Loredana Di Martino, PhD

Dr. Di Martino’s most recent works, “Crossing the Borders and Challenging the Boundaries of White Feminism in Italy” (CIS 2023), “From Adriana Cavarero’s ‘Relating Narratives’ to Elena Ferrante’s Intersectional Ethics of Narrative Relations” (g/s/i 2020) and the forthcoming, co-written, “‘Body-Territory’ and the Influence of Latin American Social Reproduction Movements on Italian Anticapitalist Feminism,” deal with contemporary feminist practices and poetics focusing particularly on intersectional and transnational discourses that have been emerging in Italy. Previously, she has worked on modernism (Pirandello and Gadda), postmodernism (Eco and Vattimo), and contemporary crime and hybrid fiction dealing with migrations, fatherhood and youth violence (Lakhous, De Cataldo, Carofiglio, Scurati and others). Her publications on these topics include articles, book chapters and encyclopedia entries in addition to the co-edited volume Encounters with the Real in Contemporary Italian Literature and Cinema (2017) and the single-authored manuscript Il caleidoscopio della scrittura. James Joyce, Carlo Emilio Gadda e il romanzo modernista (2009). 

Dr. Di Martino developed the major in Italian Studies with the goal of promoting a broad and critical understanding of Italian culture that transcends disciplinary and geographic confines and highlights the connections between different areas of study and the interweaving knowledges created by local and global movements. Dr. Di Martino has designed unique interdisciplinary courses dealing with cultural history and literary and cinematic representations of Italian and hyphenated Italian identities, feminism and intersectional experiences, fictions and realities about Southern Italy, Italian migrations and global diasporas, and the environmental humanities. Some of those courses fulfill requirements also for the Minors in Film Studies and Women’s and Gender Studies. Dr. Di Martino strives to engage students by creating a learning environment that encourages reflection, creativity, collaboration and inclusion. She often complements her courses with field experiences and international guest lectures, and organizes workshops, film screenings and other events also in collaboration with other local universities and cultural organizations.