Major in Italian
The Italian major takes an integrative approach to prepare students to explore connections and understand the continuum from past to present while introducing Italian culture in all its manifestations. Students develop their critical and analytical skills through intellectual dialogue in small class settings and develop new perspectives and approaches to world issues through study abroad in Italy.
Italian majors at Georgetown are required to complete 10 courses in Italian. Note that many students will need to take a total of 12 courses in Italian, depending on their beginning level and results of the placement exam (i.e., 12 if they begin in Intensive Beginner, 11 if they begin in Intensive Intermediate, and 10 if they begin in Intensive Advanced I or above). Italian Majors are also required to spend a semester or an academic year in Italy studying at an Italian university.
Note for students with a background in Spanish or another Romance language: Students who are already fluent in Spanish or another Romance Language may take ITAL 1009 Italian for Spanish or Romance Language Speakers instead of ITAL 1011 Intensive Italian Language and Culture: Beginner. Students interested in ITAL 1009 should contact the professor teaching it before they register. Upon successful completion of ITAL 1009, students may enroll in ITAL 2010 or ITAL 2011 depending on the recommendation of the professor. Students who complete ITAL 2010 may enroll in a 2000-level class upon successful completion of the placement test.
Integrated Writing Requirement
Writing is central to the teaching of Italian at Georgetown. This emphasis comes from a Curriculum Renewal Project initiated by the Italian Department in 2005, which identified writing skills as a crucial area for unifying the curriculum from the language foundations to the upper courses and for the development of critical abilities that become necessary at higher levels of study. The Curriculum Renewal Project involved the design of specific writing tasks reflective of expected learner development at distinct levels of the language curriculum, the implementation of process writing throughout the curriculum, and the elaboration of specific writing goals. To learn more about writing goals at each level of instruction, please see http://italian.georgetown.edu/writingproject/outcomes
Overseas Studies
Georgetown has approved academic programs at the University of Florence (Middlebury), University of Bologna (Brown), and at universities in Milan through IES. For further information, consult the Office of Global Education website: studyabroad.georgetown.edu.
Requirements for the A.B. in Italian
10 Courses in the Italian Department, one of which may be taught in English. as follows:
Course List
| Code |
Title |
Credits |
| ITAL 2011 | ADV 1 Ital. Contemp Cult & Soc | 5 |
| ITAL 2012 | Adv.2 Ital. Tradit., Hist. Art | 5 |
| ITAL 2033 | Writing & Culture | 3 |
| 3 |
1 | |
| |
| Italian Soc. and Pop Culture 2 | |
| Ital Thrgh Art ItalRen Art (Sexuality, Gender, and Art in Early Italian Renaissance (1350-1550) ) 2 | |
| Italian Conversation Practicum | |
| 12 |
| |
| Medici: Renaissance Patrons | |
| It Renaissance Women Writers | |
| Bella Ciao! Women in It. Cult. 3 | |
| Monsters&MonstrosityinMedItaly | |
| Dante and the Medieval Mind | |
| Italian Actors and Actresses 2 | |
| Theater,Politics&Art:Ital Ren | |
| Boccaccio:Invntn of Storytllng | |
| DANTE'S AFTERLIFE POP CULTURE 2 | |
| Madness in Ital Lit/Theater 3 | |
| Love & Friendship in Medieval | |
| The Dark Prince 2 | |
| Dante | |
| |
| Italian Cinema: Adv. Journey | |
| Literature of United Italy | |
| Primo Levi and the Holocaust 2 | |
| Made in Italy: Fashion & Food 2 | |
| Ital. Songs Cantautori to Rap | |
| Mysteries Dante to Terrorism | |
| Mafia: Reality and Fiction | |
| Contemp Ital & Its Regnl Varie | |
| Ital Amer Lang/Lit/Film 2 | |
| Fictions of Europe 2 | |
| Language and Migration 2 | |
| Language and Migration | |
| DISCOURSE IDENTIT & NARRATIVE 2 | |
| Betrayals of Translation | |
| Farewell to Realism | |
| ITAL 4989 | Senior Seminar | 3 |
| ITAL 4460 | Dante | 3 |
| Total Credits | 34 |
Georgetown Core Curriculum
The Georgetown Core Curriculum (Georgetown Core) is a distinctive expression of Georgetown University’s identity as a student-centered research university rooted in the Jesuit and Catholic tradition. The Georgetown Core is a two-tiered program. The first tier – the “shared core” – has been created and approved by the Main Campus Core Curriculum Committee and is shared by all undergraduates as a common core experience. The second tier of the requirement – the “school-specific core” – is designed and determined by each of the undergraduate schools, embodying the shared learning goals of the university Core while furthering the specific mission and tradition of each school. Both the shared and school-specific cores change over time, balancing the traditional ethos of a liberal arts education with the changing needs of our students in a changing world. Ultimately, it is the hope that the entirety of a Georgetown education – the cores, majors and minors, and electives – will lead students to embody as life-long habits the goals described in the Georgetown Core Curriculum Learning Goals.
