Courses

THE PROGRAM OF STUDY: Students choose any two courses from the offerings. The courses make every effort to use the resources of the city of Rome in their curriculum. All courses in Rome satisfy the University Scholars program seminar requirements. The courses typically offered in the Summer Rome program are listed below.

1) General program courses that meet Xavier University core requirements:

ARTS 112 The Aesthetic Experience: Rome in Film - Prof. Kelly Blank
Creative Perspectives
In this course, students will discuss and analyze cinematic representations of the City of Rome in Italian and American film. We will assess the ways in which the urban, social, cultural, and political history of the Eternal City have influenced the portrayal of Rome as a “character” in film. We will consider representations of Roman monuments and locations constructed in film studios vs. on-location shooting. In this course, we will examine five main topics regarding Rome in film: Images of Ancient Rome; Neorealism; Americans in Rome; Fellini’s Rome; and Urban Angst. Students will visit important film locations in the city both in class and on their own. The class will visit the film studios of Cinecittà. Films will be shown in Italian with English subtitles.

ARTS 113 Art in Rome - Prof. Suzanne Chouteau
Creative Perspectives
This 3-week intensive class introduces students to the art and architectural wonders of Italy spanning ancient to modern times. Rome is a historic center of great art, culture and learning. Students not only get immersed in Rome, but also have opportunities to visit other cities in Italy including Florence, Siena and Assisi as part of the Rome Study Abroad program. In each locale we see as many of the most important art works as we possibly can by artists like Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Titian and Caravaggio in places such as the Borghese Gallery, the Vatican, St. Peter’s, and the Uffizi Gallery. This variety of masterworks is seen on-site in churches, museums, and on the streets. We spend roughly five hours each day in the city looking at art, sharing the historical record, and drawing or writing from it. Students realize that humans across many centuries have created profoundly brilliant and beautiful works from architecture to sculpture to painting and everything in between. Studying art in Rome brings history to life in ways that the classroom cannot, thus encouraging students to foster a life-long passion for researching and seeking out the world’s treasures—both natural and human-made.

ARTS 113 is capped at 12 students, with seats reserved for art majors. All other students (including non-art majors seeking the 3 week option) will be placed in the course based on the date of their deposit.

PHYS 126/127 Science or Art and Architecture - Prof. Marco Fatuzzo
Natural Science Elective or Scientific Perspectives - both carry the QR flag
How can a church be used to make astronomical measurements?  What does a statue in Campo de Fiori and a painting in the Sistine Chapel have to do with the structure of our Universe?  How can you use a particle accelerator to read ancient writings from a scroll that was charred in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD, or to reconstruct hidden portraits?  These are just some of the questions we will explore in this course designed exclusively for the Rome program.  And our exploration will include trips to the Pantheon, the Forum, St. Peter's,  Brunelleschi’s Dome in Florence, the Sistine chapel, the Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli, and who knows where else.

PHIL 200 or PHIL 351 Italian Philosophy - Prof. E. Paul Colella
PHIL 200 is a Philosophical Perspectives course
PHIL 351 can be taken as a Humanities Elective or as an ER/S Elective Flag (but not both)
For our class, the city of Rome itself is as much an indispensable required text to be read and interpreted.
The multiple Romes - The Rome of the Caesars, Christian Rome, the capital of the modern Italian nation (1870-1922), and the center of Mussolini’s fascist empire (1922-1943) will provide the materials for a study of collective political identity.  Specifically, we shall examine the manner in which a shared public identity is established, sustained and communicated through urban monumental space.  How are political and cultural ideals embodied in the architecture of the city, and how do they enter into dialogue with the monuments of past historical eras? How is it possible that the same images can be appropriated by successive regimes with different systems of ideas? Globalization and mass immigration, in Italy as well as in Europe have renewed the interest in these questions today.

THEO 344 Early Christianity in Rome - Prof. Anna Miller
Theological Perspective course

This course is a hybrid class which is conducted partly as an on-line course, and partly on site with lectures and site visits conducted in Rome. Rome is a uniquely rich environment to study the art, architecture, literature, and burial practices of the early Church in Rome.  We will explore these elements in order to illuminate the developing theology and community practices of these early Christians.  This theology class also establishes the place of Rome itself in the imagination of the early church, drawing on primary and secondary texts that relate the city to the evolving experience and identity of the earliest Christians.  The class’ textual work is enriched and complexified by visit to Greco-Roman and Christian archaeological sites in Rome.  While we intensify our understanding of the ancient Roman context with visits to locations like the Forum and ancient Ostia, we will also visit early Christian sites unique to Rome.  Among these sites, the Christian catacombs are particularly useful for challenging accepted wisdom about these earliest communities.  In our last weeks in the course, we will explore the art and archaeology of these catacombs as we consider questions of identity and communal practice among Christians. As part of our work together, we will also consider the ways in which archaeology in Rome may expand our understanding of early Christian women’s roles, showing women as active participants alongside men as martyrs, teachers, patrons, and celebrants at common meals.  

2) Courses for Early, Middle and Special Education Majors:

 PHYS 114/115 Our Universe: Physical Science - Prof. Marco Fatuzzo
Scientific Perspectives and QR flag

Requires a minimum of 4 students to be offered.  Students cannot also take ART113 due to time conflicts.

This course has been designed specifically for pre-service teachers. Students explore properties of matter, electric circuits, magnetism, kinematics, forces, and laws of motion through inquiry - a method that asks questions and requires students to seek answers and to acquire an understanding of basic scientific concepts, without relying on authority or the memorization of facts and formulas. Students perform their own experiments and develop scientific models using scientific and mathematical reasoning. Intended for Early and Middle Childhood Education, and Montessori Education Majors with an emphasis placed on the Ohio Academic content Standards.

3) Course for Italian Studies students:

ITAL 258 Language and Culture in Italy - Prof. Kelly Blank
Prerequisite: recent completion of ITAL 102 or above.
This communicative course will provide students participating in the Xavier summer program in Rome with an opportunity to use their language skills in context as well as learn and use other high-frequency structures and vocabulary. Through conversational practice, vocabulary building, and task completion, students will build on their language skills and cultural knowledge of Italy while being able to communicate more comfortably in everyday situations. The class will also have the opportunity to discuss culturally relevant themes while reinforcing new grammar and vocabulary through the reading of short stories, articles, and essays.