RMST400

RMST400

Romance Linguistics

This course examines linguistics with an emphasis on the contemporary varieties of the Romance language family. Five main domains of linguistics will be covered: phonetics and phonology, morphology, syntax and sociolinguistics. This will provide a broad understanding of the major similarities and differences between the Romance languages. Although the focus will be on French, Portuguese, Spanish and Italian, attention will also be paid to lesser-known varieties (for instance, Romance-based Creoles, regional languages of France, minority languages in Spain, etc.). We will also be particularly interested in topics such as language variation and change, language contact, multilingualism, standardization, and language attitudes. The course will be interactive and based on numerous written exercises, in class and at home, that will allow the students to explore more precisely the different variations of the Romance languages.

Required readings: There is no required handbook for this course, all relevant material will be provided in class and on Canvas.

Prerequisites: 2nd year standing. A beginners’ knowledge (CFER A1) in at least one of the Romance languages is highly recommended.

Language of instruction: English

RMST350

Italian Food Cultures

Cross-listed with ITAL 380

Italy is world-renowned for its food cultures and Italians put great care into food preparation, consumption, and appreciation. It’s no wonder that Italian food-related themes permeate the country’s cultural life and beyond. This course examines cultural representations of Italian or Italian-derived foods and the role that they play in articulating larger social issues in contemporary Italy, including regionalism, anti-globalization, family history, gender and sexual identities, Italian American food, tourism in Italy, and immigration to Italy. Through studying primary texts such as films and literature, students are encouraged to form a complex picture of Italy’s relationships with food cultures in a global context. Oral presentations, as well as a final project (in the format of a critical essay, a short film, a multimedia project, or creative writing), are the main tools of assessment of learning outcomes. Participation in seminar-style, group discussions in class is essential to developing critical and analytical skills for these assessment activities. The course assumes no prior knowledge of Italian. But it requires a passion for Italian food and culture!

The course is particularly recommended to students at 2nd year standing or higher. The course fulfils Arts literature requirements.

Prerequisites: No prerequisites

Language of instruction: English

RMST459

The Strongman, the Latin Lover, and other Italian Masculinities

Cross-listed with ITAL 409

This course offers an overview of diverse Italian masculinities as they are represented in Italian literature and culture. What does it mean to be a man in Italy? How do diverse concepts of Italian manhood come into being? How are they constructed and circulated through literary and cinematic texts? What do these texts tell us about Italian society? And how are these male types challenged in the Italian cultural domain?

We will probe these questions by studying the depictions of Italian virilities in memoirs, novels, public speeches, news articles, films, and television programs from the 18th century to the present, with a focus on the 20th and 21st centuries. Male types and ideals that we will examine include the self-made man, the strongman, the fascist new man, nationalist soldiers, the inetto (schlemiel), the Latin Lover, libertines, and gay men. To delve further into these texts, we will also study a selective number of influential theories from Masculinity and Gender Studies.

Through this course, we will gain a historical and critical understanding of men and gender dynamics in Italian culture. This course is designed to develop your critical thinking, as well as speaking and writing skills in the context of Italian masculinities. No prior knowledge of the Italian language or Italian culture is required.

Prerequisite: No prerequisites

Note: Credit will be granted for only one of ITAL 409 or ITST 419 or RMST 459.

Language of instruction: English

ITAL234

Italian Mafia Movies

Cross-listed with RMST 202

The association of the mafia with Italy is one of a handful of prevailing cultural metaphors about the country that unfailingly provoke a broad spectrum of impassioned responses from both Italians and non-Italians. This course argues that cinema has fundamentally shaped our perceptions and emotions about the mafia. We trace the lineaments of a cinematic genre born from the American and Italian milieus: the mafia movie. Diverse theses about Italian-origin organized crime, including the Cosa Nostra, Camorra, ‘Ndrangheta, Banda della Magliana, and others, are proposed in these films, which sometimes highlight anti-mafia activities and individuals. We conduct formal film analysis while attending to the socio-historical and cultural contexts of the production of the films or the historical periods depicted in the films. The guiding question of the course is not whether these filmic representations accurately depict the mafia and their contestations. Rather, we seek to unravel the representational complexities, intentions, and agendas of the movies and of the genre. In this way, we gain a cinematic key to understanding Italian mafia which complements relevant historical and empirical studies.

