FIGSA’s event with Line Papin on October 3 was a success! Several people came to the event to hear some excerpts from Line’s book and ask questions of their own. We would like to give a big shout-out to any graduate students who helped make this event a success, as well as the French and Italian Department, the Center of Excellence at OSU, and Kaya Press.
This talk explores the way emerging cinematic techniques used to represent visions and prophecies in two early Italian films constituted a self-conscious declaration of cinema’s ability to inspire moral behavior. We’ll use the films, both released in 1911, as case studies in which mother and son protagonists demonstrate self-sacrificing behavior for the collective good after glimpsing the consequences of their potential life trajectories. Speaker information: Amy Boylan is Associate Professor of Italian at the University of New Hampshire. She obtained her Ph.D. at the University of California. Her research focuses primarily on National Memorials in Italian Literature, Art and Cinema, as well as depictions of motherhood in early 20th century Italian Culture.
More information here
This event is organized by the French and Italian Graduate Students Association in collaboration with the Center for Languages, Literatures and Cultures, and the French and Italian Department. Melissa Sigrist, graduated from the Ohio State University in Foreign Language Education with a specialization in French. Apart from fluency in French, Melissa also speaks German and Japanese. After being an educator for many years, Melissa switched tracks and embarked on a career in the travel industry. Since 2013 she has been a Tour Leader for an international travel company, Women Traveling Together, based in Annapolis, MD. Her work includes travelling with small groups of women all over the world and training new tour leaders. , Melissa will speak about how learning a foreign language has been an enriching personal experience, allowing her to better understand people who experience life differently and teaching her to be comfortable with her own vulnerabilities while speaking in a foreign tongue
More information here
In recent years, the visibility of non-binary individuals has greatly increased on both sides of the Atlantic. While the singular “they” has gained favor with many in English-speaking spaces, non-binary French-speaking people have faced other challenges regarding language and syntax, given the binary nature of French grammar. Increasingly, students of French and other binary-gendered languages are asking instructors for guidance on how to navigate and express non-binary gender in those languages. It is important to respond in ways that are linguistically coherent and also culturally situated. Vinay Swamy considers the French context and the import of imbricated relationships between language, gender and nation to understand the stakes at hand in creating and sustaining inclusive and expansive possibilities within Francophone linguistic, cultural and educational spaces.
Vinay Swamy is Professor of French and Francophone Studies at Vassar College, NY. He received his doctorate in French Studies with a certificate in Gender Studies from Northwestern University. His teaching and research interests are located in French and Francophone literary and cinematic traditions and their intersection with political and cultural histories, as well as the construction of social identities in contemporary France. He also teaches in the International Studies and Women’s Studies programs. Professor Swamy is the author and editor of several works including Interpreting the Republic (Lexington Books, 2011); Screening Integration (University of Nebraska, 2011); Les Écrans de l’intégration (Presses Universitaires de Vincennes, 2015); and “Legitimizing ‘iel’?” (H-France Salon, 2019 vol 11, issue 14). He is also the translator of Through the Keyhole (Manchester University Press, 2016) by Marcela Iacub. In 2021-22, Professor Swamy is pursuing his research on nonbinary gender as a Fulbright Research Scholar in France.
(Book in French, available in paper and epub formats from 1 Feb 2022).
In recent years, social media have become the main platform where new artistic talents, but also black activists are imposing themselves in Italian culture. This multi-media lecture explores the role of Black girls in Italy and their contribution in a variety of fields including the world-renowned Italian fashion and beauty industries, the role of Black artists in the music and entertainment industry. Social Media Entrepreneurship has emerged as an important strategy for Afro-Italians seeking to advance new narratives about Blackness and its inclusion within the material and symbolic boundaries of Italy. At the same time, Afro-Italian entrepreneurship is transforming Italian material culture, and, by extension, the meanings of “Italianness” itself.
Fred “Kudjo” Kuwornu is a filmmaker, activist, producer, and educator.
This event has been sponsored by the French and Italian Graduate Students Association.
More information here.
May 6-7 2021
Last May the Department of French and Italian and FIGSA, with the generous financial support from the Council of Student Affairs, brought together scholar doing exciting work in Italian media studies.
Get more details on the event here.
Conference Organizers: Demetrio Antolini, Dr. Jonathan Mullins, Dr. Dana Renga
MARCH 5, 4:00PM
Dr. Camilla Hawthorne, is Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology, University of California, Santa Cruz. She is a critical human geographer and interdisciplinary social scientist broadly interested in the racial politics of migration and citizenship, inequality, social movements, and Black geographies. Her work focuses at the intersection of critical public policy studies, diaspora theory, Black European studies, and postcolonial/feminist science and technology studies.
ZOOM: Go.osu.edu/Camilla-Hawthorne
Password: frit
Facebook Event: https://fb.me/e/7cjsdfwI9
Sponsored by the French and Italian Graduate Student Association.
FEBRUARY 5, 4:00PM
Dr. James E. Genova, Professor of History and Film Studies at Ohio State-Marion, explores the intersection of race and imperialism in the formative period of African cinema during the 1950s and 1960s.
ZOOM: Go.osu.edu/james-genova
Password: frit
Facebook event: https://fb.me/e/4azXwzl8d.
Sponsored by the French and Italian Graduate Student Association.
Gallery
Do you want to know more about Figsa? Here we discuss what we do and our future projects.
During the Fall Semester 2020 Figsa organized a virtual book club for the Graduate Students of the French and Italian Department. Its purpose is to help overcome the sense of isolation caused by the Covid-19 restrictions and to create a space in which students can discuss relevant topics, books and poetry in an informal and non-academic environment.
Last semester we focused primarily on Black voices and experiences from different perspectives, such as Toni Morrison and Veronique Tadjo.
V.Tadjo, Latérite, 1983
The Source of Self-Regard: Selected Essays, Speeches, and Meditations, 2019