32601 - Germanic Philology 2 (2nd cycle)

Learning outcomes

The student has deep knowledge of the history of old Germanic literatures which he/she knows through the direct reading of the sources. He / she can analyze a literary text through a solid linguistic and philological methodology. He / she has high-degree capacities in critical comprehension and analysis of Old Germanic cultural characteristics and he / she can elaborate complex analysis and formulate authonomous ideas about specific research areas.

Course contents

Reading and Translating Old English

This course will be devoted to the Old English in order to read a text in its original language directly from a medieval manuscript, to copy it and translate it into Italian (or English) language. Hence, the first lessons will explain the basic grammatical aspects of the Old English (not so far from Modern English). From the very beginning, we translate easy texts and do transcriptions directly from manuscripts. At the end of the course, student can translate Old English texts without great difficulties.

Readings/Bibliography

- Texts charged by the teacher in the web pages of the course .

- Mark Atherton, Complete Old English (Anglo-Saxon), Abingdon, Bookpoint, 2010 [Teach yourself series]

- Baker, Peter S., Introduction to Old English, Oxford, Balckwell, 2003, pp. 152-159.

- Brown, Michelle, Anglo-Saxon manuscripts, London, The British Library Publishing Division, 1991.

non attending students must contact the teacher in order to define the assessment's bibliography.

Teaching methods

The course is structured as a seminar. From the very beginning, we translate from Old English sharing the class in little work groups. The teacher will lead and follow the translating activity. it should be better to attend classes with PC / tablet / mobile etc. with internet connection.

Because of the seminarial organization of the course, it is strongly recommended to attend lessons.

Assessment methods

The examination is structured in a written proof in which a short transcription from an Old English manuscripts and a short translation from the Old English will be submitted.

The evaluation will be structured with these bands of voting:

- very good: 30L - 29

- good: 28 - 26

- discrete: 25- 23

- sufficient: 22 - 18

-failed: under 18

and will equally shared between:

- correct transcription

- corret translation

Teaching tools

- Multimedia materials

Office hours

See the website of Alessandro Zironi