THE
GRADUATE PROGRAM IN ITALIAN
The Ph.D. program in Italian Studies at Harvard University is committed to providing an innovative and interdisciplinary approach to Italian culture, with special emphasis on Dante, the Renaissance, 19th- and 20th-century literature and society, contemporary Italy, cinema, in addition to the history of ideas and ideologies. We believe that the building of a solid historical and philological background should be accompanied by extensive critical practice, profound interaction with current cultural trends and scholarship, and familiarity with new media and technologies. For this reason all graduate students in residence during the spring attend the Italian Studies Colloquium, which consists of weekly meetings with the authors of newly published books. The “Espresso Talks”—informal meetings in which students and faculty discuss recent novels, movies, and cultural events over a cup of coffee—serve the same purpose. Students are also invited to contribute articles, reviews, interviews, and documentary videos to the online magazine Romance Sphere.
Courses
Our faculty teach courses and seminars either in Italian or in English. Recent topics include Dante’s Divine Comedy (Pertile), Semantics of Desire: Love in Dante’s Poetry (Pertile), Petrarca and the Divided Self (Pertile), Renaissance Epic (Erspamer), Cultural History and Nation-Making, 1870-1920 (Lolla), Literature and Fascism (Pertile), Italian Modernism (Minghelli), The Modern Image: Intersections of Photography, Cinema and Literature (Minghelli), The Last Ten Years: Italian Fiction and Film (Erspamer), Ethics and Aesthetics (Erspamer and Sommer), Literary Cityscapes: Italian Urban Life and Cultural Change (Minghelli). To help students develop their writing and research skills we have instituted a student-organized dissertation writers group convened by faculty on a rotating basis.
Recent visiting professors include Giorgio Agamben (philosophy), Daniele Archibugi (political science), Piero Boitani (comparative literature), Adriana Cavarero (political philosophy and gender studies), Paolo Galluzzi (history of science), Carlo Ginzburg (history), Ara Merjian (aesthetics), Sergio Zatti (Italian literature). Most of them were invited by the Lauro De Bosis Committee, established at Harvard seventy years ago in memory of Lauro de Bosis, a poet and intellectual who had given his life fighting Fascism in Italy.
Harvard professors who offer courses cross-listed with Italian Studies or of interest to our students include Mario Biagioli and Katie Park (History of Science), Giuliana Bruno (Visual and Environmental Studies), Gennaro Chierchia (Linguistics), Kathleen Coleman (Classics), Frank Fehrenbach and Alina Payne (History of Art and Architecture), James Hankins and Charles Maier (History), Thomas Kelly (Music).
Although the program’s emphasis is on Italian literature and cultural studies, we encourage students to take other courses within the Romance Languages and Literatures Department as well as in other disciplines, including history, philosophy, women and gender studies, cinema, art and architecture, music, classics, religious studies, anthropology, social studies.
An agreement with Brown University allows students to take courses offered by the Italian department there. Graduate students of the two universities organize annually a joint conference in Italian Studies (“Chiasmi”), held alternatively at Harvard and Brown.
Teaching
In addition to forming capable and creative scholars, the program promotes their effective teaching at all levels. Beginning in their third year students teach language classes; once they have completed their general exams they may teach sections of courses in Italian literature or culture.
Exchange program
An exchange program with the prestigious Scuola Normale Superiore provides students with an opportunity to study one year in Pisa under eminent scholars such as Lina Bolzoni, Michele Ciliberto, Carlo Ginzburg, Salvatore Nigro, Adriano Prosperi.
Resources
Graduate students at Harvard University discover an unusual wealth of research resources. Among them is the library system, which includes Widener Library, the largest university library in the world; Houghton Library, with its collection of manuscripts, ancient books, and papers of major Italian authors and intellectuals such as Pirandello and Salvemini; and the Harvard Film Archive, which contains a magnificent collection of world cinema. These repositories supplement a number of research centers related to Italian studies, including the Humanities Center, the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, the Film Study Center, and the Villa I Tatti Center for Italian Renaissance Studies.
Financial aid
In addition to the standard financial aid package, all students admitted to the GSAS to pursue Italian studies are granted the Lauro de Bosis Award ($2,000 per year) for the first two years of their study.
Admission
Although our Ph.D. program incorporates a Master's degree, we will only consider applicants for the full doctoral program. The application deadline for the 2009-10 academic year is January 2, 2009. It is important that candidates submit all of the required documents by that date. The Admission Committee will evaluate the overall profile of each applicant; however, we give particular attention to the following aspects:
- Statement of purpose: It should give the committee a sense of the applicant’s interests, strengths, and intellectual objectives. Applicants need not indicate a field of specialization nor a specific project of research as they will identify these areas during their second and third years at Harvard. It would, however, be useful to know something about the candidate’s professional vision and goals, as well as why he or she has chosen this program to pursue them.
- Writing sample: Applicants should submit only one paper, 28,000 to 45,000 characters in length (spaces included). The sample must demonstrate critical writing (rather than creative writing) on a subject directly related to Italian studies.
Candidates can send other papers or publications with their application, but they must clearly indicate which one they have selected as their writing sample. The sample may be in either English or Italian.
- Official academic transcripts: While the overall GPA is important, it is also important to have an average of no lower than A- in courses related to Italian studies. If a candidate has not majored in Italian or a related field, he or she should have sufficient background to enter the graduate program.
- Letters of recommendation: Candidates must present three strong letters of recommendation from professors or scholars who are familiar with their academic work. Letters may be in either English or Italian. Additional letters from employers may also be included.
- GRE: All applicants—including those whose native language is not English—are required to take the Graduate Record Exam (GRE). A high Verbal score (above 700) positively complements the application, but it is not in itself a decisive factor, especially for students whose native language is not English. The Quantitative and Analytical scores carry less weight than the Verbal and Subject scores.
- TOEFL: The Test of English as Foreign Language (TOEFL) is required of all applicants whose native language is not English, or whose undergraduate degree program was not conducted in English.
- Languages: As courses and seminars are taught in either English or Italian, candidates must have strong writing and speaking abilities in both languages. It is highly recommended that candidates acquire at least a reading knowledge of a second Romance language and of Latin before matriculation.
Per i candidati italiani
Ulteriori informazioni in italiano per candidati che facciano domanda dall’Italia: in questa pagina.
Contacts
For more information on our program, please contact Professor Francesco Erspamer, Director of Graduate Studies, at erspamer@fas.harvard.edu. Inquiries about admission and financial aid should be addressed to Frannie Lindsay, Graduate Coordinator, at flindsay@fas.harvard.edu or calling her at 617-495-2525.
Last updated on September 17, 2009
