Course Catalogue

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This course explores the role of mountains in shaping (and re-shaping) Italy's material and cultural identity. By reading poems and stories that intersect the physical reality of rocks, rivers, and lakes, as well as Alpine and Appennine flora and fauna, it aims to approach Italian mountain landscapes as layered texts that enrich our view of Italian society, ecology, and politics, as plural entities always in the making.  

20 x 1 hour seminar sessions  

Available to all students fulfilling requirements for Honours entry into one of the SMLC Honours programmes, and by arrangement to visiting students or students of other Honours programmes who qualify under the University's 25% regulation.

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Essay (3000 words) - 75%

Written or Oral Report (1000 words/10 mins) - 25%

Reassessments are normally available for all courses, except those which contribute to the Honours classification. Where, exceptionally, reassessment on Honours courses is required to satisfy professional/accreditation requirements, only the overall course grade achieved at the first attempt will contribute to the Honours classification. For non-Honours courses, students are offered reassessment in all or any of the components of assessment if the satisfactory (threshold) grade for the overall course is not achieved at the first attempt. This is normally grade D3 for undergraduate students and grade C3 for postgraduate students. Exceptionally it may not be possible to offer reassessment of some coursework items, in which case the mark achieved at the first attempt will be counted towards the final course grade. Any such exceptions for this course are described below. 

This course aims to:

■ examine the political, social, and cultural relevance of mountains in the negotiation of Italian identity

■ investigate the ecological complexity of Italian border landscapes

■ discuss the effectiveness of a material ecocritical reading of mountains as texts

■ individuate in mountain literature a multifarious set of stratigraphic narratives, alternative to monolithic national discourses

■ encourage students to engage in close reading of the rhetorical strategies through which authors reflect upon and represent mountains' storied matter

By the end of this course students will be able to:

■ question received, simplifying views of Italian landscapes as comforting and aesthetically pleasing, and complicate them through engagement with mountains' ecological fragility

■ evaluate the ideological and sociological relevance of shifting mountain frontiers during Italy's long twentieth century

■ analyse the texts studied in relation to historical context and relevant ecocritical frameworks

■ undertake independent research, engage with secondary sources, and apply critical tools to the analysis of primary texts

■ effectively communicate their understanding of the works analysed, both through traditional academic writing and creative (oral, visual, and/or written) analysis of texts

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.