Â鶹ÊÓƵ

My research interests include Italian and European Modernism and Avant-Garde, early 20th century art and literary magazines, inter-war literature visual arts, architecture and design the relationship between classicism and modernity. I have a particular interest in Italian culture under Fascism and in the material and cultural legacy of Fascism in contemporary Italy. I have also published on contemporary Italian fiction, women writers and intellectuals and the cultural construction of space.

I am the Deputy Head and EDI Director of the School of Arts, Media and Communication. I have been the Deputy Head of the School of Arts and the School of Arts’ Equalities Champion (2016-19). I was Academic Director for the School of Modern Languages between 2013 and 2016 the School of Modern Languages’ Year Abroad Coordinator in 2013 and Admissions Coordinator in 2011. I was Director of Studies in Italian between 2009 and 2012 and between 2014 and January 2016 and Italian Section Coordinator between 2016 and 2019 and between 2021 and 2023.

I have published widely on early 20th century Italian culture, particularly on the intersection between literature, art, architecture and design. I have an ongoing interest in Italian culture under Fascism and on the heritage and legacy of the Fascist regime. I am currently completing two book projects on the Return to Order in art and literature in post World War 1 Italy and on and Italian interwar culture. I am the Italian Editor of the open access journal Modern Languages Open (Liverpool University Press): www.modernlanguagesopen.org.

Books 

Massimo Bontempelli e la cultura italiana tra le due guerre. L'intellettuale, il fascismo, la modernita' (Milan: Mimesis, 2024)
Women and the Public Sphere in Modern and Contemporary Italy. Essays for Sharon Wood, ed. with Marina Spunta and Maria Morelli (Leicester: Troubador, 2017).

Visualizzare la Guerra. L'iconografia del conflitto e l'Italia, ed. with Giuliana Pieri and Maria Giuseppina Di Monte (Milan: Mimesis, 2016).

The Great War and the Modernist Imagination in Italy, ed. with Luca Somigli, Annali d'Italianistica, 33 (2015).

Ed., Beyond the Piazza. Public and Private Spaces in Modern Italian Culture (Bruxelles: Peter Lang, 2013).

Back to the Futurists: The avant-garde and its legacy, ed. with Elza Adamowicz (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2013). 

Valori Plastici 1918-1922. Le inquietudini del nuovo classico (monographic supplement to The Italianist), 2006.

Selected articles and book chapters 

'Artists at War: Artistic Identities and the Politics of Culture in Post-World War I Italy', in Mobilizing Cultural Identities in the First World War. History, Representations and Memory, ed. by Federica Pedriali and Cristina Savettieri (New York: Palgrave, 2020), pp. 57-79.

'The Artist-Officer. War, Beauty and the Nation in Ardengo Soffici's Diaries', in Italy and the Military. Interdisciplinary Perspectives, ed. by Mattia Roveri (New York: Palgrave, 2020), pp. 267-88.

'The ex Casa del Fascio in Predappio and the question of the "difficult heritage" of Fascism in contemporary Italy', Modern Italy, 24.2 (2019), 139-57.

'Ardengo Soffici's Rete mediterranea: The Aesthetics and Politics of Post-War Modernism', Annali d'Italianistica 33 (2015), 321-40.

Early 20th century Italian Literature and Culture 20th century Italian Art Architecture and Design Modernism and the Avant-Garde Italian Fascism and its legacies

I teach the following modules: IT1028 Introduction to Italian Studies; IT2016 Italian Society and Culture under Fascism; IT3144 Visions of Modernity; IT3146 Made in Italy. Italian Design and Fashion in the 20th and 21st Century; ML3176 Extended Essay; TS3006 Extended Translation; TS7036 Translation Strategies (MA Translation Studies). I have taught Italian language at all levels.

Contemporary Italian culture art and politics

Dott. Ling. Stran. Mod. (Bologna University); PhD (University College London); Senior Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy