Transnational Italian culture and the ghosts of empire

This event is fully booked. 

Lecture in Modern Languages

In this lecture, Charles Burdett argues that our understanding of modern Italian culture needs always to take account of the traces left by past instances of mobility. More specifically he will consider the course of Italian expansionism both immediately before and during the twenty years (1922-43) in which the Fascist regime was in power in Italy, and the legacy of this period in works of literary and visual culture, in examples of the built environment and within enduring attitudes towards other cultures and people. He suggests how we can become aware of the proximity of the colonial world and how the spectre of the past can infiltrate and disturb the present.

Speaker:
Professor Charles Burdett, Professor of Italian, Durham University
Charles Burdett is Professor of Italian at Durham University. His publications include Journeys through Fascism: Italian Travel Writing between the Wars (2007) and Italy, Islam and the Islamic World: Representations and Reflections from 9/11 to the Arab Uprisings (2016). He was Principal Investigator of the AHRC large grant, 'Transnationalizing Modern Languages: Mobility, Identity and Translation in Modern Italian Cultures' (2014-2017).

Chair: 
Professor Robert S C Gordon FBA, Serena Professor of Italian, University of Cambridge 

As this event is free, not everyone who registers for tickets attends. To make sure we have a full house we allocate more tickets than there are seats. We do our best to get the numbers right, but unfortunately we occasionally have to disappoint people. Admission is on a first come, first served basis, so please arrive in good time for the start of the event.

You can listen to an audio recording or view the presentation.

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Image © Francesca Di Pasquale