I am Associate Professor of English Literature at the University of Bologna and the coordinator of the PhD program in Languages, Literatures and Cultures: Diversity and Inclusion at LILEC. I am also the vice-director of CISR (Inter-university Centre for the Study of Romanticism), which includes the Universities of Parma, Florence, Bari, Rome-Sapienza, Cassino, and Valle d'Aosta. My research interests include Romantic poetry, novel and drama (I have authored a monograph entitled Letitia Elizabeth Landon and Metrical Romance. The Adventures of a ‘Literary Genius’, Peter Lang 2009), Gothic literature (Gothic Metamorphoses across the Centuries, ed. S. Baiesi, M. Ascari and D. L. Palatinus, Peter Lang, 2020), Jane Austen and popular culture (I am co-editor, with C. Farese and K. Halsey, of a special issue of Textus on “Subversive Austen: from the Critic to the Reader”, 2017); women’s literaure and gender studies; and slavery literature. I have also worked on Victorian-period consumer literature (annuals and gift books) and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. In 2005 I published a book on colonial women writers in Australia (Pioniere in Australia: diari, lettere e memoriali del periodo coloniale, 1770-1850), and I have published articles on colonial and postcolonial literature. I edited two issues of the interdisciplinary journal La Questione Romantica on “Colonialism and Imperialism” (2008) and on “The Language(s) of Romanticism” (2011), and I am general editor, with Lilla Maria Crisafulli, of the Series “Romantic Studies: Theories and Practice” (Peter Lang). My current research concentrates on Leigh Hunt and the Italian context with special attention to the periodical The Liberal.
Over the years, I have taught undergraduate and postgraduate courses in English literature from the medieval to the modern period at the University of Bologna, and I have been invited lecturer of Romantic literature at several Italian and foreign universities. I am currently supervising several PhD candidates on Gender and Women’s Studies.
EDUCATION AND ACADEMIC CAREER:
As for my academic studies and career, I took my first degree at the University of Bologna in 1998, when I graduated with a thesis on English poetry of the Romantic period. I then received my PhD in ‘Cultures and Literatures of English speaking countries’ (UNIBO) in 2004, with a dissertation dedicated to ‘Australian women autobiographies: colonial letters and diaries and contemporary Aboriginal women life-writings’. I received a four-year Research Fellowship in English Literature at the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Bologna, with a research project on the narrative poem from the Romantic to the Victorian period (2006-2010); and a two-year Post-Doctoral Fellowship in English Literature in the same Department, with a research project on ‘National, cultural and gender identity on the English stage: women playwrights between 1760 and 1830’ (2004-2006). I was appointed permanent lecturer in 2011 and promoted to Associate professor in 2015.
AREAS OF TEACHING AND RESEARCH:
British Romantic literature (poetry, drama, the novel, and
romance); Victorian literature; Eighteenth-century fiction; slavery
and abolition in English history and literature; colonial
literature; travel writing; gothic fiction; Australian literature
(colonial and postcolonial).
FELLOWSHIPS FOR INTERNATIONAL MOBILITY:
As for teaching mobility, scholarships and research abroad, I have been invited as visiting virtual fellow at University College Oxford (September 2020-January 2021), and I was visiting professor at Clare Hall and Trinity College, Cambridge (November 2018). In 2016 I was invited to teach Romantic literature at the Department of English, Vassar College, NY (USA). I received a three-month fellowship as research scholar at the Dept of English, UCLA, Los Angeles (USA) in 2013; a three-month grant as research scholar at the Chawton House Library, UK in 2007; I was visiting scholar at University of Winchester, Exeter, York (UK) in the summer of 2007; received a three-month scholarship for post-doctoral fellows from Brown University (USA) in 2006; and was also in 2006 visiting scholar at ‘The Humanities Center’ at Harvard University, Boston, USA; I spent a one-year PhD scholarship at the Australian National University in 2001.
SCHOLARSHIPS AND GRANTS FOR RESEARCH ABROAD:
2020-2021: visiting virtual Fellow at the University College, University of Oxford (September-January)
2018: invited visiting professor at Clare Hall and Trinity College, University of Cambridge (November).
2016: Teaching mobility exchange at Vassar College, NY (USA), Department of English.
2013: Visiting Scholar at University of California, Los Angeles
(UCLA), Department of English
2013: three-months fellowship from University of Bologna (Marco
Polo) for research at UCLA, California (USA).
