Module Identifier IT30310  
Module Title THE LANGUAGE OF CURRENT AFFAIRS 2  
Academic Year 2000/2001  
Co-ordinator Elisabetta Tarantino  
Semester Semester 1  
Pre-Requisite (Normally) eligibility for entry to Level 3 Italian.  
Co-Requisite (Normally) IT30130  
Course delivery Contact Hours   15 Hours (10 one-and-a-half hour lessons/seminars)  
Assessment Exam   2 Hours written exam. (One translation and one summary from Italian into English.)   60%  
  Continuous assessment   10 written assignments OR 7 written assignments PLUS one web page production exercise   40%  

Learning outcomes
At the end of this course, students should

Brief description
This module aims to familiarise students with the language of current affairs (typically, as it appears in daily newspapers and weekly magazines). It also hopes to broaden the students' awareness of and curiosity towards the reality of contemporary Italy.

Lectures will be based, on a rota, on current newspaper or magazine articles or on material available in Robert Lumley' text (see below), which covers topics such as racism, political satire, terrorism, and the Tangentopoli scandal.

Students will be asked to prepare the material beforehand for discussion in class and then produce one piece of homework per week consisting, alternately, of a translation, a summary, or answers to the exercises in the Lumley text.

N.B. As an alternative to handing in three of the above pieces of work, students will be given the opportunity (and, if required, the necessary technical support) to produce a web page based on a current affairs article, with links explaining or illustrating relevant aspects of Italian culture, history, or politics.

Reading Lists
Books
Lumley, Robert. (1996) Italian Journalism. A Critical Anthology. MUP