OPPORTUNITIES FOR
STUDENTS
IN ITALY
(Thanks to Ben Buelow
'02 for the following information.)
Italy provides a wide variety
of excellent study abroad programs. The ones I will address here
are concerned primarily with areas of classical studies: Roman
History, Topography, and Archeology. However, the ICCS program
in Rome also has opportunities for the study of art history of
the Renaissance and Baroque.
ICCS in Rome
A program administered by Duke
University focus on the study of Roman History and Topography.
This program is open only to classics and art history majors,
but I think that for classics majors in particular this is an
excellent program. The professor to student ratio is excellent
(about 1-to-9), and the professors are, for the most part, quite
good. Although the centerpiece of the program is an intense and
in large part on-site Roman history and topography course, classes
in Greek and Latin, as well as Italian and art history are offered.
If you haven't studied art history before, I think this is a
great opportunity: the pieces you see are incredible, the information
is concise and clear, and the professor is a riot. I think my
only two complaints about this program are: 1.) I appreciated
the intensity of the program, but it was sometimes too intense:
it tended to leave too little time to explore the city on your
own. 2.) No rooming with a family. I wish I had gotten the chance
to really learn italian: studying it in class is one thing, but
being forced to speak it would have been a huge help. The program
is also rather expensive (a little more than a semester at Grinnell,
but that includes housing, food, and two week long trips to Sicily
and Naples with Hotel stays, etc. It also covers things like
your bus pass, entrance to monuments, etc. But yeah, its pricey).
In general, however, I thought this was a great program that
shows you more of ancient Rome, the western Greeks, Italian art,
and modern Italy than any other program.
Anglo-American Project in
Pompeii (AAPP)
(Information courtesy of Claire Weiss)
This is a program administered by Rick Jones at Bradford University
in the UK. It serves as a field school in which students learn
everything they need to know about on-site Archeology: ~60% of
the digging is done by the students. The program is located in
Pompeii, Italy, and runs for five weeks: all of July and one
week at either end. The program costs $2200 the first time you
do it, and $980 the second time around. This includes meals,
and a space in a tent: you supply your furnishings (sleeping
bag, pad, etc.). Showers and Laundry facilities are available
at the campsite. Training consists of eight hour days beginning
at 8 am, with a two hour break for lunch. Four of the five weeks
are spent digging, one week on ecofacts/artifacts (identifying
and cataloguing the stuff you find), and one day on survey (laying
out new sites, I think). There are also optional seminars twice
a week by faculty members on their research. According to Claire,
"they teach you how to do EVERYTHING". More information
is available at the following website: http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/archsci/field_proj/anampomp/index.html
Survey Project in Corinth
Also administered by Bradford
University in the UK. This is also a complete field school which
teaches you everything you need to know for archeological field
work. The program runs for five weeks, including all of the month
of July. The cost is $2200 the first year and a little over $1000
the second year. Like Pompeii, it gets quite hot and days are
long: students get Saturdays off and Wednesdays are half days.
They are organized into groups of ten overseen by one supervisor.
Each group is assigned to a site which contains several loci
of interest, and students rotate through these loci over the
course of the program. Like the other Bradford U. program, one
week is spent on eco/artifacts, cleaning and categorizing finds,
and one day is spent doing survey. Students are required to keep
a detailed log of their work. The program accepts 120 students
from around the world. Those wishing to apply need letters of
recommendation, transcripts, and a personal statement. I've tried
to find a website for this program, but have been unsuccessful,
so interested parties will probably have to contact Bradford
University and see if this project is still running. From the
Bradford U. website, I'm not sure if it is.
Poggio
Colla
This program lasts about 6 weeks,
which is longer than most other digs from around June 16 to August
3. Tuition is $4000. Its located in Vicchio, a small town about
20 miles NE of Florence in the Sieve valley (Val di Sieve in
Italian). It's an Etruscan site with a long history- the oldest
remains are from the 6th century BC and the youngest are from
right around 200 BC. It's located on top of a hill, and it's
still unclear what exactly is on the hill- all we know is that
the focus of the settlement is a large monumental building, something
like 7 by 21 meters (and going- just last year we discovered
that it's actually longer than 21 meters, but its still unclear
how much farther that extends). There are three building phases
on that main building. On another part of the site, in the middle
of a field on the side of the hill, we'rer excavating what seem
to be hellenistic farmhouses.
The dig is sort of known as the
"club med of archaeology"- the food and
accomodations are much much better than at most digs. Remember
claire and
kellam's dig at Pompeii? they lived in tents there. At Poggio
Colla, a
refurbished farmhouse is used, and the cooking is done by a little
old
Italian lady- that food is by far the best I have ever had. Weekends
are
free, and they're good about driving people to the train station
in town so
they can go travel (Florence is 1 hour away by train, from where
you can
get just about anywhere). In the middle of the program, between
weeks 3 and
4, there is a long weekend (4 days) to give everyone a break
and an
opportunity to go somewhere for a more extended time. When I
was there, a
group of us went to Capri for the weekend; others went to Pompeii
and other
destinations.
Its a field school, so none of
the students (about 16) have any digging
experience. They're good with teaching you how to do things,
and they teach
you all aspects of archaeology- digging, sifting, cataloging,
surveying,
even archaeological photography. The thing that I learned the
most from,
however, was when the site supervisor would come with his assistants
and
they would stand over our trench and debate about what the finds
of the
last couple of days mean. They got into some intense discussions,
and
everyone in the trench agreed that we enjoyed hearing how they
think about
things and what their theories are. That's where we learned to
think like
archaeologists. Also, the people are really cool and they make
sure that everyone has alot of fun.
