Italian Diaspora Studies Seminar 2023

Workshop in Calabria

In a published essay, Margherita Ganeri discusses the mission and the most significant innovative teaching activities promoted by the Italian Diaspora Studies Seminar, a research center founded in 2017 at the University of Calabria, where she works. 

The Seminar aims to promote scholarly research into the abovementioned fields while building educational programs inspired by them. In particular, we investigate the perspective of specific Italian transnationalism that identifies itself with the network of Italian diasporic literature disseminated worldwide. Their goal is not limited to research; but seeks to pursue a proactive perspective. 

As part of their summer program, poet Maria Mazziotti Gillan conducted seminar workshops in May of this year in Calabria. 

It is a fact that contemporary writers of Italian heritage are generally unaware of contemporary Italian writers and that many of them are not familiar even with the Italian canonical masterpieces from the past, and the same goes vice versa. In order to create new bridges to fill these gaps, the “Italian Diaspora Seminar”aims to investigate the opportunity to create, both theoretically and pragmatically, an inclusive ground in which to detect and promote new connections among Italian, diasporic, and migrant Italian contemporary writers. Their goal is to reinforce a sense of community that will lay the foundations for the growth of inclusive, inter-dialoguing, and unified Italian transnational literature.

Margherita Ganeri is a Full Professor of Contemporary Italian Literature and Director of the Seminar “Italian Diaspora Studies” at the University of Calabria. She also directs the course CLIA (Italian American Culture and Literature), operated through an annual Fulbright Lectureship.

Maria and Margherita, Rome, 2023

Maria Mazziotti Gillan's newest poetry collection is When the Stars Were Still Visible (2021). Other recent publications are the poetry and photography collection, Paterson Light and Shadow, and the poetry collections What Blooms in Winter and The Girls in the Chartreuse Jackets, a pairing of her poems with her paintings.
Maria's artist website is MariaMazziottiGillan.com and her poetry website is MariaGillan.com.