B4425 - L’INTERCOMPRENSIONE PER LA COMUNICAZIONE PLURILINGUE

Learning outcomes

The course aims to train students in oral understanding and communication in linguistic intercomprehension among related languages (Romance languages such as Italian, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Romanian, Catalan). In particular, students will be facilitated in the comprehension of academic lessons of specific disciplinary contents in the language of the host country (economic, technical-scientific, humanistic, legal, etc.), for example for the purpose of international mobility (Erasmus exchanges for study or thesis preparation, CAF, CFP, master, summer and winter school). Students will be able to dialogue and interact with people with a different L1, without using a vehicular language.

Course contents

The workshop introduces the principles and practices of intercomprehension, i.e. a communicative model according to which, within a group of interlocutors, everyone expresses oneself in one’s native language (or in a foreign well known Romance language) and, at the same time, understands the Romance languages used by others. In the context of multilingual communication, speakers are called upon to activate metacognitive, strategic, collaborative and relational skills to be applied in professional and private contexts.

Summary of the topics addressed:

• identification and differentiation of some Romance languages and linguistic varieties starting from their graphic, lexical and morphosyntactic characteristics and perception of their phonological and prosodic differences;
• characteristics of one's multilingual profile (cf. FREPA) and notion of partial linguistic competence (cf. Companion Volume of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages);
• strategies for reading texts in unknown or little-known Romance languages;
• -oral intercomprehension strategies;
• written and oral interproduction strategies;
• conscious use of digital tools to develop multilingual collaborative tasks.

  The student is able to:

• understand written and oral documents of various types of A2 / B1 level in (at least) five different Romance languages (Catalan, French, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish) also in specialist and professional fields;
• interact effectively in multilingual and intercultural contexts also during international academic and work mobility experiences;
• use their linguistic, cultural and experiential background for the acquisition of new languages or for the improvement of skills in languages already known;
• reframe unexpected linguistic and cultural behaviours into shared frames of meaning;
• collaborate effectively in synchronous and asynchronous online work contexts, respecting team timing, roles and objectives.

  The student knows:

• the principles of ecological communication in a multilingual and intercultural context and the notion of linguistic repertoire;
• the relationships between languages of one's linguistic repertoire (mother tongue, other languages, dialects) and their contribution to the processes of language comprehension and learning;
• the classification and hierarchy between intercomprehension strategies (written and oral).

Readings/Bibliography

The material (slides and more) used in class is an integral part of the study program and is available on the Virtuale platform. Further research material and bibliographical references will be made available during the course , in different languages.

Bibliographical references (updated)

The following texts are to be considered as useful for personal study and not as compulsory study material for the exam.

TEACHING MANUALS

Benavente Ferrera S., Calvo del Olmo F., Frisan E.H., Manole V., Rocha da Cunha K.M., Sheeren H. (2022), Manuale di intercomprensione tra lingue romanze, Zanichelli, Milano.

Bonvino E., Caddeo S., Vilagines Serra E., Pippa S. (2011), EuRom5. Leggere e capire 5 lingue romanze. Portugues, español, italiano, català, français. Hoepli, Milano.

MONOGRAPHS, ARTICLES AND ESSAYS

Benucci A. (a cura di) (2015), L’intercomprensione : il contributo italiano, UTET, Torino.

Bonvino E., Garbarino S. (2022), Intercomprensione, Caissa Italia, Bologna.

Celentin P., Fiorentino A., 2022, "Plurilingual Lexical approach: contact points and developmental trajectories", in Mosaic, Vol. 13, n. 2, pp. 780-801. ISSN: 1195-7131. https://ojs.cimedoc.uniba.it/index.php/glottodidattica/article/view/1248/1060

Celentin P., 2020, "An intercomprehension based approach and teaching method accessible to students with SLN (specific language needs): a first exploration of the points of convergence", in ItalianoLinguaDue, Università degli studi di Milano, 2(12), pp. 443-457. ISSN: 2037-3597. https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/promoitals/article/view/15090/13967

Cervini C., Zucchi A. (2022), “Learning languages through intercomprehension: some hints on cultural and intercultural competences”, in Toyota J., Richards I., Kovačević B. (a cura di). Second Language Learning and Cultural Acquisition: New Perspectives. Newcastle upon Tyne, Cambridge Scholars, pp. 46-63.

