Fall Semester C1/C2 Italian Language Program – Advanced Plus
The Fall semester Direct Enrollment: University for Foreigners program consists of two separate courses as follows:
1-month course – September (Level C1)
3-month course – October through December (Level C2)
This program is for advanced students who start their Italian language learning at the Common European Framework Level C1 (first level advanced), and after completing the one-month course, continue to study at the Level C2 (second level advanced) for the remaining three-month course.
This program is taught entirely in Italian with the majority of the program taught at the Università per Stranieri di Perugia, and two tutorial hours per week at the Umbra Institute.
Weekly Schedule
C1
Students in the advanced proficiency Level C1 may choose from three curricular tracks: Linguistic, Cultural, or Technical/Business.
Each program covers topics in advanced linguistic studies, including phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics, dialects and historical linguistics, and supplements the linguistic program with one elective course chosen from a variety of offerings in the humanities and social sciences.
Total hours of lessons per week: 24 hours
Tutorial Sessions with Umbra Instructors: 2 hours/week
C2
Students in the advanced proficiency Level C2 may choose from three curricular tracks: Linguistic, Cultural, or Technical/Business.
Each program covers topics in advanced linguistic studies, including phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, pragmatics, dialects and historical linguistics, and supplements the linguistic program with three elective courses chosen from a variety of offerings in the humanities and social sciences.
Total hours of lessons per week: 27 hours
Tutorial Sessions with Umbra Instructors: 2 hours/week
Elective courses focus on various aspects of Italian history, culture, society and linguistics and include courses such as: History of Italian Cinema, History of Italian Theater, Contemporary Italian Literature, Art History, Contemporary Art, Sociolinguistics, Business Communications, the Language of the Mass Media, and Psycholinguistics. While these courses are designed to introduce and study a particular subject matter, they principally utilize the subject matter as a tool for further enhancing language proficiency.
Prerequisites
The C1 program accepts students who have attended the second level Intermediate course (B2) or students who have been placed in C1 as a result of the placement exam. Also students who have a CELI 3 (the internationally recognized certificate of Italian language proficiency issued by the Università per Stranieri) or an equivalent Italian Language Certificate issued by institutions similar to the Università, have a direct access to the C1 level. Then, after the first month, the move to C2 level is acknowledged by passing an exam at the Università. Normally, this program is too advanced for an undergraduate student arriving from the U.S., because it requires the student to pass to level C2 (a level often used by European teachers of Italian as a foreign language in their home countries) after only one month of study. Therefore, if you are interested in this program, you must talk with the Coordinator of the Full Immersion program, Francesco Burzacca, before advancing to C2 in October.
Objectives and grammatical background
Starting at a first advanced level, the program C1/C2 aims first to consolidate those linguistic skills required in a very fluent and possibly much structured or thematically specialized interaction with native speakers (see objectives for level C1). Moving to the C2 level means becoming part of a selective study group, made up of very experienced, nearly native-speaking students, whose mastery of the Italian language make them able to interact in every linguistic situation with the most appropriate lexical repertory and who possess a very advanced written and oral communicative ability.
At this level, advanced grammatical competency must be considered an already stable intellectual acquisition, subject to deepening through the activities proposed by the instructors.
Transcripts
UMBRA TRANSCRIPT AWARDED – Levels C1/C2:
ITLN 501 Advanced Italian – 5 credits
SOIT 450 Civiltà Italiana: Italian Culture and Society – 5 credits
ITST 490 Advanced Italian I: Special Topics (elective course*) – 3 credits
ITST 491 Advanced Italian II: Special Topics (elective course*) – 3 credits
*There are a variety of elective courses that are on offer to you at the C1/C2 level. Examples of elective courses are: History of Italian Cinema, Art History, Contemporary History, and History of Italian Music.
Note