21th Century Literature

The aim of the course is to provide a solid basic training in the field of contemporary Italian, European and non-European (but in European languages) literature, according to two perspectives. The first, of a critical, methodological and theoretical nature, aims to intro-duce students to the understanding of the functioning of the contemporary literary system, observed synchronically and against the background of the historical dynamics of the 20th century. The second, of a monographic nature, intends to train them in the critical analysis of single works and paradigmatic authors.

Knowledge: 1) Understanding of the constitutive roles and functions of the contemporary literary system: author, readership, critical and editorial mediation. 2) Understanding of the interactions between literature and other media. 3) Understanding of concepts and methods for the analysis and interpretation of the text in its various articulations (themes, narrative structures, stylistic, rhetorical, metrical devices); awareness of the plurality of possible perspectives of investigation on literary works. 4) Knowledge of the criteria for bibliographical identification of texts.
Competences: 1) Ability to identify the main expressive features (structural, thematic, sty-listic) specific to a work and to recognise the traits of an author's identity. Ability to de-scribe textual choices as modes of dialogue between author and readers and to situate works in different genres. Ability to correctly employ an appropriate critical vocabulary to describe texts. 2) Ability to recognise the set of functional relationships that define the contemporary literary system, also in relation to other media systems, and to grasp their contribution in shaping the physiognomy of texts. 3) Ability to use the critical and theoret-ical essays in the reading list to support one's own discourse on works and context.