2011: one-month fellowship from the Chawton House Library and
University of Southampton (UK).
2007: three months grant spent as research scholar at the
Chawton House Library (UK).
2007: Visiting scholar at: University of Winchester, University
of Exeter, and University of York.
2006: Scholarship for post-doctoral fellows from Brown
University, Providence, (USA), Department of English. Visiting
scholar at “The Humanities Centre”, Harvard University, Boston,
USA.
2001-2002: One-year scholarship for PhD students spent at The
Australian National University, Canberra (Australia), Faculty of
Arts, School of Humanities.
2001-2002: Visiting PhD student at The Australian Academy of the
Humanities, (Canberra); Australian Defence Force Academy(Canberra);
Victoria University of Technology (Melbourne); University of
Melbourne; Monash University (Melbourne);
2002: Visiting PhD student at University of Western Australia
(UWA), Perth.
2000: Post-graduate students at University of Glasgow, Scotland,
(UK).
1998: University of Bristol, Department of English: M.A. on
Romanticism.
PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS:
Co-editor of the Series "Romantic Studies. Theories and Practices" with Lilla Maria Crisafulli (Bern: Peter Lang).
Member of the Scientific Board of the intedisciplinary and international journal of Romantic Studies "La Questione Romantica" (Napoli: Liguori)
From 2023: Coordinator of the PhD course in Modern Languages, Literatures and Cultures:Diversity and Inclusion (LILEC Departiment, University of Bologna).
October 2013 – October 2015: Member of the international program
EDGES - Joint European PhD in Women's and Gender
Studies.
UNIBO Coordinator of the Interuniversitary Centre for Romantic
Studies (CISR), University of Bologna.
Member of the following associations: European Society for
Studies in English (ESSE); European Association of Studies
on Australia (EASA); Associazione Italiana di Studi di
Anglistica (AIA); Byron Italian Society; Oscar Wilde Italian Society; Associazione Italiana di Studi
Canadesi (AISC); Associazione Italiana Studi Letterature in
Inglese (AISLI).
Coordinator of the Erasmus student exchange program of the
University of Bologna with the following universities: University
of Bristol, University of Cambridge, University of Glasgow,
University of Leicester, University of York (UK), Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (Greece).
RESEARCH PROJECTS:
2016: European Network ERA (European Romanticisms in Association)
This Association is bringing together within a single network those with a shared interest in researching, presenting and promoting European literary romanticisms to the European public. It is proposed to involve scholars and public institutions (house-museums, libraries, archives, galleries and other literary heritage sites) to focus on the European dimensions of literary romanticisms and explore how romantic-period writers and their works move across national borders in ways that illuminate, investigate, and challenge romanticism’s installation of the idea of national literatures and cultures. It is envisaged as providing a basis for a series of events and other funded collaborations at European scale.
2016: International Research Network oon: “International Knowledge Transfer Networks: Britain and Italy, 1785-1825” coordinated by Diego Saglia (Università di Parma) and Alan Rawes (University of Manchester).
2015-2019: European International Project Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme - Marie Sklodowska-Curie ITN "GRACE". The aim of the GRACE – Gender and Cultures of Equality in Europe project is to systematically investigate the cultural production of gender equalities within Europe (http://graceproject.eu/). The Consortium comprises 8 institutional partners: the University of Hull, University of Granada, University of Oviedo, University of Bologna, Associazione Orlando, University of Lödz, Central European University and Utrecht University. GRACE draws on innovative and interdisciplinary methodologies to investigate an under-examined aspect of those processes, namely the production of cultures of equality that underpin, enable and constrain those changing policy and legislative frameworks.
ORGANIZATION OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES AND PRESENTED PAPERS AS INVITED SPEAKER:
University of Bologna, 25 May 2021: PhD lecture for EDGES Curriculum (Gender and Women's Studies) on "Mary Shelley and the Anthropocene: an Eco-feminist Reading of The Last Man".
University of Bologna, 13-14 May 2021: Dipartimento LILEC – DIVE-IN project: Diversity and Inclusion. Conference title: Le parole sono importanti. Organized panel and talk on slavery on stage between Oland and England from XVII to the XIX century.
