Course requirements include: weekly readings, class attendance and participation, two group oral presentations, a midterm exam, a final exam, and a final project.

Attendance is required. Students must attend all course meetings and events. Intelligent, informed participation in seminars and sections is also required.
Students must arrive in time in class and at all events. Arriving late will affect your final grade.

Readings: Students must read all assigned materials before the due date and be prepared to discuss them in class. Don’t forget to bring the assigned texts or book to class. Comments and questions about the readings are welcome in class and during office hours.
The reading is not extensive—on average, approximately 200 pages per week. But the materials are very diverse and they are a necessary prerequisite for lectures and class discussion. Exams will test students’ comprehension of these texts.

The following four books must be purchased by all students prior to their departure and brought to Italy; please acquire the recommended editions.
– Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities, trans. William Weaver (Harcourt) ISBN 9780156453806;
– Giovanni Della Casa, Galateo or, The Rules of Polite Behavior, trans. M. F. Rusnak (University of Chicago Press) ISBN 9780226010977;
– Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince, trans. George Bull (Penguin Classics) ISBN 9780140449150;
– Elaine Scarry, On Beauty and Being Just (Princeton University Press) ISBN 9780691089591.
Please purchase a paper copy rather than an e-book. If you have to buy an e-book, be sure that it is the same edition (in particular, the same translator and publisher).
You may also want to purchase a copy of Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Judgement, from which you will have to read almost 200 pages. It is an important book, extremely relevant to our program’s interpretation of beauty. Besides, it may prove useful for other courses as well. In case, purchase the translation by James Creed Meredith and Nicholas Waler (Oxford World’s Classics, ISBN 9780199552467). Otherwise you will find the reading among the PDF files. As there is not much free time in the first days of the program, you must read Kant before arriving in Italy.

Before the beginning of the program you should read also Gabriele d’Annunzio’s Pleasure. If you want to purchase the book, the recommended edition is the one translated by Lara Gochin Raffaelli (Penguin Classics, ISBN 9780143106746). Otherwise you can read the novel online or in PDF in the 1898 translation by Georgina Harding, The Child of Pleasure.

Copies of the required books (new and used) may be available at the Harvard Coop. In other bookstores you will have to order them so you must look for them as soon as possible. Preferably buy books in bookstores rather than online: it saves jobs and communities.

If your Italian is sufficiently advanced you may want to read Calvino’s Le città invisibili in Italian and purchase the book when in Italy. If you want to read Machiavelli’s Principe in Italia, purchase the Rizzoli BUR edition (series: I grandi classici riscritti, EAN 9788817066945) which includes both the original text and a translation in today’s Italian.

All other readings will be available online as PDF files. Only students enrolled in this program have access to them. To download the files click here [link not yet active] and log in to the Canvas site of the course with your HUID.

You are strongly advised to read at least Kant’s selection, Scarry’s book, D’Annunzio’s novel, and the PDFs of the first week before leaving for Italy.

Final project: At the orientation students are introduced to the field of visual sociology and encouraged to use their cellphones, tablets, or cameras to photograph ordinary Italian people, places, and events, as opposed to iconic monuments or tourist attractions. With the help of their instructors, students should soon identify a specific topic that they want to document and explore. The final project, due by July 31, consists of a very short introduction (less than 100 words) and a slideshow of ten pictures taken in Italy in different locations. All projects will be presented in class on August 3. Click here to see the topics already assigned to students [link will be activated in June 2023].

Logo project: Pass/fail. Students must design a logo for our program following the instructions received at Inarea on DATE TBA. Projects are due on DATE TBA. Inarea will then choose the best logo and prints it on a t-shirt to be given to all participants in the Fall. All projects will be presented in class on August 4.

Midterm exam: 90 minutes, on July 10. It will include several identification questions and two short-answer questions on the assigned readings and topics addressed in class and during the trips and events.

Final exam: Oral exam, on August 11 and 12: 45 minutes. It addresses the entire course, including readings, trips, and events.

Grading breakdown:

• • • •  35%   Participation (in class, during sections, and during events; includes oral presentation)
      •  20%   Midterm exam
      •    5%    Logo project
      •  30%   Final exam
      •  10%   Final project
      •  Extra credit (up to 10%): Italian language course

Italian language course: Click here for more information.

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