Intercultural Relations

This course aims to provide the theoretical and analytical tools that are necessary for engaging with scholarly research in the field of migration and ethnic relations. Some particular attention will be focused on the notion of citizenship and its variations across space and time. The course will also deal with an additional number of novel questions referring to access to the public sphere, acquisition of citizenship, models of political representation/participation, and growing generations of citizens of migrant descent within contemporary democracies. Issues of intercultural relations will be tackled in times of growing migration and intensifying of cultural differences.

By the end of course, students will acquire full knowledge of different approaches to intercultural relations in social sciences; they will acquire full knowledge of main notions such as assimilation, integration, multiculturalism, universalism, interculturalism and citizenship; at the same time, they will distinguish the effects of citizenship transformations across the public and the policy domain. Within a broader comparative context (both at the European and at the international level), students will acknowledge the specificities of the Italian case in terms of intercultural relations, citizenship policies as well as social and political action.