BARS Digital Events, 15 April 2021: Theme-panel sponsored by CISR, Italy, entitled Geo & Eco-Criticism: Returning to Romantic Italy. Presented paper: "Leigh Hunt’s Italian Green footsteps". (https://www.bars.ac.uk/blog/?p=3637)
University of Oxford, 27 October 2020: attendance of the "Romantic Research Seminar" organized by the Department of English Studies. Presented paper: “It looks like a thing you have dreamt of”: Leigh Hunt’s Italian Experience". [Online presentation].
University of Parma, 13 November 2019: international day-conference on Rooting Eco-criticism: British Romanticism and the Environment. Presented paper: "Mary Shelley and the Anthropocene: an Ecofeminist Reading of The Last Man".
Museo Byron Palazzo Guiccioli, Ravenna,18-19 October 2019: International workshop “Dreaming Romantic Europe: Workshop 2 ‘Romantic Authorship’” sponsored by ERA network. Presented paper: "Leigh Hunt’s Parlour at Surrey Gaol".
Keat-Shelley House, Roma, (2019): invited speaker to the international day-conference: "Peterloo at 200 (1819-2019): Histories, Narratives, Representations". Presented paper: “Talking about Peterloo Then and Now: “Radical Expressions” and Oratory Speech from the Page to the Screen”.
University of Malta, (2019): invited speaker to the Eleventh International Conference on Anglo-Italian Studies Britain and Italy: Literary and Cultural Relations". Presented paper on "Leigh Hunt’s Letters from Abroad".
Villa Vigoni: German-Italian Centre for the European Dialogue (Lake Como), 2019: international seminar organized by CISR (UNIBO) and the University of dedicated to "Germanophobia and Anti-European Sentiments in British Romanticism". Presented panel on "Jane Austen and German Gothicism".
University of Bologna, (2018): invited speaker at the international conference organized by the Academy of Global Humanities and Critical Theory intitled "Global F(r)ictions". Presented paper: "Jane Austen as Global Cultural Icon".
Bologna, (2018): member of the organizing committee for the "Frankenreads events in Bologna" to celebrate the bicentenary of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.
University of Bologna, (2018): co-organized or the international conference on "Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, 1818–2018: Circuits and Circulation" sponsored by CISR, UNIBO with Cardiff University, ERA (European Romanticisms in Association) network, the British Association for Romantic Studies and the Open University. Presented paper: "Italian Gothic Context and Culture in Mary Shelley’s Stories after Frankenstein".
Roma, University of Notre Dame’s Rome Global Gateway (2018) international conference: "Why Frankenstein Matters at 200: Rethinking the Human through the Arts and Sciences”. Presented paper: “Strange, supernatural, and necromantic adventure”: Mary Shelley’s gothic stories and the inherence of Frankenstein”.
University of York, UK (2017), 15th biannual conference of the British Association for Romantic Studies (BARS) Romantic Improvement. Themed panel proposal by the Inter-university Centre for the Study of Romanticism (CISR) “Illegitimate theatre: context, performance and material culture.” Presented paper: "Theatre is ‘a pleasure for most social kind’: illegitimate performances as personal enjoyment and social improvement in Leigh Hunt’s reviews."
University of Vechta, Germany (11-14 May 2017): invited speaker to the international conference on "The Lost Romantics". Presented paper: "Subjects of this kind are more fitted for narrative than for dramatic representation”: Polidori’s Ernestus Berchtold and the Daring Narrative of Incest".
University of Bologna, (2017): co-organizer of the wo-day international seminar "Women’s Voices and Genealogies in Literary Studies in English". Presented paper: "Novel, Romance and Tale of Real Life: Meta-Discourses in Romantic Women's Narratives".
University of Pisa (14-16 September 2017), XXVIII AIA Conference. Presented paper: "Illegitimate theatre, culture and society, 11170-1840".
University of York, UK (27-30 July 2017), 15th biannual conference of the British Association for Romantic Studies (BARS) Romantic Improvement. Themed panel proposal by the Inter-university Centre for the Study of Romanticism (CISR) “Illegitimate theatre: context, performance and material culture.” Titolo dell'intervento: "Theatre is ‘a pleasure for most social kind’: illegitimate performances as personal enjoyment and social improvement in Leigh Hunt’s reviews."
University of Vechta, Germany (11-14 May 2017): international conference on "The Lost Romantics". Titolo dell'internveto: "Subjects of this kind are more fitted for narrative than for dramatic representation”: Polidori’s Ernestus Berchtold and the Daring Narrative of Incest".
