24075 - Italian Language and Linguistics

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course students will learn to master the technical terms and core concepts of Italian linguistics; they will be able to provide different levels of linguistic analysis of contemporary Italian language; they will be able to use the specific tools employed in linguistic research (historical dictionaries, etymological dictionaries etc.), both in analog and digital format.

Course contents

Linguistic awareness and writing craftmanship.

Table of contents:

Fundamentals of philosophy of language and general linguistics. The human being as a “linguistic animal” and human cultures. Linguistic studies and their articulation.

Cultural and linguistic “earthquakes” of our time.The web-surfing reader and the writing process.

The linguistic concepts of usage and good usage (bon usage).

The Italian language today: its diversity and its rules. The concepts of standard, neostandard, substandard, standardization.

The “educated norm” and the new Italian.

The traditional Italian language as opposed to the new usage, focusing in particular on: pronounciation, neology, lexical morphology, syntax, enunciation strategies, phrasing.

A new “ortograph”: the graphic form of texts written with digital devices.

How living in a language and by a language provides a personal and creative appropriation of the linguistic range.

The living relation with the style, rhythm and phrasing choices of an author.

Prosody, rhythm and the “linguistic ear”.

The choice between the 6 CFU and the 12 CFU option will be based on the number of text chosen by the student, and it will be exposed thoroughly in the tools and in the texts sections.

This course allows two different reading and studying options:

6 CFU – Italian language and linguistics (1) (30 hours)

12 CFU – Italian languge and linguistics (60 hours)

Readings/Bibliography

Texts/Bibliography

The bibliography listed below applies both to attending and non-attending students.

For the 6 CFU Italian Language and Linguistics option:

M. Prandi e C. De Santis, Le regole e le scelte, manuale di linguistica e di grammatica italiana, Torino, UTET 2011 (sections III and IV).

A. Ferrari, Tipi di frase e ordine delle parole, Roma, Carocci, 2012.

D. De Kerckhove, Dall'alfabeto a Internet, l'homme "littéré": alfabetizzazione, cultura, tecnologia.

The following reference works might be useful for resolving doubts or performing closer examinations (reference books intended for a personal library):

L. Serianni, A. Castelvecchi, Grammatica italiana : italiano comune e lingua letteraria, Torino, UTET, 2006 (1997)

M. Beltramo, M.T. Nesci, Dizionario di stile e scrittura, Bologna, Zanichelli, 2011.

One text to be chosen among the following:

A.A. Sobrero (a cura di), Introduzione all'italiano contemporaneo. Le strutture, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2000 (1ed. 1993). Take a closer look at: "che" polivalente, dislocazioni e fenomeni collegati (tematizzazioni, temi sospesi, etc.)

G. Berruto, Sociolinguistica dell'italiano contemporaneo, Roma, Carocci, 2000 (1 ed. 1987, La Nuova Italia Scientifica). With particular attention to the following concepts: standard, neostandard, standardizzazione, norma.

M. Dardano, Costruire parole, la morfologia derivativa dell'italiano, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2009, the first part and an “illustrative exploration” of the parts II and III. “Illustrative exploration” means that students have to understand, by studying the articulation of different cases and examples, how the “building-of-words-out-of-words-process” works.

U. Cardinale, Manuale di scrittura giornalistica, Torino, UTET, 2011.

Reading seminar: examples of language as used by the authors.

The course will include reading seminars, in which reading practices will be experienced and analysed, and writing exercises.

We will be working on a rich and diversified choice of texts, exemplifying journalistic and narrative prose. The proposed authors will be, among others: Beppe Fenoglio, Italo Calvino, Dino Buzzati; Gabriele Romagnoli, Francesco Merlo, Marco D'Eramo; Alessandro Baricco, Aldo Nove and other last generation Italian authors.

Foreign students with no particular needs regarding research or in-depth analysis, may prepare for the exam by choosing one of the two following works:

Elementi di linguistica italiana , Ilaria Bonomi, Andrea Masini, Silvia Morgana, Mario Piotti, Carocci (eds.), Roma, new edition 2010.

L. Serianni, G. Antonelli, Manuale di linguistica italiana, stora, attualità. grammatica, Milano, Bruno Mondadori, 2011.

For the 12 CFU Italian Language and Linguistics option:

Fabrizio Frasnedi, Alberto Sebastiani, Lingua e cultura italiana, studio linguistico e immaginario culturale, Archetipolibri, Bologna, 2010. pagg. 1-73. The "Documenti" chapter might be useful for a deeper analysis of some specific subjects.

M. Prandi e C. De Santis, Le regole e le scelte, manuale di linguistica e di grammatica italiana, Torino, UTET 2011 (sections III and IV).

