Anna Bagorda got her Italian laurea in "Lettere Classiche" (Classical Studies) from the University of Lecce in 2002. She has just completed her third year of doctoral studies in Italian Studies and her main focus is Dante's Paradiso and medieval philosophy related to the representation of God.

Franco Baldasso was born in Treviso, Italy. He lived in Bologna for many years where he graduated in contemporary Italian literature from "Università degli Studi" and worked as a journalist and editor. He is a first year doctoral student beginning September 2007. He recently published his first book, entitled Il cerchio di gesso. Primo Levi narratore e testimone (Bologna: Edizioni Pendragon, 2007).

Elena Bellina graduated in Foreign Languages and Literature from the University of Bergamo, Italy, and received her M.A. in English from Youngstown State University. She is currently working in on a Ph.D. in Italian Studies at NYU, where she is focusing on autobiographical writing. She has published on Angela Carter and on Elena Ferrante's literary works. She is editor, with Paola Bonifazio, of the proceedings of the conference State of Exception: Cultural Responses to the Rhetoric of Fear, held at NYU in April 2005 (Newcastle, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2006).

Paola Bonifazio has a Laurea in Lettere Moderne from Universita' Cattolica of Milan, an M.A. in Italian and an M.A. Certificate in Film Studies from University of Pittsburgh. Her area of interests are film studies, cultural studies, modern and contemporary Italian Literature. She is currently writing her dissertation on documentary films about  modernization in post-war Italy. She is editor, with Elena Bellina, of the proceedings of the conference State of Exception: Cultural Responses to the Rhetoric of Fear, held at NYU in April 2005 (Newcastle, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2006).

Valeria G. Castelli is a first year doctoral student in Italian Studies at NYU beginning September 2007. She has a laurea in Lettere Moderne (with a specialization in Modern and Contemporary Italian Literature) from Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore di Milano and an M.A. in Italian Studies from the University College of London. Her interests include Fascist and Post-War literature and culture, 20th century Italian poetry, cultural studies and literary theory. Valeria has worked in the study abroad sector as academic advisor prior to her graduate studies.

Sara E. Diaz has earned both her B.A. and M.A. from NYU and is currently at work completing her Ph.D. in Italian Literature. Her research interests focus on the representation of erotic and conjugal love in medieval and Early Modern art and literature, while her dissertation specifically explores the polysemous theme of marriage in Dante’s Divine Comedy. She has published on Giacomino da Verona, Salimbene da Parma, Agnolo Firenzuola, Cassandra Fedele and Gaspara Stampa.

Claudia DiFonzo ha conseguito il titolo di dottore di ricerca con una tesi sulla tradizione manoscritta dell'Ottimo commento (Chiose sopra la Comedia di Dante Alleghieri Fiorentino tracte da diversi ghiosatori. Edizione critica dell'ultima redazione dell'Ottimo Commento. Vol I: Inferno, Firenze, Università degli Studi di Firenze, 1999). Ha svolto un perfezionamento presso l'Albert Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg i. B. Ha collaborato a diversi progetti di ricerca, e lavorato come assegnista nelle Università di Chieti e Teramo. Ha all'attivo una serie di pubblicazioni in diverse riviste del settore.

Jessica Goethals is a 5th year student who came to NYU after receiving her BA in Italian Literature at Northwestern University. She recently spent a year at NYU's Villa La Pietra in Florence, where she completed her master's thesis on Michelangelo's late-life poetry. Her areas of interest include fifteenth and sixteenth-century Italian literature, prophecy and apocalypticism, and courtly life. She is also co-editor, with Valerie McGuire and Gaoheng Zhang, of the proceedings of the 2006 NYU graduate conference, "Power and Image in Early Modern Europe" (forthcoming from Cambridge Scholars Press).

Kylene Jennings D'Alfonso received her Bachelor of Arts in Italian at Vassar College and began her pursuit of the Ph.D.  at NYU after two years of teaching in public school in upstate New York. Her research interests include Medieval and Renaissance Italian poetry, especially Dante , the Art of Memory, and the role of the Church in Italian literary culture.

Lindsay Eufusia is a fourth-year PhD student whose research interests include modern Italian literature, film, and culture, the  fascist period, gender and identity, and performance studies. She received her BA in Italian from the University of California, Berkeley and worked as an editor in educational publishing prior to joining the graduate program at NYU.

Valerie McGuire received a B.A. in Comparative Literature at Columbia University. She currently researches Italian Modernism, proto-Fascism and Colonialism using memoirs, travel and war diaries. She is two time recipient of a FLAS for Modern Greek for a specialization in the Italian occupation of Greece in the Dodecanese.Currently she is writing and researching at NYU Villa La Pietra, Florence. She is also co-editor, with Jessica Goethals and Gaoheng Zhang, of the proceedings of the 2006 NYU graduate conference, "Power and Image in Early Modern Europe" (forthcoming from Cambridge Scholars Press).

Alessandra Montalbano

Jonathan Mullins is a second year Ph.D. student from Virginia who completed his undergraduate coursework at Dartmouth. He focuses on 20th century Italian culture, particularly political philosophy, visual culture and literature.

Jennifer Newman is working towards a Ph.D. in Italian Literature with a focus on Medieval and Renaissance Literature. Her research interests include Dante, Machiavelli, and Renaissance court culture and literature, particularly Baldassare Castiglione's Il libro del Cortegiano. She received bachelor's degrees in both Italian and French language and literature from Arizona State University.

Joseph Perna is a second year Ph.D. student, and comes to NYU with a B.A. in Comparative Literature from the University of Chicago. His interests lie primarily in the modern period and include visual culture, film studies, issues of sex/gender, and literary theory.

Laura Perna's adventures at the University of Texas in Austin led her to New York for a year, and then Florence for another, working toward an MA in contemporary Italian literature.