Comune di Mirandola (MO), "JANE AUSTEN (1775-1817) -- RITRATTO DELLA SCRITTRICE NEL BICENTENARIO DELLA MORTE" (Febbraio-Marzo 2017). Intervento tenuto il 24 marzo 2017 dal titilo: “Jane Austen e la narrative inglese romantica tra guerre, rivoluzioni e schiavitù”.
Univeristà di Bologna (30 gennaio - 10 febbraio 2017): "GRACE" WINTER SCHOOL on Gender and Women's Studies. Panel dedicato a "Women’s Agency and Empowerment in Literary Studies". Lezione dottorale tenuta il 7 febbraio 2017 su "Finding a public voice: English Romantic and Vicotiran Women journalists and editors between tradition and innovation".
Università di Bologna, (12-13 gennaio 2017): Two-day Seminar "Women’s Voices and Genealogies in Literary Studies in English". Giornate di studio nell’ambito del Dottorato in Women’s and Gender Studies (Curriculm EDGES). Titolo dell'intervento: "Novel, Romance and Tale of Real Life: Meta-Discourses in Romantic Women's Narratives".
Univesità di Genova (2-3 dicembre 2016): partecipazione al seminario dedicato a “International Knowledge Transfer Networks: Britain and Italy, 1785-1825” con presentazione di un intervento intitolato: " 'Liberal' cultural exchange between Italy and England: Leigh Hunt and his 'Letters from Abroad'".
Univesità di Genova (2-3 dicembre 2016): international seminar “International Knowledge Transfer Networks: Britain and Italy, 1785-1825” . Talk on " 'Liberal' cultural exchange between Italy and England: Leigh Hunt and his 'Letters from Abroad'".
Casa Editrice Berti, Parma (5 novembre 2016): presentation of the new Italian translation of Jane Austen's "Northanger Abbey".
Università di Bologna (15-16 settembre 2016): organization, together with Maurizio Ascari and Diego Saglia, of the international conference “Gothic Galaxy: Intersections and Metamorphoses” . Talk on "Intersections and metamorphoses of the gothic genre from Clara Reeve to Ann Radcliffe".
University of Galway, Irlanda (22-26 agosto 2016): International conference organised by European Society for the Study of English (ESSE). Panel: "Contemporary Writers on Writing: Performative Practices and Intermediality" and presented paper on "New performances of the past: Jane Austen, a vampire in New York"
University of Hull, UK (11 May 2016): Project Launch Conference of GRACE – Gender and Cultures of Equality in Europe project (orizon 2020 Marie S. Curie GRACE Project). Delegate of the University of Bologna as part of the consortium which is made of 8 institutional partners: the University of Hull, University of Granada, University of Oviedo, University of Bologna, Associazione Orlando, University of Lödz, Central European University and Utrecht University.
Biblioteca Salaborsa, Comune di Bologna (9 aprile 2016): presentation and discussion with Diego Saglia (Università di Parma) on his work “Leggere Austen” (Carocci Editore).
Università di Bologna (12 febbraio 2016): day-seminar on “Maschere d’Autore. La Letteratura dal punto di vista degli Scrittori”. Title of the presented talk: "Lord Byron e Letitia Elizabeth Landon: maschere a confronto".
Biblioteca Salaborsa, Comune di Bologna (16 gennaio 2016): introduction to "I misteri di Udolpho" by Ann Radcliffe, "Tom Jones" by Henry Fielding and "Evelina" by Frances Fanny Burney to the reading club organized by JASIT (Jane Austen Society of Italy) http://www.jasit.it/fielding-burney-radcliffe-jabc-serena-baiesi/
Chawton House Library (UK), 11-12 Dec. 2015: International conference dedicated to ‘Marilyn Butler and the War of Ideas: a Commemorative Conference’. Presented paper: ‘Rewriting The Genre of Romances Of Real Life: Maria Edgeworth and Jane Austen’.
Università di Bologna (6 novembre 2015): organiser with Carlotta Farese of the international conference: “Subversive Jane Austen: from the Critic to the Reader" sponsored by CISR, dal LILEC and Chawton House Library.
