OVERVIEW

The course is aimed at students approaching the language within a concrete field of action related to cultural issues in the social sciences. The course is open to absolute beginners and experienced speakers. The latter will be able to agree with the lecturer on the attendance of lecturing hours or the recognition of language certifications. At the end of the course students will have reached level B1 of the European Framework of Reference for Languages. The course is annual and is composed by both language practice sessions and lectures with the instructor.

AIMS AND CONTENT

LEARNING OUTCOMES

Thanks to the acquisition of knowledge and skills corresponding to the B1 level of the CEFR, at the end of the course students will be able to produce and connect simple texts on political and institutional topics on the Hispanic world.

AIMS AND LEARNING OUTCOMES

The course, of 8 and 9 credits according to the degree program, aims to bring students closer to the study and analysis of some components of the Spanish language and their use in different communicative situations, taking into consideration distinct dialectal variants of the Hispanic world, from a contrastive (IT/SP) and intercultural perspective. The course aims to enable students to reach a level of linguistic-communicative competence equal to B1 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Foreign Languages.
At the end of it students will be able to:

• recognize and describe the morphological and graphic units of the Spanish language, and use the derivative and compositional processes for the formation of words; 
• explain in a simple way, but using the appropriate metalanguage, the interlingual (IT-SPA) and intralingual contrastive differences and the fundamental phonetic and morphological phenomena. 
• recognize and describe the main geographical and social varieties of the Spanish and Hispanic-American language. 
• develop not only sociolinguistic competence, but also existential competence (“knowing how to be”, in the CEFR) through the construction of an intercultural personality that helps to know and manage oneself without prejudice in the rich linguistic and cultural range that the Spanish language offers. 
• appreciate the richness of multilingualism, dialectal varieties, contact situations in the Hispanic world, even in a migratory context. Develop the ability to make critical and constructive judgments on the linguistic policies implemented in the Hispanic world. 
• present the contents of the course clearly, using a specific and correct metalanguage.
• use the terminology and linguistic skills acquired in the description and critical discussion of the linguistic, sociolinguistic and historical-cultural contents that constitute the teaching.
• self-assess the skills acquired.
• identify topics of study and research of interest in the Spanish-speaking world

PREREQUISITES

The course is also open to absolute beginners. Students must possess the basic metalinguistic terminology; must be able to recognize and classify the parts of discourse based on criteria pertaining to the morphological structure, the semantic value, the function. Strategic and referential skills are required, which will be further developed favoring the ability to use grammatical skills. Beginner students can supplement their language lessons with online courses from the University Language Centre at: https://cla.aulaweb.unige.it/  

TEACHING METHODS

Students must register at the beginning of the academic year on Aulaweb in order to receive all the information. It is recommended to unify the Unige mailbox (where communications arrive) with the most frequently consulted email address. For the purely linguistic part, addressed with the help of the instructor exercises, you will rely on the textbook indicated in the bibliographical section; topics covered in class by the instructor will be published on Aulaweb - or, in the case of distance learning, on the Teams page of the course. Those who have a language certification (DELE) corresponding to level B1 or higher issued by an accredited certification body are exempt from the written test upon notification to the reader and the teacher, and upon acceptance of the punctuation.

The lectures, which will be held in Spanish, will alternate with moments of debate, group laboratory activities (exercises, analysis of texts of different types, film clips, short interviews, songs, videos, etc.) belonging to the Hispanic culture (Spanish and Latin American), moments of discussion with external guests, for which attendance is highly recommended. The contents will be presented with the support of texts in pdf or slides that will be projected in the classroom.

Erasmus students, non-attending students and students from other degree courses are requested to contact the teacher and the lecturer by email.

SYLLABUS/CONTENT

The topics covered in the lectures (and consequently those of the exam) are the following:
- Elements of phonetics and morphology; Spanish and its varieties.
- History of the Spanish language: birth and main lines of evolution. Spanish in the world.
- History and culture in Spain, 20th and 21st centuries.
- Latin American migration to Italy and Genoa.
- Linguistic attitudes towards the varieties of Spanish.
- Linguistic landscape: Spanish in Genoese linguistic landscape.