Inga Pierson Inga Pierson received her B.A. in Italian Literature from Boston College and her M.A. in Italian Studies from New York University before undertaking the Ph.D. Her present interests and areas of expertise include modern and contemporary Italian literature, history of cinema, and Italian film and theater. She is currently writing her dissertation on neorealist cinema from the perspective of a tragic discourse. Her project explores how films such as Visconti's Ossessione, De Sica's Shoeshine and Rossellini's Germany Year Zero attempt to deal with political upheaval, social chaos and the search for truth while aspiring to a cathartic revolution.

Beatrice Sica received her “laurea” in Modern and Contemporary Italian Literature from the University of Pisa as well as the “diploma” of the Scuola Normale Superiore also in Pisa. She has published various articles in particular on twentieth century Italian literature. She is the editor of Ruggero Jacobbi, L’Italia simbolista, introduzione di Anna Dolfi (Trento: La Finestra, 2003) and Ruggero Jacobbi e la Francia. Poesie e traduzioni, con uno scritto di Andrea Camilleri (Firenze: Società Editrice Fiorentina, 2004). She is the author of Poesia surrealista italiana (Genova: San Marco Dei Giustiniani, 2007). She is currently working on her PhD dissertation, that will address the discourse on the magic of Italy and the Italian fantasy as it was carried out in Italy particularly during the 1930s and 1940s for purposes of national identity.

Marco Scalvini joined the Ph.D. program in Italian Studies in 2005 and he is also pursuing a concentration on Mediterranean Studies with the Center for European and Mediterranean Studies (CEMS). He works on Gramsci, Timpanaro, Rossi-Landi and Eco and his current research interests include political theory, the nature and evolution of national states, globalization, and problems of development and democracy in the Mediterranean region. Before joining NYU, he was involved in mediation and conflict resolution issues. He took part in numerous efforts by the international community to promote political dialogue, national reconciliation, and democratization in Kosovo and in Palestine. He also taught and lectured at Politecnico of Milan and Université de Montréal. He has just published 'What's wrong with Muslims? Screening conflict and identity within France and Britain's suburbs' in Framing Globalization: Visual Perspectives, edited by P. Facioli and J. Gibbons for Cambridge Scholars Publishing. His website is scalvini.eu

Gabrielle Sims Gabrielle Sims came to NYU after graduating from the University of Western Australia in 2001 with a BA in English literature and Italian studies. She recently received her Master’s degree from NYU with a thesis on Brunetto Latini's Ciceronian theory and Dante’s early poetics, partially completed during a year at Villa La Pietra as part of the graduate program in Florence. Her research interests include medieval Italian poetic theory, Romanticisms and modernism in Italy, and the writings of Giacomo Leopardi.

Amelia Sosa received her B.A. in Comparative Literature and Art from the Catholic University Andrés Bello in Caracas, Venezuela, an M.A. in Latin American Studies and Museum Studies from NYU. Before joining the Italian Department for her PhD, she worked at the UN Development Fund for Women and had the directorship of the Patricia Phelps de Cisneros Art Collection. She taught at the Universidad Central and Universidad Metropolitana in Caracas and lectured at the Solomon Guggenheim Museum in New York. Her interests include modern and contemporary visual culture, collecting practices and cultural studies. Her dissertation project explores industrial design and fashion particularly in the 1950s.

Melissa Swain is currently interested in everything yet harbors hope of one day completing a dissertation.  She graduated from UC Santa Cruz with a B.A. in Italian Studies and Art History. She then received a Post-Baccalaureate Certificate in Art Conservation from SACI, Florence, focusing on the production, meaning, and conservation of Tuscan wedding cassoni. Prior to joining the graduate program at NYU she worked as an art restorer and conservation technician in Florence, Italy and New Orleans, Louisiana.

Paola Ugolini is a doctoral student and comes to NYU with a Laurea in Lettere Moderne from the University of Bologna and a MA in Teaching Methodologies of Italian as a Foreign Language from the University of Venice. Her research interests include literary and cultural studies in Early Modern and Medieval Italy, 20th century Italian poetry and second language acquisition.

Paola Ureni received her Laurea in Italian Literature from the University of Florence, with a thesis on the work of Federigo Tozzi and its relationship with the French scientific culture of the time. As a doctoral student, she has been working both on medieval and contemporary Italian literature and philosophy. Her main area of interest and research is medieval philosophy and poetry, but she investigates also twentieth-century Italian literature. She is currently writing her dissertation, which focuses on the Augustinian concept of intellectual memory and its trace in Dante’s poetry. She has published several articles, mainly in the review “Studi danteschi”, exploring the relationship between Dante’s Divine Comedy and medieval medical science as well as theology. She has also published articles on the work of Italian writers of the twentieth century, such as Federigo Tozzi and Pier Vittorio Tondelli.

Alberto Zambenedetti was born and raised in Venice, Italy. He has a Laurea in Foreign Languages and Literatures from Università degli Studi di Venezia, Ca' Foscari, a Master's degree in Cinema Studies from New York University, and he is currently pursuing a Ph.D in Italian Studies from the same institution. He is a cat person.

Gaoheng Zhang was born in Hangzhou, China, in the Year of Monkey. He   holds a B.A. in Italian and International Business from Beijing Foreign Studies University (“Bei Wai”) and a M.A. from NYU with a thesis on theater architecture and rhetoric in the late Renaissance. His areas of research are rhetoric, theories of Italian art and architecture since the Renaissance, Italian cinema, postcolonial studies, and gender studies. He is also co-editor, with Jessica Goethals and Valerie McGuire, of the proceedings of the 2006 NYU graduate conference, "Power and Image in Early Modern Europe" (forthcoming from Cambridge Scholars Press).