Silvia Valisa
Background and research information
Born and raised in Italy, I hold an undergraduate degree from Università di Pavia, where I studied romance philology and Italian Literature with professors Cesare Segre, Franco Gavazzeni and Giovanni Pozzi. I also hold a D.E.A. (Diplome d’études approfondies) in French Literature from the Université la Sorbonne Nouvelle, in Paris. I received a PhD in Italian Studies from the University of California, Berkeley in December 2007.
My research interests include modern and contemporary Italian literature and culture, gender studies, comparative literature (Italian and French), film studies, and the history of publishing.
I have taught at the University of California, Berkeley, the University of Oregon, San Francisco State University, and from the Fall 2008 (my first time on the East Coast!) I am assistant professor of Italian Studies in the Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics at Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL.
A short description of my work
I am currently working on turning my dissertation into a book manuscript. My doctoral dissertation, entitled "Dissonant Vehicles of Gender. The ideology of Character from Alessandro Manzoni to Elsa Morante," explores the intersection between narrative, epistemology and gender in a selection of nineteenth and twentieth century Italian novels. In it, I discuss the literary category of "character" as an ideological notion. I explore how gender informs not only the characters' biography and behavior, but the very narrative and epistemological structures that shape their fictional existence and the novel at large.
My second project is borne out of my interest in the history of publishing. It will be focused on one of the editorial protagonists of post-Unification Italy, the publishing house Sonzogno. My aim is to render its catalogue accessible online and to further analyze its cultural, ideological and economic role in shaping a different literary and information system in Italy.
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