A. Ferrari, Tipi di frase e ordine delle parole, Roma, Carocci, 2012.

D. De Kerckhove, Dall'alfabeto a Internet, l'homme "littéré": alfabetizzazione, cultura, tecnologia.

Dario Corno, Scrivere e comunicare: la scrittura in lingua italiana in teoria e in pratica. MIlano-Torino, Bruno Mondadori, 2012.

Fabrizio Frasnedi, Terremoti e fraseggio: la lingua della tradizione e l'allegro della nuova lingua. It can be found in Perché la grammatica, Giuliana Fiorentino (ed.), Roma, Carocci, 2009, pag. 67-78. The text will also be available online on the course's website.

Simone Fornara, La punteggiatura, Carocci (le bussole), Roma, 2010.

The following reference works might be useful for resolving doubts or performing closer examinations (reference books intended for a personal library):

L. Serianni, A. Castelvecchi, Grammatica italiana : italiano comune e lingua letteraria, Torino, UTET, 2006 (1997)

M. Beltramo, M.T. Nesci, Dizionario di stile e scrittura, Bologna, Zanichelli, 2011.

At least two texts chosen among the following:

A.A. Sobrero (a cura di), Introduzione all'italiano contemporaneo. Le strutture, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2000 (1ed. 1993). Take a closer look at: "che" polivalente, dislocazioni e fenomeni collegati (tematizzazioni, temi sospesi, etc.)

G. Berruto, Sociolinguistica dell'italiano contemporaneo, Roma, Carocci, 2000 (1 ed. 1987, La Nuova Italia Scientifica). With particular attention to the following concepts: standard, neostandard, standardizzazione, norma.

M. Dardano, Costruire parole, la morfologia derivativa dell'italiano, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2009, the first part and an “illustrative exploration” of the parts II and III. “Illustrative exploration” means that students have to understand, by studying the articulation of different cases and examples, how the “building-of-words-out-of-words-process” works.

U. Cardinale, Manuale di scrittura giornalistica, Torino, UTET, 2011.

Foreign students with no particular needs regarding research or in-depth analysis, may take the exam by studying and integrating the following two works:

Elementi di linguistica italiana , Ilaria Bonomi, Andrea Masini, Silvia Morgana, Mario Piotti, (ed.) Carocci, Roma, nuova edizione 2010.

L. Serianni, G. Antonelli, Manuale di linguistica italiana, stora, attualità. grammatica, Milano, Bruno Mondadori, 2011.

Reading seminar: examples of language as used by the authors.

The course will include reading seminars, in which reading practices will be experienced and analysed, and writing exercises.

We will be working on a rich and diversified choice of texts, exemplifying journalistic and narrative prose. The proposed authors will be, among others: Beppe Fenoglio, Italo Calvino, Dino Buzzati; Gabriele Romagnoli, Francesco Merlo, Marco D'Eramo; Alessandro Baricco, Aldo Nove and other last generation Italian authors.

The prosodic and rhythmic analysis included in this course will be carried out during Prof. Frasnedi's lectures. Students who are interested in further information upon the subject will be provided with adequate bibliography.

Teaching methods

Lectures, seminars and workshops.

Assessment methods

The final assessment will be based upon the writing of a paper or, as an alternative, upon a written exam that will take place following the procedures indicated below. This applies to all Italian students from the Facoltà di Lettere and Lingue who have registered on this course; it does not apply to those who have registered as supplementary activity (2 CFU). The latter will take an oral exam. Foreign students (both EU and non-EU) can choose between writing a paper or taking an oral exam, based upon a simplified bibliography.

Proposals for the assessment papers:

1) A “diary” that will register the various interests, difficulties, personal reactions to the different parts of the course (lectures, readings, authors etc.). Ten pages approximately.

2) A “reading journal” that will report on the reading of the full text of one of the works from which the above mentioned excerpts have been taken (the examples of language used by the authors). Ten pages approximately.

This option is possible only if the papers are handed in before the first examination session that will take place immediately after the end of the course (summer session 2012/2013).

3) Written exam (six sessions during the academic year).

The written exam will include:

- Syntactic analysis of an excerpt of literary or journalistic prose.

- A re-writing exercise based upon a literary or journalistic text.

- Writing the “answer” to an article/journalistic excerpt, regarding social and/or cultural issues; it may be a new text taking the proposed subject as a point of departure for a personal and creative development.

Students from Lettere registered on the 6 CFU option, and students from Lingue, will take only the first two parts of the exam.

The different possibilities will be practiced with exercises that will be proposed during the course.

Teaching tools

Theoretic elaboration, text reading, video screening, online resources.

Analysis of the student's papers and written contribuition will take place during the seminars.

Office hours

See the website of Fabrizio Frasnedi