MODERN HISTORY

The course aims to provide the notions to acquire the basic knowledge of the method and tools of the historian's work. To provide knowledge of the periods, aspects, problems, events and most significant personalities relating to the period from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century from a general historical-geographical point of view. To make the educator more aware of historical changes and the related cultural and social conditioning.

The expected learning objectives, according to the Dublin descriptors, are the following:

Knowledge and understanding (DD1)

•     To know theories and models in the historical-geographical area to interpret educational and training events (Core1)
•     To know theories and methodologies of empirical research (Core 2)
•     To know the theories useful to interpret historiographic dynamics (Core 4)

Applied knowledge and understanding (DD2)

•      To link the theoretical and methodological contents learned to the interpretation of events and processes past, present, future (Core1)
•     To be able to choose methods, techniques and tools functional to the subjects and contexts of reference (Core 3)
•     To know how to intervene in relational dynamics using methods and tools to manage situations at different levels (individual, organisational and community) (Core 4)
•     Knowing how to use methodologies appropriate to the training objectives (Core 5)

Autonomy of judgement (DD3)

•      Evaluate the relevance of the theories studied with respect to the situations faced and the actions managed and/or observed (Core1)
•     To know how to evaluate the connection between the objectives and the results of the research (Core 2)
•     To be able to evaluate the tools used in historical research (Core 2).
•      To be able to advance, formulate and argue proposals for change and transformation (Core 4)

Communication skills (DD4)

•     To be able to communicate projects (Core 3)
•     Knowing how to deal with interlocutors, specialists and not (Core 3)
•     Being able to communicate the meaning of one's actions (Core 4)
•     Being able to justify objectives, procedures, methodologies in oral and written form (Core 4)
•     Be able to activate sharing processes (Core 5)
•     Knowing how to value the different points of view involved (Core 5)

Learning capacity (DD5)

•  To be able to identify unexpected results of research and its possible developments in terms of methodology and impact.
• To be able to identify one's own training needs

The prevailing didactic method will be the lecture, spaced out with discussion, working  group  and seminarial meetings.For attending students there is an optional on-going test. Each small group (or single student) is required to present orally, and (in view of the final exam) with a short written report, explanation and comment on a text chosen from the recommended ones

The course is divided into two modules:The general part provides precise knowledge and the study of the following topics:The breaking of geographical barriers - the explorations and the discovery of America - The birth of colonial empires - Italy and Europe in the sixteenth century - the splendor of the Italian Renaissance - the wars of Italy - the Protestant Reformation - the Counter-Reformation and the Council of Trent - new wars for dominance over Europe - The Seventeenth-century Europe Seventeenth century - The absolute monarchy in France - The parliamentary monarchy in England - Italy in the Seventeenth century - The scientific revolution - The early Eighteenth century - The new Enlightenment culture - Europe and eighteenth-century Italy - The world to Europeans: the colonial empiresThe age of the Revolutions - The first industrial revolution - The American revolution and the birth of the United States of America - The French Revolution - The Napoleonic age.

The Monographic part proposes the study of different themes to be chosen respectively:

- The century of Enlightenment and the law as a social structure and expression of collective mentalities.

- History of Queens and Court Life in the Early Modern Age

General Part

F. Benigno, L’età moderna. Dalla scoperta dell’America alla Restaurazione, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2005, pp. 3 -360.

A. Trampus, Mappe del tempo. La storia e le altre scienze umane, Unicopli, 2021

Monographic Part

a) The century of Enlightenment and the law as a social structure and expression of collective mentalities.

 R. Tufano, Verso la giustizia produttiva. Un’esperienza di riforma nelle Sicilie del Settecento, Arte Tipografica, Napoli 2013, cap.1-2 pp.1-82; R.   Tufano, Illuminismo e governamentalità. Riformismo e dispotismo nelle Sicilie da Filippo V a Ferdinando IV, Aracne, Roma, 2018, Introduzione pp. 21-32, II parte pp. 209-356.

  b) Stories of queens and court life during early modern age

C. Recca, Sentimenti e Politica. Il diario inedito della regina Maria Carolina di Napoli, Milano, FrancoAngeli, 2014, pp.9-68 . COMBINED WITH C. Recca, The diary of Maria Carolina of Naples,1781-1785, New York London, Palgrave, 2018 pp. 1-108;  C.Recca  Io, la Regina II. Maria Carolina d’Asburgo- Lorena e il suo tempo. Quaderni di Mediterranea-ricerche storiche,  37 2020,

For attending- students

Each small group (or individual student) is required to present orally, and (in view of the final exam) with a short written report, the analysis and commentary on one or two texts chosen from those listed monograph course.

Erasmus students or workers or master's degree students who have chosen the discipline can agree on alternative programs with the teacher.