The Italian Language Department of the University of Baghdad is open again. Eight years after its closure, the Italian Ambassador in Baghdad, Antonio Pasquino, inaugurated the new department at the presence of the Deputy Rector and with the participation of Professor Mahmoud Salem Elsheikh from the University of Florence. Professor Elsheikh delivered a brief lecture to illustrate the development of Italian Language Departments in the Arab world and the specific case of the University of Baghdad, highlighting the role of Italian language and culture in understanding the dynamics in the Mediterranean and in the Middle East.
The reopening of the Department is the result of an intense cultural and linguistic effort put in place during the past few years: in 2016, archaeological missions were performed and the Italian-Iraqi Centre was open; in the same year, several events were organised within the framework of the University’s initiative called “Italy. Cultures. Mediterranean”. Italian was thus listed as one of the University’s ‘lofty languages’ and the new department was open according to the rules of procedure and now ranks fourth out of eleven. In this academic year 2018-19, the students enrolled in the course are 30 while 50 had originally applied to attend. This means that the students were submitted to a screening process and, in order to enrol, must graduate from secondary school with a mark above 75/100.
The Dean of the Language Department expressed the hope that this first invitation extended to an Italian professor may be followed up by a close cooperation with Italian institutions, as is also in place in the English, French, Spanish and Turkish Departments, which receive resources – along with mother-tongue lecturers – from Partner Countries.