People

Dr Marina Spunta

Associate Professor of Italian

Marina Spunta profile

School/Department: Arts, School of

Telephone: +44 (0)116 252 2658

Email: m.spunta@leicester.ac.uk

Profile

I am Associate Professor of Italian. I was educated at Bologna University (BA/MA in Modern Languages and Literatures) Exeter University (MA and MPhil in Applied Linguistics) and Birmingham University (PhD in Italian Studies). I taught Italian at Exeter University before joining the University of Leicester in 1997. I was Visiting Lecturer at the University of Amsterdam in 2018. I teach and convene a wide range of modules in Italian, Modern Languages, Film Studies and Translation. I research in 20th/21st Century Italian literature, Photography, Cinema; Cultural and Visual Studies; Environmental Humanities, Space, Place, Landscape studies; Ecocriticism and cultural/literary ecology; Orality and Vocality. I have held various leadership roles in my School, including Head of School of Modern Languages and most recently Director of Studies for Modern Languages in the School of Arts. I have acted as external examiner in Italian at the Universities of Nottingham Trent, Liverpool and Salford. I currently hold portfolios and sit on the Executive Committees of the Society for Italian Studies and the International Association of Teachers of Italian (AIPI).

Research

Research interests

My research focuses on 20th/21st Century Italian literature, Photography, Cinema, Cultural and Visual Studies; Environmental Humanities, Space, Place, Landscape studies; Ecocriticism and cultural/literary ecology; Orality and Vocality. I have published extensively on these subjects and on leading writer and intellectual Gianni Celati and leading photographer Luigi Ghirri. My publications include two monographs, Voicing the Word: Writing Orality in Contemporary Italian Fiction (2004) and Claudio Piersanti (2009), and a series of peer-reviewed articles and essays on a range of issues. I have co-edited (with M. Martelli) a Journal Special Issue on Gianni Celati and the Visual Arts (ReCHERches, 2020), and six co-edited volumes of scholarly essays on various aspects of Modern Italian Culture, including, among others, Orality and Literacy in Modern Italian Culture (with M. Caesar, 2006) and Letteratura come fantasticazione. In conversazione con Gianni Celati (with L. Rorato, 2009), following a British Academy sponsored international conference at the University of Leicester. I was Principal Investigator for the British Academy / Leverhulme Trust research grant ‘Viewing and writing Italian landscape. Luigi Ghirri and his legacy in photography and literature’, which resulted in two international conferences (Rome and Leicester) and in the co-edited volume (with J. Benci) Luigi Ghirri and the Photography of Place. Interdisciplinary Perspectives (2017).

 
 

Publications

Selected Publications

Books 

Tra ecologia letteraria ed ecocritica: narrare la crisi ambientale nella letteratura e nel cinema italiani, ed. With S. Ross (Florence: Cesati, 2022)

Viaggi minimi e luoghi qualsiasi: intersezioni tra letteratura e arti visive, ed. with M. Jansen, I. Lanslots  (Florence: Cesati, 2020)

Luigi Ghirri and the Photography of Place. Interdisciplinary Perspectives, ed. with J. Benci (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2017)

Women and the Public Sphere in Modern and Contemporary Italy, ed. with S. Storchi, M. Morelli (Leicester: Troubador, 2017)

Letteratura come fantasticazione. In conversazione con Gianni Celati, ed. with L. Rorato (Lampeter: Edwin Mellen Press, 2009)

Claudio Piersanti (Florence: Cadmo, 2009)

Orality and literacy in Modern Italian Culture, ed. with M. Caesar (Oxford: Legenda, 2006)

Proteus - The language of metamorphosis, ed. with C. Dente, G. Ferzoco, M. Gill (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005)

Voicing the Word: Writing Orality in Contemporary Italian Fiction (Oxford/Bern: Peter Lang, 2004)

 

Journal Special Issues

La scrittura dello sguardo. Gianni Celati e le arti visive, ed. with M. Martelli, ReCHERches, n. 24, 2020, https://journals.openedition.org/cher/624


M. Belpoliti, G. Gimmelli, M. Spunta (eds), Gianni Celati e l'arte della traduzione, Elephant & Castle, 29 (2023), https://elephantandcastle.unibg.it/index.php/eac/issue/view/35

 

Journal articles (Select)

‘Pia Pera’s Poetics of the Planetary Garden’, Italian Studies, 78: 1 (2023), https://doi.org/10.1080/00751634.2022.2148190

M. Spunta, “Far sentire la voce dell’altro”: traduzione come risonanza nella poetica di Gianni Celati, in M. Belpoliti, G. Gimmelli, M. Spunta (eds), Gianni Celati e l'arte della traduzione, Elephant & Castle, 29 (2023), pp. 14-29

‘Gianni Celati, Hartmut Rosa e la risonanza’, in E. Morra and G. Raccis (eds), Prisma Celati. Testi, Contesti, Immagini, Ricordi (Milan: Mimesis, 2023), pp. 117-135

