Unit information: Destination Italy: Cultural Responses to Migration in 2016/17

Unit name	Destination Italy: Cultural Responses to Migration
Unit code	ITAL20032
Credit points	20
Level of study	I/5
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12)
Unit director	Professor. Glynn
Open unit status	Not open
Pre-requisites	None
Co-requisites	None
School/department	Department of Italian
Faculty	Faculty of Arts

Description including Unit Aims

This unit explores cultural representations of migration and migrants to Italy, from the 1980s to the present. It situates those representations in relation to Italy’s rapid transition from a country of emigration to a net receiver of migrants, and to the ways in which the experience of migration to Italy has compelled the country to recognise and tackle its colonial past. It further addresses the role of migration in shaping and reshaping Italian identity over time.

The unit will be structured around the analysis of representations in three different media: news reports focussing on distinct migration ‘crises’; cinematic texts addressing the encounter between Italians and migrants; and literary texts by migrants and ‘new’ Italians, which ‘talk back’ to Italian understandings of migrants and migration.

The unit aims to:

• acquaint students with the history of migration to Italy and with dominant tendencies in the representation of migrants and migration.
• equip students with the appropriate tools (theoretical and linguistic) to understand and to articulate their interpretation of such representations.
• expand students’ knowledge of Italian culture and to refine their critical and communication skills.

Intended Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of the unit, students will be able to:

(a) demonstrate their knowledge of migration to Italy and its representation in cultural production in a variety of ways and to the appropriate standard: orally, for seminar presentations and discussion; and in writing through extended research for the coursework essays;

(b) articulate a good understanding of the context in which cultural representations of migration to Italy occur and with which they engage;

(c) demonstrate their understanding of and deploy a conceptual framework for the interpretation of representations of migration appropriate to Level I;

(d) demonstrate good critical skills and the ability to analyse and argue

(e) demonstrate an appropriate understanding of Italian-language texts by engaging in detailed analysis of Italian prose and film.

Teaching Information

2 x 1-hour weekly seminars

Assessment Information

Summative assessment:

1 x 3000-word essay (75%) ILOs: a-e

1 x 1500-word commentary (25%) ILOs: a-e

Formative assessment:

15-minute seminar presentation ILOs: a-e

Reading and References

Pap Khouma, Io venditore di elefanti (1990)

Amara Lakhous, Scontro di civiltà per un ascensore a Piazza Vittorio (2006)

Cristina Ali Farah, Madre piccola (2007)

Flavia Capitani and Emanuele Coen (ed), Pecore nere (2015)

Gianni Amelio, dir., Lamerica (1994)

Manetti bros., Zora la vampira (2000)

Paola Randi, dir, Into Paradiso (2010)

Graziella Parati, Migration Italy: The Art of Talking Back in a Destination 'Culture (Toronto UP, 2005)

Graziella Parati, Mediterranean Crossroads: Migration Literature in Italy (Fairleigh Dickinson UP, 1999)

Emma Bond, Guido Bonsaver and Federico Faloppa, Destination Italy: Representing Migration in Contemporary Media and Narrative (Peter Lang, 2015)