CIVILIZATION AND LANGUAGE OF MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY GREECE

The course is intended to provide, beyond the fundamentals of modern Greek language, a general knowledge of modern and contemporary Greek civilization (literature, myth, folklore, history, art, music), through the analysis of the “vicissitudes” of loanwords, the relationship between cinema and Greek history/civilization, the historiographical and philological prejudices, and literary and philological questions. The aim is also to give students an opportunity to satisfy the increasingly demanding expectations of job market with a broader liberal arts perspective, for favouring professions in education, tourism, journalism, business management, international relations, politics, publishing work. In this regard the course can be considered preliminary to the achievement of the International Certification of Attainment in Modern Greek Language (Hellenic Ministry of Education) in order to be employed in the touristic, editorial, or commercial field; and besides it follows the ministry guidelines for teaching in Italian state secondary schools.

Together with the possibility of efficiently communicating in modern Greek, the program aims to introduce students - through the topoi of the “different”, the “crime”, and the “escape/journey” - to the critical investigation of texts (literature, cinema, and music) and historical sources, and to the knowledge of the relations among Greece, Europe, and Turkey in modern and contemporary age, highlighting the contrast between ideal and actual language, the conflict between urban imaginary and town plan, among engagement, contestation and dictatorship, the woma and the weak/,disabled, the phenomena of migrancy and diaspora as well as the processes of constructing the national identity. The syllabus comprises three modules (see below). The program also allows a breath of scope to multimedia applications (electronic media management of texts and search engines in Greek, film screening, listening to music), and to workshop drills of translation (literary, touristic, commercial, journalistic).

Module A: “Is Modern Greek language in crisis?”. Aspects of modern Greek language (and the literary translation) and its relations with Italian language: “One face, one race”?

1. - M. Peri, Gli scambi linguistici fra Italia e Grecia. Compendio di una storia dimenticata, in M. Peri - A. Kolonia (eds.), Greco antico, neogreco e italiano. Dizionario dei prestiti e dei parallelismi, Bologna 2008, pp. 26-102 (only for students who cannot attend class, or in substitution of S.Nicosia. E. Giakumaki, V. Rotolo).
2. - S. Nicosia, Etimologie neogreche, and E. Giakumaki, Della sorte di alcuni prestiti italiani in neogreco. Mutamenti semantici in senso dispregiativo, in Italia e Grecia: Due culture a confronto. Atti del III Convegno Nazionale di Studi Neogreci, Palermo 1991, pp. 93-103, 195-199.
3. - V. Rotolo, L’insegnamento del neogreco nelle scuole italiane, in Id., Scritti sulla lingua greca antica e moderna, Palermo 2009, pp. 373-377.
4. - K. Papatheu, Le dieci “Storie di Corfù” di Konstantinos Theotokis. Glossario greco-italiano, Roma 2014; or A. Di Gregorio, Vademecum del traduttore. Idee e strumenti per una nuova figura di traduttore, Roma 2014 [157 p.];
5. - Fundamentals of Modern Greek Language (handouts; comics, puzzles, advertising material, articles on lifestyle, different types of modern songs: hip hop, rap, pop, rock, rebetika, etc.)..).

Module B “Proud to be Greek”. Greece in movies: myth or reality? - Everyday Greece: traditions, and contradictions.

1. - M. Peri, M. Herzfeld, S. Barberani (eds.), La politica culturale del fascismo nel Dodecaneso, Padova 2009, pp. 15-48, 63-73, 137-148.
2. - K. Papatheu (ed.), Greci e turchi. Appunti fra letteratura, musica e storia, Acireale-Roma 2007, pp. 35-77, 117-149.
3. - Movies: Zorba il greco, dir. by M. Cacoyannis (1964); Mediterraneo, dir. by G. Salvatores (1991); Il mio grosso grasso matrimonio greco, dir. by J. Zwick (2002); Un tocco di zenzero, dir. by T. Boulmetis.
4. - Readings: K. Papatheu, Le dieci “Storie di Corfù” di Konstantinos Theotokis, Padova 2014; A. Arslan, La masseria delle allodole; J. Eugenides, Middlesex, o N. Kazantzakis, Zorba il greco.

Module C “Does fear come from Athens?”. Madonnas, Maddalenes, monsters, migrants, corrupts, escapees and tax evaders, and other derelicts and crimes.

1. - M. Vitti, Storia della letteratura neogreca, Roma 2001 (pp. 195-434: only the authors suggested in class).
2. - G. Spadaro, La novella della Matrona di Efeso in un testo greco medievale, in Id., Letteratura Cretese e Rinascimento Italiano, Soveria Mannelli 1994, pp. 207-229.
3. - M. Peri, Donna/Donnola, in La presenza femminile nella letteratura neogreca, Atti del VI Convegno Nazionale di Studi Neogreci (Roma, 19-21 nov. 2001), a c. di A. Proiou - A. Armati, Roma 2003, pp. 31-40.
4. - K. Papatheu, L’universo dei derelitti e il mondo dell’idillio, Acireale-Roma 2011 (one chap. of your own choice).
5. - Readings: K. Papatheu, Disagio della parola. Voci della letteratura greca contemporanea (Appunti sparsi), Padova 2014; T. Patrikios, Le parole nude, Interlinea 2013; a novel of your own choice of Pètros Màrkaris or V. Caposella, Tefteri. Il libro dei conti in sospeso.