‘Gianni Celati, una questione di meraviglia’, Bollettino ‘900, Electronic Journal of '900 Italian Literature, 1-2, I-II semester 2022, https://www.boll900.it/numeri/2022-i/

‘‘Dentro la città”: Gabriele Basilico’s Photography and the Embodied “Experience of Place”, Annali d’Italianistica, 37 (2019), Urban Space and the Body, 79-107

‘‘‘A magical balance of opposites’. Reading Luigi Ghirri’s photography through Walter Benjamin’, Journal of Italian Cinema and Media Studies, vol. 2:2, May 2014, 215-235

‘Zur Geschichte des Foto-Text-Bandes in Italien’, Zibaldone. Zeitschrift für Italienische Kultur der Gegenwart; Fotographie in Italien, ed. by T. Bremer and T. Heydenreich, n. 55, Spring 2013, pp. 77-88 (commissioned article translated  into German)

‘Pensar com imagens’ (Thinking through images), ZUM, 3, 2012, 58-63 (commissioned article translated into Brazilian Portuguese)

‘Fossati’s and Messori’s Viaggio in un paesaggio terrestre – an imaginative journey through writing, photography, landscape and painting’, Italian Studies, vol. 66, n. 1, March 2011, 93-111

‘Sense of home and ‘exile’ in Giorgio Messori’s narrative fiction’, Romance Studies, vol. 29, n. 4, November 2011, pp. 285-98 

‘Esplorazioni sulla via Emilia e dintorni – la fotografia italiana degli anni ’80 in dialogo con la scrittura di paesaggio’, in The modern Image, Intersections of Photography, Cinema and Literature in Italian Culture, special issue of L’anello che non tiene. Journal of Modern Italian Literature, ed. G. Minghelli, XX-XXI, 1-2, Spring-Fall 2008-2009, pp. 158-87

‘Il profilo delle nuvole: Ghirri’s photography and the new Italian landscape’, Italian Studies, 61: 1, Spring 2006, 114-36

‘Lo spazio delle pianure come “territorio di racconti” - verso la foce con Gianni Celati’, Spunti e Ricerche, 18, 2003, pp. 5-28

Il narrare semplice, naturale di Gianni Celati e i suoi progetti editoriali’, Rassegna Europea di Letteratura Italiana, 22, 2003, pp. 53-72


Book chapters (Select)

‘Gianni Celati, Hartmut Rosa e la risonanza’, in E. Morra and G. Raccis (eds), Prisma Celati. Testi, Contesti, Immagini, Ricordi (Milan: Mimesis, 2022), pp. 119-138

‘Guido Guidi e la fotografia della ‘qualsiasità’, in Spunta co-ed (2020), Viaggi minimi e luoghi qualsiasi, 149-159

‘Gianni Celati e la fotografia come “pratico pensare per immagini” – in dialogo con Ghirri e Gajani’, in Spunta co-ed (2020), La scrittura dello sguardo, 97-121

‘Verso la foce: The Experience of Place between Writing and Photography’, in P. Barron (ed), Towards the River’s Mouth by Gianni Celati (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2019), 77-88

‘Gianni Celati and the allure of the voice: from “Voci da terra” to “Notizie ai naviganti”’, in M. Ronchi Stefanati (ed), Gianni Celati. Traduzione, Tradizione e Riscrittura (Rome: Aracne, 2019), 49-68

‘Narrating the experience of place: Luigi Ghirri and literature’, in Spunta co-ed (2017), Luigi Ghirri and the Photography of Place, 199-224

‘Interfaces of photography, writing and landscape – the landscape photobook from Ghirri to Fossati and Messori’, in G. Minghelli, S. Hill (eds), Stillness in motion. Italy, Photography and the Meaning of Modernity (Toronto: Toronto University Press, 2014), 288-313

‘Il paesaggio e l’estetica: considerazioni sulla teoria recente’, in P. Chirumbolo, L. Pocci (eds), Bel Paese? The Representation of Landscape in Contemporary Italian Literature and Cinema (Lampeter: Edwin Mellen Press, 2013), 21-51 

 

Supervision

I welcome enquiries from prospective postgraduate students, particularly in the following areas:

  • 20th/21st Century Italian literature

  • Cultural & Visual Studies

  • Postwar Italian cinema

  • Postwar Italian Photography; Photography and Literature

  • Environmental Humanities; Ecocriticism; Cultural/Literary Ecology  

  • Space, Place, Landscape studies

  • Literary Orality and Vocality

RESEARCH STUDENTS

I have supervised to successful completion the following PhD students:

Visiting PhD & MA students

• Simone Giorgio, University of Trento, ‘Gianni Celati and James Joyce’ (2023)
• Sara Bonfili, European Doctorate in Italian Studies, University of Macerata, Italy (2013): ‘Ermanno Cavazzoni tra comico e parodia’, http://www.aracneeditrice.it/index.php/pubblicazione.html?item=9788854873513

  • Marta Guerzoni, MA Filologia Moderna, Università Cattolica, Milan: ‘Geografie d’affezione. Spazi, luoghi, paesaggi nell’opera di Gianni Celati’, January 2024

