• Italy is one of the top five economies in the world, and many employers are seeking people who speak both Italian and English. An estimated 7,500 American companies do business with Italy and more than 1,000 U.S. firms have offices in Italy, including IBM, General Electric, Motorola, Citibank, and Pricewaterhouse Coopers. Many Italian firms have offices in the U.S., especially in the Detroit metropolitan area.
• Knowing Italian is greatly beneficial in several career fields. Italy is a world leader in the culinary arts, interior design, fashion, graphic design, furniture design, machine tool manufacturing, robotics, electromechanical machinery, shipbuilding, space engineering, construction machinery, and transportation equipment.
• Italy's cultural importance spans from antiquity through the present, of which the Roman period and the Renaissance are perhaps the two most influential moments.
• According to UNESCO, over 60% of the world's art treasures are found in Italy. Some of the most famous Western artists, from Giotto to Michelangelo, were Italian. Knowledge of Italian is vital to understand the contexts of this art.
• Italian literature boasts some of the world's most famous writers and thinkers, from Dante, Boccaccio, Petrarch and Machiavelli, to Verga, Svevo, Pirandello, and Gramsci, to name a few.
• Since Roman times, Italy has exported its literature and culture to other parts of Europe and beyond, in the areas of Latin literature, Romanitas, humanism, opera, film, science, political thought, fashion, design, and cuisine. Knowing Italian allows you to understand, appreciate, and analyze this treasury of human expression.
• Italy has the cultures, landscapes, and histories to fill a lifetime of investigation. Knowing Italian places you in a position to explore Italy's past and present from the most fulfilling vantage point.

Concentration Prerequisite

• Italian 230, 232 or 233; or the equivalent.  
  

Concentration Requirements

• A minimum of 30 credits in Italian courses numbered 235 and above.
• 18 credits must be conducted in Italian.
• At least one course must be at the 200-level beyond 233.
• At least one course must be at the 300 level.
• At least two courses must be at the 400 level. 
• Of these, at least two courses (six credits) must come from courses focused on Italian literature and/or periods prior to 1900.
• Three credits may be accepted from courses in a cognate field, selected in consultation with and approved by the concentration advisor.

Residence Requirement

A minimum of 15 credits of the required 30 credits must be taken at U-M or a study-abroad program affiliated with    U-M.

Students wishing to pursue an academic concentration must develop a specific plan for its completion in consultation with an Italian advisor.  Appointments may be scheduled at 4108 Modern Languages Building,(734) 764-5344.

Italian Concentration Worksheet (PDF)

Objective

The objective of the academic minor in Italian are to develop some facility in the use of Italian, to recognize major monuments of Italian literature, to gain insight in to the history and present of Italian culture.

This academic minor offers students an opportunity to complement the knowledge gained in their principal field while focusing on linguistic competence and a grounding in one of the world's most historically influential, currently vibrant literatures & cultures.

Prerequisites

• Italian 230, 232, or 233; or the equivalent

Requirements

• Minimum of 18 credits of courses in ITALIAN numbered ITALIAN 235 or higher
• 12 credits (four courses) must be conducted in the Italian language
• At least one 200-level course, 235 or above
• At least one 300-level course
• At least one 400 level course

Residence Requirement

A minimum of 9 of the 18 required credits must be taken at U-M or a study-abroad program affiliated with U-M.

Students wishing to pursue an academic minor must develop a specific plan for its completion in consultation with an Italian advisor.  Appointments may be scheduled at 4108 Modern Languages Building, (734) 764-5344.

Italian Minor Worksheet (PDF)

Course Offerings

For a complete, at-a-glance list of all Italian courses offered in any given semester, see the LSA Bulletin. For information on currently offered Italian courses, visit the LSA Course Guide.

Courses

Italian culture without language prerequisite
You can study Italian culture even before you finish the language track.  These courses are taught by are faculty in English, are open without prerequisite, and will count toward the Italian concentration.

• 250     First-Year Seminar in Italian Studies
  
• 310     Italian Cities
  
• 311     Making Difference
  
• 312     Genius and Geography
  
• 313     Italian Families
  
• 314     Italy: 1815-Present
  
• 315     Cinema & Society
  
• 317     The Renaissance
  
• 333     Dante’s Divine Comedy

Once you finish the elementary language track, all upper-division courses taught in Italian are open to you.  You can choose from a multi-media overview of the regions of Italy, an introduction to Italian literature, or a class where you learn an opera, act out a play, read short stories and novels, analyze films, television and new media, learn to read and appreciate the great writers of the Renaissance, investigate postwar and contemporary politics  -- all while improving your comprehension, speaking, and writing skills. 

Intermediate-Advanced Classes (after 232 or equivalent)

• 235                 Advanced Practice in Italian
  
• 236                 Reading and Composition
  
• 270                 Italian Literature and Culture
  
• 271                 Language in Action
  
• 275-276         Italian in Multi-media
  
• 280                 Italian Phonetics
  
• 300                 Advanced Composition and Conversation
  
• 305                 Introduction to the Study of Literature in Italian
  
• 320                 Modern Italian Literature
  
• 325                 Novels and Film
  
• 340                 Contemporary Italian Culture
  
• 361                 Advanced Comprehension
  
• 374                 Advanced Topics
  
• 422                 Politics and Literature
  
• 425                 Romanticism
  
• 430                 20th c. Italian Literature
  
• 450                 Medieval Italian Literature
  
• 461                 Italian Through Opera
  
• 467                 Screening Italian Fascism
  
• 468                 Italian New Media
  
• 471                 Italian Theater
  
• 475                 Petrarch
  
• 481                 The Novella
  
• 4xx                  Fascism and the cult of Mussolini

Italian Honors Concentration. For information on honors concentrations in RLL, please visit the RLL Honors page. For specific information on the Italian Honors requirements, please proceed to the Italian Honors page.

Students interested in completing teaching certificates may either apply to the School of Education, as a cross-campus transfer or remain in LSA and apply to the School of Education just for certification. In the first case, the School of Education will grant the degree, and in the second, the student will receive the degree from LSA. For more information, visit the School of Education's website.