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Academics

Modern Languages

Whether or not you plan to use a foreign language in your future career, studying one at Bentley can significantly enhance your career options. It will also make you a more well-rounded individual and culturally sensitive global citizen. We offer a diverse and engaging array of courses in Chinese, French, Italian and Spanish. Each class is carefully designed to help you hone your language and communication skills while also developing the critical cultural awareness necessary for success in our ever-expanding global community. Additionally, you’ll have the opportunity to venture outside the classroom through study abroad and internship opportunities that offer experiential learning and cultural immersion. Whichever career path you ultimately choose, our Modern Languages courses help you prepare for future success by fostering a deeper awareness and understanding of our interconnected world.

Language Placement

Actors from the play "La Giara (The Oil Jar)" pose in their traditional Sicilian costumes.

One-act play celebrates Sicilian culture

This spring, Bentley collaborated with All’italiana-Boston Italian Theatre Company to stage a special performance of “La Giara (The Oil Jar),” a one-act comedy by Nobel Prize-winning Sicilian playwright Luigi Pirandello. Presented under the auspices of the Consulate General of Italy in Boston, the event was co-sponsored by the Valente Center for Arts & Sciences, the Modern Languages and English and Media Studies departments and the Center for Languages and International Collaboration (CLIC) and showcased the talents of Lecturer in Italian Alessia Dalsant, who played the role of Mpari Pè. 

Guzmán explores Spanish theater

In her chapter for the new book, “The Theater of Twenty-First Century Spain: Identities, Anxieties and Social Immediacies,” assistant professor of Spanish Alison Guzmán explores lingering intergenerational trauma from the Spanish Civil War as presented in the works of contemporary playwright Lola Basco. Casting herself as a character in her “autofiction,” Basco accentuates tensions between autobiography and fiction, past and present, in a quest to reconcile her own identity with what she discovers about her grandmother´s experiences during the war, Guzmán says, underscoring the legacy of survivors’ deferred grieving processes on their progeny. 

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Headshot of Colman Shea, wearing a red plaid button down shirt, next to the Bentley shield logo in white on a light blue background.

Shea honored for Chinese language skills

More than 1400 students from 40 U.S. states competed in this year’s National Chinese Speech Contest (NCSC), a prestigious competition for Chinese language learners to showcase their skills and through oratory expression. Among them was Colman Shea ’23, a Language, Culture and Business (LCB) major whose passion for Chinese language and culture — as well as his exceptional speaking proficiency — helped earn him an Honorable Mention. Shea, who aspires to a career in private wealth management or real estate outside of the U.S., credits in assistant professor of Chinese Fei Yu with helping him prepare for and excel in the competition. 

Courses

CLIC

The Center for Languages and International Collaboration (CLIC)

The Center for Languages and International Collaboration (CLIC) seeks to enhance course curricula in Modern Languages and International Studies through the use of state-of-the-art technology. Faculty members in both disciplines work in concert with the center to integrate course content and technology using synchronous and asynchronous technology.

Live video and computer conferencing, a multimedia library of instructional materials for language and cultural learning, and access to international satellite broadcasting are some of the technical resources available at the center that make authentic exposure to language, countries and cultures possible. The CLIC staff, composed of undergraduate Bentley students who speak two or more languages, also work with their peers throughout the semester and in doing so, continue to build the global perspective within the Bentley community.

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Contact

Christian Rubio
Associate Professor and Department Chair
Morison Hall 285
781.891.2694
crubio@bentley.edu

 

Darlene Saunders
Senior Academic Coordinator
Morison Hall 109
781.891.3137
dsaunders@bentley.edu