 

 

Teaching

I teach and convene a wide range of undergraduate modules in Italian, Modern Languages, Film Studies and Translation, including modules on contemporary Italian culture, literature, cinema, photography, language and linguistics. I also teach Postwar Italian Cinema on the MA in Film and Film Cultures. I teach on a range of Translation modules and I supervise BA and MA dissertations in Translation. My taugth/convened modules include:

Undergraduate Teaching in Italian/Modern Languages

Year 1
IT 1022/3 Italian Language Advanced 1 & 2
IT 1027 Authors & genres 2
IT 1029 Italy since 1945 
ML1006 Language and Society
Year 2
IT 2011 Introduction to Italian Linguistics 
IT 2012 History of Italian cinema
IT2024 Italian language post-advanced
Year 3/4
IT 3136/3336 Contemporary Italian fiction 
IT 3139 Postwar Italian directors 
IT3113 Italian language post-advanced

Cinema / Postgraduate Teaching 
MA in Film and Film Cultures 
HA7202 Postwar Italian Cinema, module on the MA in Film and Film Cultures in Historical Contexts 

Translation Studies / Undergraduate & Postgraduate Teaching & Supervision 
TS3003 Advanced Translation
TS3006 Extended Translation
TS7005 Dissertation (Supervision)

Press and media

Media engagement / Commissioned Articles

Invited talks / Public Engagement

  • ‘Homage to Gianni Celati’, Italian Cultural Institute, London, 27 April 2022

  • Luigi Ghirri. The Map and the Territory, in conversation with James Lingwood, Italian Cultural Institute, London, 22 October 2018

  • The Flying Carpet, in conversation with Cesare Fabbri and Michael Mack, Italian Cultural Institute, 20 March 2017

  • Guido Guidi, Facciate/Facades: In conversation with David Campany and James Lingwood, Large Glass, London, 15 December 2016, http://largeglass.co.uk/Events/Conversation-Guido-Guidi-with-David-Campany-Dr-Marina-Spunta-and 

  • Luigi Ghirri. The Complete Essays; in conversation with Julian Stallabrass, Waterstones Gower Street, London, 25 October 2016

 
 

Activities

Journal editing

Senior Co-Editor, Italian Studies, responsible for post-1700 submissions 

Learned societies

I sit on the Executive Committee of the following learned societies:

I am a member of the following learned societies:

  • SIS: Society for Italian Studies
  • AIPI: International Association of Teachers of Italian
  • AAIS: American Association of Italian Studies

 

External Examining

I have acted as  for Italian at the following Institutions:

  • University of Leeds, Italian undergraduate courses (2023-)
  • University of Nottingham Trent, Italian undergraduate courses (2016-2020)
  • University of Liverpool, Italian undergraduate courses (2014-2018)
  • University of Salford, Italian undergraduate and postgraduate courses (2009-2013)

Awards

Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

The Society for Italian Studies Article Prize 2024 for M. Spunta, ‘Pia Pera’s Poetics of the Planetary Garden’, Italian Studies, 78: 1 (2023), pp. 91-106

Conferences

Conferences Organised

Homage to Gianni Celati, Italian Cultural Institute, London, 27/4/2022

Tra ecologia letteraria ed ecocritica: narrare la crisi ambientale in letteratura, cinema, fotografia, series of panels at XXIV AIPI Conference, Univ. Genève (online), 28-30 June 2021 (with S. Ross)

La scrittura dello sguardo. Gianni Celati e le arti visive, Univ. of Strasbourg 8-9 November 2018 (with M. Martelli and N. Palmieri) 

‘Viaggi minimi e luoghi qualsiasi: intersezioni tra letteratura e arti visive in cammino verso il nuovo millennio’, series of panels at XXII AIPI Conference, Univ. Siena, 5-8 September 2018 (with M. Jansen and I. Lanslots)

‘L’esperienza del luogo’: Italian photography, writing and landscape. Luigi Ghirri, his contemporaries, his legacy, University of Leicester, 19-20 September 2014 (with J. Benci)

How to think in images? Luigi Ghirri and photography, The British School at Rome, 9 October 2013 (with J. Benci)

Letteratura come fantasticazione – in conversazione con Gianni Celati, University of Leicester, 2-4 May 2007 (with L. Rorato)

Orality and Literacy in Modern Italian Culture, Institute of Romance Studies, University of London, 2-4 May 2002 (with M. Caesar)

 

 

Interests

• 20th/21st Century Italian literature 
• Cultural & Visual Studies 
• Postwar Italian cinema 
• Postwar Italian Photography; Photography and Literature 
• Environmental Humanities; Ecocriticism and Cultural/Literary Ecology 
• Space, Place, Landscape studies 
• Literary Orality and Vocality

 

Media coverage

 

Qualifications

  • PhD in Italian Studies, University of Birmingham

  • MA & MPhil in Applied Linguistics, University of Exeter

  • BA & MA degrees in Modern Languages; University of Bologna

  • Senior Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy

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