| A Report on the Program's Activities |
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Summer 2002
from the Director, Antonella D. Olson
ad.olson@mail.utexas.edu
Office: HRH 4.134; (512) 471-5531
Office Hours fall 2002: Mon, Tue 3:30-5:30pm
The Rome Study Program gives
students of all majors the opportunity to spend six weeks in
Rome, Italy, and to visit some of the most beautiful Italian
sites on weekends. Some field trips are included in the cost
of the program and others are optional.
Italian families host the students,
providing an in-depth experience of Italian life and language.
Students can earn three or six credit hours.
During the academic year preceding
departure for Rome, the program offers participants seven meetings
and a final orientation session on the U.T.-Austin campus.
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Program Director:
- Antonella D. Olson
Assistant on UT campus:
- Carlos Capra
Assistant in Rome:
- Robert Olson
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Thirty-three students
from the University of Texas at Austin enrolled in this year's
program. Professor Douglas Biow taught with Antonella Olson.
Students spent their class time (1 1/2 hours for each class)
from Monday to Thursday in the Palazzo Antici-Mattei. The cost
of the program was $2,600. The fee did not cover airfare, UT
tuition and fees, or textbooks. It covered all the rest: housing
and three meals per day, transportation from and to the airport
to Rome, bus tickets, a monthly bus-card, a guided visit to Tivoli,
admission to the Museum of the Galleria Borghese and numerous
guided tours in Rome. A total of $7,900 was awarded in scholarships
to deserving students. |
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ITL 312K:
Second-Year Italian Language and Culture I.
3 credit hours, taught by Antonella Olson.
The focus of this course is
on a partial review of first year grammar with emphasis on listening,
speaking, reading, and writing. As in the past, it had a very
similar curriculum to the ITL 312K offered on the UT campus during
a long semester, so that students are able to go on in the fall
in ITL 312L-fourth semester with the same preparation. The city
of Rome is a living laboratory in which students can improve
their language skills, vocabulary and immerse themselves completely
in the Italian culture and environment. At the end of the session,
the 312K students read the prologue from Machiavelli's La
Mandragola.
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ITC 349:
Rome, Eternal City: Myths and Realities.
3 credit hours, taught by Douglas Biow.
This is an interdisciplinary course taught in English with focus
on the powerful myths of Rome-political, religious, cultural-from
antiquity to the present. The analysis of historical, literary,
and cinematic works was added to the artistic and architectural
resources of the city itself. The study was enriched by visits
to sites such as the Forum, Coliseum, Vatican Museums, Galleria
Borghese, etc. Students appreciated immensely the field trips
and learned how to look around themselves to discover and recognize
the many treasures of Rome. |
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ITC 365:
Contemporary Italian Culture.
3 credit hours, taught by Douglas Biow and Antonella Olson.
This is an upper-division course taught in Italian. This year,
it focused on Niccolò Machiavelli's La Mandragola and
its ties with Italian contemporary society. At the end of the semester,
students gave a "lettura recitata" of
the play. The performance of these challenging play was impressive
and the students' commitment remarkable. The host-families--our
audience--were enthusiastic. |
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The Palazzo Antici-Mattei has
been used as classroom space since summer 1999. The Centro Studi
Americani (CSA) is one of the major Italian libraries of American
Studies and is situated in the majestic Palazzo Antici-Mattei,
a seventeenth-century palace. Its rooms are frescoed by Tuscan
and Flemish painters of the early seventeenth century. The CSA
provided and will provide again next year a spacious, elegant
and distinct environment for our students.
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Included in the program's cost:
- 1) Two orientation sessions
in Rome;
- 2) a guided visit to the Vatican
City: Vatican Museums, Sistine Chapel, San Pietro;
- 3) a guided visit to the Museum
of the Galleria Borghese;
- 4) a visit to an Italian high-school;
- 5)
a guided visit to the studios of Cinecittà;
- 6) a guided visit to Tivoli
(Villa Adriana, Villa D'Este)
Optional field trips organized
by the Director:
- 1) A three days visit to Genoa,
Nervi and San Fruttuoso;
2) A three days visit to Naples, Sorrento, Capri and Pompeii
3) A three days visit to Circeo.
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