Language of instruction: English

Prerequisites: No prerequisites

RMST100

Italian Fashion Cultures

Cross-listed with ITAL 110

Milano Fashion Week & Design, 02/2011 | Source: Flickr (Mat's Eye)

In 2022, Italy’s newly-elected, right-wing prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, re-named a previous trade ministry as the “Ministry for Business and Made in Italy,” thereby invoking a key marker of Italian commercial, group, and cultural identity. Since the end of the WWII, the garment and accessories sector has been traditionally recognized as a pillar within the Made in Italy industries.

“Italian Fashion Cultures” examines both the national history of Italian fashion since the post-WWII period and its global dimensions. The course delineates the dynamics among the country’s fashion capitals (Florence, Rome, and Milan), with a focus on the apparel sector’s growth during the 1950s-1970s. We also probe how and why Italian fashion has developed in response to the clothing sector’s exigencies and creative tension with France, the United States, and China.

The course highlights ready-to-wear and fast fashion, the two most significant categories of the fashion world today. Cultural appropriation, decoloniality, and sustainability are examined throughout the course in relation to the course’s primary texts, including fashion journalism, websites, social media, advertising, literature, films, and artworks.

Students are encouraged to consider three central questions:

(1) how clothing is represented in the primary texts to influence the audience’s cognitive and affective knowledge;

(2) how fashion helps forge individual, brand, national, and other cultural identities;

(3) given the ubiquitous presence of fashion branding, how these narratives articulate the Made in Italy cachet to consumers?

The course does not assume student’s prior knowledge of Italy or Italian fashion. Oral presentations and a final project (in the format of a critical essay, a short film, a multimedia project, or creative writing) are the main tools of assessment of learning outcomes. Regular attendance in class lecturing and participation in group discussions and in-class activities are essential for developing critical and analytical skills for these assessment activities.

Prerequisites: No prerequisites

Language of instruction: English

FREN395A

La représentation de Lyon dans les médias

This course is an experiential learning and immersive summer intensive 3 weeks course that takes students outside the classroom to engage in the course material in a real world setting, through visits of Lyon and the complex connections between art and the real world. We will work towards opening up your understanding of the variations of the French language in a local cultural context (Lyon patois). With an approach that is hands-on, collaborative and inclusive, the course develops comprehension and the mobilisation of knowledge such as savoir-faire, savoir-être and specific elements related to as study abroad program such as intercultural and interpersonal skills.

Offered in French and in Lyon (France), this course explores the vibrant literary and media culture of Lyon, through documents such as poems, graphic novels, comics, documentaries and movies. The course’s assignments will be submitted on Canvas and will reflect a diversity of format in respect to the Universal Design approach, from individual to group work, from text analysis to writing your own journal of your experience in Lyon with an exposure to drawings and creative writing with local experts.

Required readings:

1) Author: Collectif
Title: Chroniques des quartiers de Lyon
Publisher: Lyon capitale
Date of publication: 2019
ISBN: 978-2-490160-00-6
Site: https://www.lyoncapitale.fr/produit/chroniques-des-quartiers-de-lyon

2) Author: MAULAN Fachri
Title: Trabouler
Publisher: Libel
Date of publication: 2020
ISBN: 978-2-491924-02-7

3) Author: Paul Fournel
Title: Le bel appétit
Publisher: P.O.L
Date of publication: 2015
ISBN: 978-2-8180-3630-3

4) Author: Étienne Lécroart
Title: À table
Publisher: Lajouanie
Date of publication: 2014
ISBN: 978-2370470034

Other texts and media will be posted on Canvas or distributed in class.