University of Napoli l’Orientale and Federico II, (10-12 Sept. 2015): XXVII AIA International Conference ‘Transnational Subjects: Linguistic, Literary and Cultural Encounters’. Member of the panel sponsored by the Inter-University Centre for Romantic Studies (CISR) entitled ‘Imprinting Anglo-Italian Relations’. Paper: ‘Leigh Hunt as editor and contributor to The Liberal’
University of Cardiff, UK (16-19 July 2015): International conference of the British Association for Romantic Studies (BARS) ‘Romantic Imprints’. Coordinator of panel dedicated to ‘The Liberal’ sponsored by the Inter-University Centre for Romantic Studies (UNIBO). Presented paper: ‘Leigh Hunt and his 'Letters from Abroad'’’
University of Liverpool (UK), 14-15 Nov. 2014: International
Conference "Edward Rushton and Romantic Liverpool: A Bicentennial
Conference". Presented paper:: “Felica Hemans and the social
coalition in Liverpool”.
University of Sheffield (UK), 27-29
giugno 2014: International conference on Ann Radcliffe at 250.
Gothic and Romantic Imagination . Presented paper: “The power of
the lute and the genius of the language: Ann Radcliffe and the art
of poetical improvisation”.
Università di Parma, 12-14
settembre 2013: XXVI AIA Conference: “Remediating, Rescripting,
Remaking: Old and New Challenges in English Studies”. Presented
paper: “Remediating Jane Austen through the Gothic: Pride and
Prejudice and Zombies as literary adaptation and media
transmigration”.
University of Southampton (UK),
25-28 luglio 2013: International conference organized by the
British Association for Romantic Studies (BARS) “Romantic Imports
and Exports: 2013 BARS International Biennial Conference”.
Presented paper: “Colonial Picturesque and Indian Women in
English Annuals and Gift-Books”.
Chawton House Library (UK), 4-6
luglio 2013: Iternational conference: Women's Writing of the Long
Eighteenth Century . Presented paper: “Masking and unmasking the
gendered self: the art of masquerade in English annuals during the
1820s”.
Bogazici University, Istanbul (Turkey), 4-8 September
2012: 11th Conference of the European Society for the Study
of English (ESSE).
University of Bologna, 17-18 April 2012: seminar organized by
the network Erasmus Mundus in Women's and Gender Studies GEMMA
“Nuove prospettive degli studi di genere in Italia e in Europa”.
Presented paper: “Il contributo delle donne scrittrici alla
letteratura di largo consumo nell'Inghilterra vittorina”.
Museo del Risorgimento (Bologna), 21 Feb. 2012: Lecture on
“Donne inglesi e Risorgimento italiano tra Romanticismo e
Vittorianesimo”.
Chawton House Library (UK), 26/10/2011: seminar “Poetry of Taste
and Refinements”: Consumer Literature in Ninetheenth-Century
Annuals”.
University of Leicester, School of English,
Victorian Studies
Centre , 19/01/2011: Vicotrina Study Center, Spring Seminar
Series 2011: ‘“But Italy, my Italy! Can it last, this gleam? Can
she live and be strong?”: Elizabeth Barrett Browning and the
Italian Risorgimento'.
University of Turin, 14-28/10/2010: 10th Conference of the
European Society for the Study of English (ESSE). Participation to
the Round Table on “From the Renaissance to the Risorgimento:
British Perceptions of Italy as a Nation State, between Aesthetics
and Ethics”.
Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge (UK), 19/06/2010: one-day
conference on Celebrating Women's Writing. Presented paper:
"'British Risorgimento': Representations of the process of Italian
Unification and the cultural interaction between Italy and Great
Britain in the writings of Elizabeth Barrett Browning".
University of Rome “Roma Tre” 1-3/10/2009: 24° National
conference of the Italian Association of Studies in English
Literature, Culture and Language (AIA) Challenges for the 21st
Century: Dilemmas, Ambiguities, Directions. Presented paper in
the Literary Workshop: “The Narrative Poem from the Romantic
to the Victorian period: Lord Byron to Robert Browning”.
University of Newcastle, 16-18/07/2009. Attendance of the
conference Republican Exchange, c.1550-c.1850. Presentation
of the paper on “Poetry as thought and action: Mazzini's
reflections on Byron”.
Chawton House Library (U.K.), 9-11/07/2009. International
Conference New Directions in Austen Studies. Presentation of
the paper entitled: “Belinda and Pride and Prejudice
as Romances of Real Life”.