More information about the Georgetown Core Curriculum can be found on the Provost’s Core Curriculum website.
Georgetown Shared Core Requirements
The core requirements that form the first tier, the common experience across the University, are outlined below. Georgetown courses fulfilling each of these requirements are designated “Core: [specific requirement]” in the Attributes in the Schedule of Classes.
Philosophy – 2 Courses
Through the Core, the Philosophy Department is committed to providing courses that promote students’ personal growth as human beings in search of meaningful lives, foster their development as responsible citizens, and offer effective introductions to the discipline of philosophy. The learning goals shared by courses in the Philosophy Core are:
- Understand what philosophy is, how it differs from other academic disciplines, and what its primary areas of inquiry are.
- Understand and construct arguments.
- Describe and analyze complex problems.
- Read, write and speak effectively.
- Engage critically and constructively with moral problems and decisions.
- Apply philosophical analysis, argumentation, and critical reflection to the study of other disciplines.
Please refer to each school/college curriculum for specific courses that will fulfill this requirement.
Theology and Religious Studies – 2 Courses
Through the Core, the Theology and Religious Studies Department is committed to fostering in students a critically appreciative awareness of the religious dimension of human existence, and to assisting students in reflecting upon their own experience and understanding in that enlarged context. The first course provides this foundation while the second course allows students to develop their critical awareness by applying it to a particular area of interest in religion or theology.
The learning goals shared by courses in the Theology and Religious Studies Core are:
- To consider reflectively your relationship to the world, your fellow humans, and God.
- To foster a critically appreciative awareness of the religious dimension of human existence.
- To assist you in reflecting upon your own experience and understanding in that enlarged context.
- To develop your critical awareness by applying it to a particular area of interest in religion or theology.
Problem of God1 (THEO 1000) and one Theology and Religious Studies elective fulfill the Theology and Religious Studies requirement. Introduction to Biblical Literature (THEO 1100) may be substituted for Problem of God or may be used as an intermediate level elective.
Writing – 2 Courses
The writing requirement provides students with opportunities to connect their writing with critical reading and thinking, inquiry, and analysis. The Writing and Culture Seminar, WRIT 1150, approaches writing through three interrelated frameworks: writing as a tool for inquiry, writing as a process, and practice writing in different rhetorical situations. Each section focuses on a cultural theme, with readings and assignments that engage students with compelling questions and problems. Seminar readings provide texts for analysis as well as models and motives for student writing. Students are encouraged to complete this course during their first year at Georgetown. The learning goals shared by different sections in the Writing and Culture Seminar are:
- Experiment with diverse strategies for planning, drafting, and revising writing.
- Adapt writing to respond to, engage, and persuade audiences.
- Employ rhetorical strategies for analyzing, designing, and communicating in writing and other forms of media.
- Engage in writing as a form of thinking, inquiry, and learning.
The second half of the Writing Core is an intensive writing experience located within the student’s chosen major, embedded within the requirements as determined by that program. Each major’s Integrated Writing requirement is established by the department or program in order to express the unique conventions and practices of the discipline. The learning goals shared by courses in the Integrated Writing Core are:
- To prepare students to use the relevant forms, styles, and conventions of writing within their chosen major(s).
- To employ writing as a method to enhance students’ learning of concepts, materials, and methods in their major.
Courses fulfilling this requirement are identified within each major.
Humanities: Art, Literature, Music, and Media (HALM) – 1 Course
(Formerly Humanities: Art, Literature and Culture (HALC))
The Humanities: Art, Literature, Music, and Media (HALM) requirement serves to deepen students’ understanding and experience of a range of creative media representing cultural expressions from various historical periods and world regions, from the local to the global.
Through reading, listening, viewing, analyzing, writing, and/or creative practice, students acquire the intellectual and practical tools to interpret human experiences portrayed in the arts, literature, music, and media.
HALM Learning Goals:
-
Understand how art, literature, music and/or media have historically shaped and been shaped by cultures.
-
Develop generative habits of mind and exercise critical thinking skills for a world in flux: openness, resilience, curiosity, creativity, imagination.
-
Activate knowledge through creative, analytical, and/or critical approaches in individual, collaborative, and/or public-facing projects.
HALM courses must be Georgetown University courses and cannot be fulfilled by transfer credits; they must be 3-credit courses. Courses that can fulfill other Core requirements (such as HIST, PHIL, THEO) are ineligible.