De Carlo M., Garbarino S. (2021), « Intercomprehension. Strenghts and Opportunities of a Pluralistic Approach », in The Routdlege Handbook of Plurilingual Language Education, Routdlege.

Meissner F.-J. (2016), « L’intercomprensione nell’apprendimento della lingua specialistica ab initio : il caso dell’italiano per studenti di Storia dell’Arte e Archeologia all’università in Germania », in Meissner F.-J., Martinez H., Wauquier S. (ed.), 2016, Actes du XXVII Congrès international de linguistique et de philologie romanes (Nancy, 15-20 juillet 2013). Section 12 : Acquisition et apprentissage des langues, Nancy, ATILF . https://web-data.atilf.fr/ressources/cilpr2013/actes/section-12/CILPR-2013-12-Gay.pdf

 

Teaching methods

Synchronous online teaching with 3 face-to-face meetings (see calendar). The course includes individual and collaborative group activities.

Assessment methods

Project work: At the end of the course, there will be a final exam: small groups of students (max 4 people) will prepare and illustrate a collaborative digital product reflecting the principles of intercomprehensive communication.

Assessment criteria:

Given the laboratory nature of the course, a strong interaction is required throughout the development of the activities. For this reason, the final evaluation will also be based on the quality and quantity of participation in synchronous activities (face-to-face and remote) as well as on the final exam. The final grade will be given by the average of the two evaluations that will be determined on the basis of the following criteria.

• delivery on the Moodle instance of at least 70% of the tasks assigned and carried out during the course hours;
• compliance with the task processing criteria (timing, length, language);
• proper interaction with other participants (collaboration and constructive contributions);
• contents covered by the project work (assimilation, reflection and re-elaboration);
• characteristics of the digital product created (digital quality and coherence with the principles of intercomprehension)
• presentation and discussion of the project work (communicative competence in oral interproduction and expository and argumentative skills with alternation of voices).
  

Grades 28 to 30:

• delivery of 100% of assigned tasks
• full compliance with the processing criteria of all tasks
• always correct Interaction with other participants
• contents reworked in order to make understand the most significant aspects of the topic;
• effective and secure exploitation and use of digital assets for the digital product;
• systematic adaptation of the language of the presentation to make it comprehensible to the listener;
• excellent competence in oral interproduction;
• excellent presentation skills.

Grades 26 to 27:

• delivery of 90% of assigned tasks
• inaccuracies in the delivery of 1 task;
• almost always correct and always collaborative interaction with other participants;
• most of the contents reworked in order to make the most significant aspects of the topic understood;
• almost always effective and safe exploitation and use of digital assets for the digital product;
• almost always systematic adaptation of the language of the presentation to make it comprehensible to the listener;
• -very good competence in oral interproduction;
• Very good display skills.

Grades 23 to 25:

• Delivery of 80% of assigned tasks
• Inaccuracies in the delivery of 2 tasks
• Correct interaction with other participants but not always aimed at collaboration
• most of the content has been reworked to make understand almost all the most significant aspects of the subject;
• exploitation and use of digital resources for the digital product, with some shortcomings;
• adaptation of the language of the presentation to make it comprehensible to the listener, sometimes with deficiencies or grey areas;
• good oral interproduction skills;
• Good presentation skills.

Grades 20 to 22:

• delivery of 70% of assigned tasks
• Inaccuracies in the delivery of 3 tasks
• Interaction not always correct with other participants and not always aimed at collaboration
• contents partially reworked to make almost all the most significant aspects of the subject understood;
• -only partially effective and secure exploitation and use of digital assets for the digital product, with some shortcomings;
• adaptation of the language of the presentation to make it understandable to the listener, with repeated deficiencies or grey areas;
• fair competence in oral interproduction;
• Decent display skills.

 

Grades 18 to 19 :

• delivery of 70% of assigned tasks
• Inaccuracies in the delivery of 4 tasks
• Limited interaction and collaboration in a limited number of cases.
• contents partially reworked in order to make understand only some of the most significant aspects of the topic;
• exploitation and basic use of digital resources for the digital product;
• -not always successful attempts to adapt the language of the presentation to make it understandable to the listener,;
• sufficient competence in oral interproduction;
• sufficient exhibition skills.

Teaching tools

Moodle and Zoom Virtual Platforms. Slides and other audio-video materials.

Office hours

See the website of Paola Celentin