FYSP 148 - Hollywood’s Italians: How Legends are Made

FC ARHU WINT

4 credits
This seminar explores Italian-American history, starting with a visit to Cleveland’s Little Italy during Oberlin’s Connect Cleveland event. In this seminar, students will engage with films and readings on topics such as displacement, citizenship, bilingualism, rejection, and integration while analyzing the portrayal of Italian-Americans in films, from early stereotypes to more nuanced representations, through the works of filmmakers like Howard Hawks, Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Brian De Palma, and Spike Lee and more. This seminar will dive deeply into Italian-American experiences, fostering critical analysis and empathy with themes including bias, identity, and cultural transformation.