SPRINGFIELD – After a year stuck at home, the Italian Cultural Center (ICC) is bringing a piece of Italy to Western Massachusetts. The ICC will be offering two online Italian classes, with one at a beginner level and the other at an intermediate level.

The classes will be hosted on Zoom and taught by Dr. Marco Prina. These classes will be the first online courses the ICC offers. For years, they have provided language in person.

“We have received many inquiries from people who wanted to resume their Italian studies, and we are now able to pair the Zoom platform with a highly qualified language professor, Dr. Marco Prina,” said Maria Silvestri, an ICC board member and coordinator for the ICC language classes.

Dr. Prina has a PhD. in both Italian Studies and Medieval Studies from the University of California at Berkeley, where he was also the recipient of the prestigious Berkeley Language Center Research Fellowship. He is currently an adjunct professor of Italian in the Florence Program for both Lipscomb and Pepperdine Universities. Prina resides in Valdarno, Italy in the heart of Tuscany.

“The nice thing about holding it online is our teacher is actually going to be in Italy doing the classes from Italy,” said Silvestri. “We are very excited. I mean, this is quite an opportunity. We were excited to be offering classes online, but then to have someone in Italy that’s going to actually be doing them for us, it’s going to be interesting.”

Introduction to Italian will begin on April 20. The course is designed for people who have not had previous Italian language instruction. Its goal will be to build foundations in skills such as listening, speaking, reading and writing. The course will run for 12 weeks and take place every Tuesday from 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.

The course designed for intermediate levels will begin on April 21. It will be centered on The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri. According to a press release, “This course traces Dante’s footsteps during the time he spent in exile during political turbulence in Italy.  Most of this course is dedicated to The Inferno (Dante’s Hell). Discussion of this important piece will be in English and Italian.” The course will also run for 12 weeks and take place every Wednesday from 4 p.m to 5:30 p.m.

For this course, Silvestri said Prina will actually be traveling to various locations in Italy that connect with the piece of literature. This year is the anniversary celebration of Dante in Italy, which Prina will also connect to the course.

“He is going to combine all of that culture in the class,” said Silvestri.

For non-ICC members, the cost of tuition for each course is $175. The cost for ICC members is $150. Registration for the classes will close on April 15. According to Silvestri, there will be a cap of between 12 to 15 students for each class.

“He [Prina] wants to have it     manageable, especially since it’s by Zoom,” she said.

Silvestri encourages people to sign up for these courses given their unique nature and opportunity for true immersion into Italy.

“I think it’s going to be an extremely unique way of gaining that experience. I don’t think you can get that just sitting in a classroom,” she said.  

Those interested in learning more about the Italian courses are able to call the ICC at 784-1492, or go to the ICC website at iccwm.org.