RECOMMENDED READING/BIBLIOGRAPHY

For the written exam:

 Frecuencias directo A1-B1. Libro del Estudiante e Libro de Ejercicios, Edinumen.

For the oral exam:

- Ariolfo, Rosana (2017), “Visibilidad y percepción del español en el paisaje lingüístico genovés”, Lingue e Linguaggi, 21, pp. 7-25.

Ariolfo, Rosana y Mariottini, Laura, “Los hispanoamericanos en Italia”, pp. 31-48.

- Moreno Fernández, Francisco (2020), Variedades de la lengua española, London and New York: Routledge; chapters: 2: El español en su historia y su geografía; 3: Políticas e ideologías lingüísticas del español; 4: Panorama lingüístico de la península ibérica; 5: Panorama lingüístico de Iberoamérica; 14: Variedades de la lengua española y globalización.

- Pdf and slides on Aulaweb.

- Sobrino Triana, Roxana (2018), “Las variedades de español según los hispanohablantes: corrección, incorrección y agrado lingüísticos”, Cuadernos de Lingüística de El Colegio de México, 5 (2), pp. 79-119. (https://cuadernoslinguistica.colmex.mx/index.php/cl/article/view/115)

Other materials and articles will be provided by the teachers during the course.

TEACHERS AND EXAM BOARD

Exam Board

DANIELA CAPRA (President)

LESSONS

LESSONS START

See academic calendar

Class schedule

The timetable for this course is available here: Portale EasyAcademy

EXAMS

EXAM DESCRIPTION

The examination for this course consists of a written part and an oral part, which combine to form a single grade. The two parts may be taken in different sessions, but the written exam must be taken before the oral exam. Registration for each part of the exam is required via the designated platform. While attending the language practice sessions is helpful for preparing for the written exam, students who do not attend will find plenty of relevant materials on the dedicated Aulaweb page. This exam is a prerequisite for the oral exam conducted by Prof. Daniela Capra; it is taken on a computer and lasts approximately 30 minutes in total.

The exam for the course is oral and is conducted in Spanish. It will take the form of a discussion focusing on the topics and concepts covered during lectures and listed in the required bibliography. Many materials and articles for exam preparation are available on Aulaweb.

Non-attending students are required to study the texts listed in the bibliography, as well as the articles and other materials uploaded to Aulaweb.

ASSESSMENT METHODS

The written test is structured into four types of exercises designed to assess whether the target exit level (B1) has been reached:

•           multiple-choice reading comprehension exercises based on narrative and expository texts;

•           text reconstruction activities involving the insertion of text fragments;

•           exercises matching lexical definitions to the reference text;

•           text completion exercises designed to test grammatical structures, verb tenses, and vocabulary in context.

The structure of the test is modeled on the types of exercises found in the DELE B1 language certification exams; students will find a practice exam that they can complete on bluaulaweb at the end of the course.

SLD students must submit a request well in advance via the designated platform and send an email to the professor and the language instructor. To request compensatory tools or dispensatory measures, students with disabilities or SLD must fill in the dedicated Webform available at https://unige.it/disabilita-dsa, at least 7 working days before the exam.
Students with SEN may instead send their request by e-mail to the lecturer, copying the Department Representative, Prof. Aristide Canepa (aristide.canepa@unige.it) and the Inclusion Office (inclusione.studenti@info.unige.it).
Requests from students will be assessed by the lecturer and may be approved or rejected.

The written exam is a prerequisite for the oral exam. The recognition of certifications will be assessed by the instructor and may result in an exemption from the written exam. Only students who attend the course are eligible to take any ongoing assessments (group work, presentations, written tests). The minimum passing grade for the exam is 18/30

The oral exam assesses not only Spanish language proficiency (in terms of grammatical and lexical accuracy and fluency of speech) but also the ability to navigate the course content, which is accessible via the texts listed in the bibliography and the articles/materials uploaded to Aulaweb.

The summative assessment is graded on a scale of thirty. The weighting of linguistic knowledge and content knowledge is evenly distributed (50% + 50%).

FURTHER INFORMATION

Registration on Aulaweb is recommended.