Recommended readings:

Author : Bernard Poche
Title : Lyon tel qu’il s’écrit
Publisher: Presses Universitaires de Lyon .
Date of publication : OER 2020 [2015]
OER: https://books.openedition.org/pul/8436?lang=fr

Language of instruction: French

Recommendation: CEFR A2 French proficiency level. For example: One of FREN 202 or equivalent.

Teaching Assistants: French, Spanish, Romance Studies | Summer & Winter Sessions 2024

E c’erano gerani rossi dappertutto

2024 | Edited by Michela Valmori & Valentina Di Cesare

Publisher: Radici Edizioni

Description:

E c’erano gerani rossi dappertutto presents a collection of 16 narratives authored by Italian North-American women, exploring their immigrant experiences. This volume delves into the multifaceted journeys of 16 female writers of Italian heritage, offering poignant insights into their experiences as immigrants in North America. Through a series of narratives, the book encapsulates the diverse array of challenges, triumphs, and cultural adaptations encountered by these women within the context of migration.

Full description

E c’erano gerani rossi dappertutto raccoglie alcune tra le numerose voci del panorama letterario nordamericano contemporaneo, in un vero e proprio viaggio attraverso il loro patrimonio identitario, sulle tracce dell’esperienza migratoria familiare e personale. Una antologia eterogenea dal punto di vista geografico e anagrafico, concepita sulla base di elementi ben definiti, come l’origine etnica e il genere socialmente inteso e che ospita percorsi artistici differenti. Le autrici – tutte di origini italiane – fanno i conti con il proprio passato familiare, presentando percezioni diverse della propria identità all’interno di entrambe le comunità, quella di arrivo e quella italiana d’origine. Il risultato è un’opera multiforme, sospesa tra retrospezione e introspezione, caratterizzata da una pluralità di sguardi in cui ciascuna scrittrice, a modo proprio, disseppellisce un personale forziere dai fondali di un oceano di memorie e sensazioni, parole e silenzi. Per riportarlo a galla con narrazioni piene di onestà e coraggio.

The Crimean War and Cultural Memory: The War France Won and Forgot

2023 | Sima Godfrey

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Full description:

The Crimean War (1854–56) is widely considered the first modern war with its tactical use of railways, telegraphs, and battleships, its long-range rifles, and its notorious trenches – precursors of the Great War. It is also the first media war: the first to know the impact of a correspondent on the field of battle and the first to be documented in photographs. No one, however, including the French themselves, seems to remember that France was there, fighting in Crimea, losing 95,000 soldiers and leading the Allied campaign to victory. It would seem that the Crimean War has no place in the canon of culturally retained historical events that define modern French identity.

Looking at literature, art, theatre, material objects, and medical reports, The Crimean War and Cultural Memory considers how the Crimean War was and was not represented in French cultural history in the second half of the nineteenth century. Ultimately, the book illuminates the forgotten traces that the Crimean War left on the French cultural landscape.

Politically Animated: Non-fiction Animation from the Hispanic World

2023 | Jennifer Nagtegaal

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Full description:

Politically Animated studies the convergence of animation and actuality within films, television series, and digital shorts from across the Spanish-speaking world. It interrogates the many ways in which animation as a stylistic tool and storytelling device participates in political projects underpinning an array of non-fiction works.

The case studies in the book cover a diverse geographical scope, including Spain, Argentina, Colombia, and Mexico. They critically analyse different works such as feature-length animated documentary films, a work of animated journalism, a short-animated essay, and micro-short episodes from a televised animated documentary series. Jennifer Nagtegaal employs the term “politically animated” in reference to the ideological implications of choosing specific techniques and styles of animation within certain socio-historical and cultural contexts.

Nagtegaal illuminates the creative union of animated documentary and the comics medium currently being exploited by Spanish and Latin American cartoonists and filmmakers alike. By paying particular attention to cultural production beyond the big screen, Politically Animated continues to stretch the bounds of animated documentary scholarship.