In 2026-27, the older “HALC” designation (Humanities: Arts, Literature, and Culture) will be replaced with HALM (Humanities: Arts, Literature, Music and Media). For this academic year, courses with the designation will be tagged with both HALC and HALM. In Fall 2027, the tag HALC will be retired in favor of HALM.
Science For All – 1 Course
The natural sciences, and the technologies that they enable, are woven deeply into the fabric of our lives and are central to many of the important political and social challenges that we face. They are also pinnacles of intellectual accomplishment in humanity’s ancient and ongoing quest to understand the world in which we live. Thus we believe that to function as liberally educated, ethically responsible citizens, as stewards of the planet, and as effective leaders, all Georgetown students should understand scientific modes of thought and concepts, both in the abstract and as they are exemplified in at least one major area of scientific inquiry. The Science For All (SFA) Core requirement is grounded in these beliefs. The learning goals shared by courses in the Science for All Core are:
- To understand the basic principles and some current research challenges of one or more areas of science.
- To understand science as a set of methods of inquiry that involve forming and testing hypotheses through the analysis of quantitative and qualitative data.
- To consume and interpret scientific information with critical understanding of the balance of certainty and uncertainty that research findings inevitably reflect.
Quantitative Reasoning and Data Literacy – 1 Course
This requirement applies only to students in the class of 2028 and later.
The Quantitative Reasoning and Data Literacy (QRDL) requirement will help students learn to understand how real-world interpretation of data progresses from a set of numbers, frequently incomplete and with measurement errors, to a visual distillation that clearly conveys meaning. While mathematics and statistics provide a necessary foundation for quantitative reasoning and data literacy, the power of pure mathematics lies in its abstraction. In contrast, QRDL emphasizes a distinctive variety of concrete contexts and applications. The learning goals shared by courses in the Quantitative Reasoning and Data Literacy Core are:
- To build a quantitative toolbox that allows students to become comfortable performing and/or evaluating quantitative analyses.
- To translate and make meaning of data and quantitative analyses as they apply to complex problems.
- To effectively communicate statistical methods and results both visually and textually to a diversity of audiences with considerations to contextual, social, or ethical issues.
Engaging Diversity/Pathways to Social Justice
For students in the class of 2025, 2026, or 2027
Engaging Diversity (2 courses)
All Georgetown students are required to take two Engaging Diversity courses as overlays, meaning that the courses may count toward another degree requirement (Core, major, or minor). One of these courses must be labeled with a “Core: Diversity Domestic” attribute and one must be labeled with a “Core: Diversity Global” attribute.
In courses designated as fulfilling a diversity requirement, students will engage with different cultures, beliefs, and ideas. These courses will explore conditions that contribute to unequal access and influence. Finally, these courses should enable students to reflect on their own identities as they also deepen their understanding of the experience of others. The learning goals shared by courses in the Engaging Diversity Core are:
- To prepare students to be responsible, reflective, self-aware and respectful global citizens through recognizing the plurality of human experience and engaging with different cultures, beliefs, and ideas.
- To be better able to appreciate and reflect upon how human diversity and human identities shape our experience and understanding of the world.
For students in the class of 2028 and later
Pathways to Social Justice (3 courses)
Georgetown’s Pathways to Social Justice (PSJ) curriculum prepares students to critically analyze historical and contemporary power differentials. By fulfilling the Pathways to Social Justice requirement, students will gain a better understanding of how social, political, geographic, economic, and other cultural factors shape experiences of the world, as well as how these factors contribute to marginalization and inequality. PSJ courses will also explore how communities have resisted marginalization, and will focus on axes of identity that have formed the basis for historical and contemporary marginalization and oppression, including race, gender, class, caste, disability, religion, sexual orientation, and gender identity.
A cornerstone of this requirement is the one-credit University Seminar in Race, Power, and Justice which is designed to ensure that every student at Georgetown develops a baseline vocabulary for discussing racial difference and marginalization. This seminar will provide the foundation for each student’s engagement with other PSJ-attributed “overlay” courses offered across Georgetown’s Main Campus and should be taken in the first year.
In addition to the required one-credit University Seminar in Race, Power, and Justice, the requirement also requires students to take two overlay courses (meaning that these courses may count toward another degree requirement, whether core, major, or minor). Eligible courses have the “Core: PSJ” attribute.
Each course in the Pathways to Social Justice Core works toward at least three of these shared priorities:
- Inclusive Scholarship
- Intersectional Approaches to Identity
- Historical Legacies of Inequality and Their Contemporary Impacts
- National, Regional, and Global Comparisons
- Imagining Justice
