S1112 Identity, Language and Communicative Practices in Contemporary Italy

This course is designed to give students a panorama of multilingual and multiethnic Italy with an emphasis on communicative practices that characterize contemporary Italian society and the interactions between its members. The course adopts a view of language as a social practice and investigates language use and, more broadly, communicative practices from a wide range of social, cultural, and historical contexts and perspectives. Among the topics that will be discussed are the different roles and functions of standard Italian, popular Italian and dialects; the link between dialect revival and globalization, and the role of Italian dialects in forging social and political identities and agendas. We will also analyze, from an historical perspective, language and politics in Italy with attention to the linguistic choices and policies of the Fascist Regime, post-war Italy, and current political groups. Given our location, particular emphasis will be given to the roles and functions of the dialects of the Veneto (especially Venetian ) in relation to the national language and the languages of immigrants, tourists and non-Venetians residing in the area.\r\n

The course also explores the role of gestures in communication; juvenile slang, the language of the media, the language of advertising and bureaucracy; linguistic sexism, language ideologies, and some rules of conversation management among Italians as contrasted to those typically managed by speakers of other languages such as those spoken by students enrolled in the class who, throughout the course will be asked to reflect upon their own communicative practices, analyze interactions and collect data in loco (from the dorms to the Venetian campi and calli). Students will discuss and analyze a variety of spoken, written, and visual texts and will be encouraged to compare and contrast their own experiences with those discussed in readings and class discussions. The diverse interest and experiences of participating students will be a major strength of this course.
• Students with a previous exposure to Italian and with a low-intermediate level language competence will benefit mostly from the class, as we will analyze oral, written and visual texts in Italian and their translation.

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Outcomes: After completing this course, students should be able to:
• Explain social determinants of dialect and style.
• Engage interactively and collaboratively with peers in discussing language in society issues.
• Analyze processes and problems of communication as affected by national/ethnic cultures and their influences on verbal/non-verbal communication, values, meaning, perception, and thought.
• Demonstrate an understanding of the nature of language use, both in local and global societies.
• Assess the ways in which speakers use language and other communicative behavior to communicate social meaning such as age, gender, social networks, socio-economic status, ideology, politics and to exercise power

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