LECTURE (Thursday, June 5): “Mind and Motivation in Learning Italian: What Happens in the Mind When a Person Learns Italian as a Foreign Language,” by Paolo E. Balboni, Ca’ Foscari University in Venice

The topic pertains to the field of neurolinguistics, but it will be dealt with from the teacher’s perspective. Teachers have to help students to acquire Italian, i.e., to store words, grammar, speech acts, cultural models into their brains and minds – and knowing how the brain and the mind work in language learning becomes of paramount importance in order to let teachers work properly so that learning will take place. The second part of the talk is based on the fact that the hardware and the software of language acquisition, i.e. the brain and the mind, need power in order to work. The power needed to activate them in order to learn something is motivation.

Introduced by Anthony Julian Tamburri, Dean, The John D. Calandra Italian American Institute of Queens College, CUNY and Professor of Italian & Italian/American Studies.

This event is organized by the Istituto Italiano di Cultura and in collaboration with The John D. Calandra Italian American Institute.

The event takes place at the Istituto Italiano di Cultura at: 686 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10065. Tel: 212 879 4242.