieth-Century Italian Literature
IV. One literature/culture elective from any of the 3 groups listed above
V. Dante
ITAL-460 Dante – The Divine Comedy
VI. The Senior Seminar
ITAL-489 Senior Seminar
NOTE: Students who study abroad for a semester can apply two courses taken abroad toward the Major. Those who study abroad for a full year may apply no more than four courses toward the Major.
