GERMANIC PHILOLOGY
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- Versione italiana
- Academic year
- 2015/2016
- Teacher
- MARIALUISA CAPARRINI
- Credits
- 12
- Didactic period
- Secondo Semestre
- SSD
- L-FIL-LET/15
Training objectives
- The course is an introduction to Germanic Philology and it aims at providing students with a basic knowledge to approach:
1) the study of Medieval Germanic cultures and literatures;
2) the study of Old Germanic Languages.
Furthermore, the course aims at providing students with a basic knowledge to approach the study of texts written in medieval Germanic languages.
By the end of the course students will be able to
read, translate and analyse autonomously medieval Germanic texts.
The acquisition of this knowledge, together with the contents described below, represents the main learning aims and objectives of the course. Prerequisites
- None
Course programme
- The course is structured as follows:
A) Introduction to Germanic Philology: contents, aims, methodology and overview of the history and culture of Germanic peoples.
B) Introduction to Germanic historical and comparative linguistics: analysis of the main phonological and morphological structures of the medieval Germanic languages.
C) Germanic Cosmogonic Poetry: full reading, translation and linguistic analysis of Caedmon's Hymn (Old English), of the Wessobrunn Prayer (Old High German), of some sections of the Voluspa (3-5) (Old Norse) and of lines 90b-98 of Beowulf (Old English). Didactic methods
- Lectures. Students will be invited to read short sections of the texts which are analysed during the course in order to learn how to correctly pronounce Old German languages.
Learning assessment procedures
- Oral exam.
Students are required to answer questions concerning the discipline and its methodological approaches; the history and culture of the Germanic peoples; the historical and comparative Germanic linguistics (prosody; vowel and consonant system; morphology; analysis of a lemma); the texts explained during the lectures. Students are also required to read, to translate and to perform a linguistic and philological analysis of sections of the texts. Reference texts
- Bibliography:
A) Introduction to Germanic Philology
Maria Vittoria Molinari, Filologia germanica, Bologna: Zanichelli, 1987 (2° ediz.).
B) Germanic historical and comparative linguistics:
Maria Grazia Saibene, Marina Buzzoni, Manuale di linguistica germanica, Milano: Cisalpino, 2006. In particolare: pp. 3-27; 35-41; 42-71; 75-100; 107-110; 115-126; 127-154; 201-231; 269-307.
C) Germanic Cosmogonic Poetry:
S.B. Greenfield / D.G. Calder, A New Critical History of the Old English Literature, New York / London: New York University Press 1986, p. 229.
Kevin Kiernan, Reading Caedmon’s “Hymn” with Someone Else’s Glosses, in Roy Liuzza (ed. by), Old English Literature: Critical Essays, Yale: Yale University Press 2002, pp. 103-124; il testo è disponibile al seguente link: http://www.uky.edu/~kiernan/ReadingCH/ReadingCH.html
Wilhelm Braune / Ernst A. Ebbinghaus, Althochdeutsches Lesebuch, 17. Aufl., Tübingen: Niemeyer 1994, pp. 85-86.
Claudia Händl, Dalle origini all’età precortese (La letteratura tedesca medievale, volume I), Pisa: ETS 1995, pp. 17-20, 30-32.
Marcello Meli, Voluspá. Un’apocalisse norrena, Roma: Carocci 2008, pp. 16-52, 60-71.
Giuseppe Brunetti (a c. di), Beowulf, Roma: Carocci 2003, Introduzione pp. 7-75, Manoscritto e riproduzioni pp. 78-79, vv. 90b-98 pp. 102-103.
Marco Battaglia, Medioevo volgare germanico, Pisa: Pisa University Press, 2014, cap. 2 (La tradizione letteraria alto tedesca antica) pp. 25-48, cap. 3 (La letteratura anglosassone) pp. 49-89, cap. 5 (La tradizione letteraria della Scandinavia medioevale) pp. 105-139.
Further suggested readings:
Giulia Mazzuoli Porru, Manuale di inglese antico, Pisa: Giardini, 1992.
Augusto Scaffidi Abbate, Introduzione allo studio dell’antico tedesco e dei suoi documenti letterari, Roma: Istituto Italiano di Studi Germanici, 1989.
Yvonne S. Bonnetain, Breve grammatica dell’islandese antico, Trieste: Edizioni Parnaso 2001.
Student not attending the lectures are also required to study the following texts:
Piergiuseppe Scardigli, Teresa Gervasi, Avviamento all’etimologia inglese e tedesca, Firenze: Le Monnier 1978, pp. 1-94.
Marco Battaglia, I Germani. Genesi di una cultura europea, Roma: Carocci 2013, pp. 59-77, 109-129, 149-173, 175-198, 199-247, 249-266, 317-326.
