PhD in Modern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures: Diversity and Inclusion

1. DESE - European Literatures 
2. EDGES - Women's and Gender Studies 
3. World Literature and Postcolonial Studies 
4. LINGMOD - Modern Languages Studies

Curriculum 1: DESE - European Literatures

DESE curriculum training young researchers (specialists) who will master the map of the literary topoi characterizing the European tradition from the Middle Ages to the present, and will be able to engage with different methods of analysis in several languages. The approach is supernational and students will be integrated in an international research environment benefiting from agreements with foreign academic institutions. The research project and the thesis will include at least three European literatures whose language the candidates are supposed to master. For the 42st cycle, we welcome research projects focusing in particular on literary practices such as plagiarism, forgery, pseudonymity, or anonymity, and highlighting one or more forms of literary and editorial clandestinity through the prism of the European circulation of books, texts, and imagery.

The official language of the programme is French, whose knowledge is compulsory, irrespective of the literatures chosen for the dissertation project. The thesis may be written either in French or English; the final discussion must be carried out in the languages that the candidate is required to know.

Curriculum 2: EDGES Women’s and Gender Studies

EDGES is a doctoral programme dedicated to the study of literature and culture through the methodologies and theories of gender studies, understood as tools for analysing the processes of production, circulation and consolidation of cultures of equality, the valorisation of differences and social inclusion. The programme is based on literary history and criticism, cultural studies and critical theories of gender and women's studies, considering literature as a privileged space for the development of critical thinking. Particular attention is paid to the analysis of texts, their interpretations and different literary genres in their respective historical and cultural contexts. Research projects in the 42nd cycle should focus on the ways in which women and marginalised or silenced subjects have negotiated their visibility, leaving traces of themselves and imagining alternative realities, zones of contact and transformative spaces. These spaces challenge gender barriers and those between human and non-human subjectivities, making them fluid, redefining them or overcoming them. In particular, the research project should analyse practices of falsification, plagiarism, manipulation, anonymity and dissimulation, understood as discursive, authorial, narrative and political devices. These strategies often used historically as instruments of control and exclusion, will be investigated as transformative practices capable of subverting and redefining dominant literary genres. These issues can also be addressed from a diachronic perspective, through an integrated critical approach that combines methodologies from gender studies, literary criticism, visual and intermedia studies, and cultural history.

The language of the final thesis will be English, in accordance with the rules governing the co-supervision agreements of the curriculum.

Curriculum 3: World Literature and Postcolonial Studies (WorldLit)

The curriculum offers a cross-disciplinary research programme aimed at investigating the dialogue between theoretical approaches developed in different historical and ontological contexts, integrated into transdisciplinary critical perspectives. In line with the framework of the PhD programme, the curriculum includes studies on diverse but interconnected topics within a complex historical context, such as decolonisation, cultural and linguistic diversity, inclusion and citizenship, migration, tradition and social innovation, hyperdiversity, ecologically complex environments and cultural heritage, also from a transcultural perspective. Literary practice is understood as a complex phenomenon, embedded in processes of production, circulation and dissemination, both local and global, capable of affecting relations between cultures and territories and challenging dominant systemic models in the light of ethical and pluralistic perspectives. Within this theoretical and methodological framework, the research theme for the 42nd cycle concerns forms of manipulation in and of literature and culture. Falsification, plagiarism, counterfeiting and dissimulation are practices historically linked to the literary sphere and to different traditions, which can also be addressed from a diachronic perspective. These practices can operate both as thematic elements denouncing specific socio-political conditions and as strategies for the subversion of genres, discourses and cultural spaces by subordinate individuals or communities. While on the one hand they can be analysed in terms of their critical and problematic aspects, on the other hand, understood as discursive, authorial, (meta)narrative and political devices, they can act as instruments of transformation, renewal and re-discussion of hegemonic canons and traditions. The theme can be developed through approaches related to literary criticism, cultural, visual and transmedia studies, and cultural history.

Curriculum 4: LINGMOD - Modern Languages Studies

The LINGMOD curriculum focuses on research and scientific training in modern languages from the perspectives of pragmatics, communication, translation, and translation theory. It aims to train specialists with advanced expertise in at least two languages, equipped with diverse theoretical and methodological tools to address linguistic and cultural diversity and the major social challenges of multicultural, intercultural, and multilingual societies. LINGMOD prioritizes the study of language in context and in use, with particular attention to its intersections with sociocultural issues. Research may draw on a wide range of approaches, including sociolinguistics, pragmatics, discourse and conversation analysis, interactional linguistics, linguistic anthropology, applied linguistics, language acquisition, translation studies, and digital humanities. Projects submitted for the 42nd cycle of the PhD programme must address themes related to falsification, plagiarism, concealment, counterfeiting, and manipulation. Research will explore the theoretical frameworks and linguistic-discursive strategies underlying these phenomena in different linguistic and cultural contexts and across various domains of discourse. Such practices will be examined in their political, social, ideological, cognitive, and persuasive dimensions, spanning political and commercial communication, media and social media (dis)information, (pseudo-)scientific dissemination, institutional discourse, and everyday interaction. Through an integrated approach combining discourse analysis, pragmatics, sociolinguistics, and translation studies, the curriculum aims to analyse a wide range of texts and contribute to interdisciplinary scholarly debate.

Languages: Applicants must demonstrate knowledge of Italian and at least two of the following languages: Arabic, Chinese, French, Japanese, English, Dutch, Spanish, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, and German.