Upcoming volumes

Annali d’Italianistica welcomes your contributions to future volumes. For information on how to prepare your manuscripts and reviews, take a look at our publishing guidelines.

AdI 2025 (Vol. 43)

Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence: From Theory to Practice

[Abstract deadline extended to Friday 2 February 2024]

Technology has advanced greatly and is shaping all branches of knowledge, including the Humanities. Within this rapidly evolving context, AdI intends to devote its 43^rd monographic volume to Digital Humanities (DH) and Artificial Intelligence (AI).

The volume will be edited by prominent scholars, and each has formulated a specific section, whose description follows. We are interested in contributions that address a specific theoretical or practical dimension of the DH and AI debate, such as, for example: how has DH enhanced Italian Studies in scholarship and teaching; how is Italian Studies responding, reacting, and contributing to the challenges brought about by these technological advancements? Are there concrete examples of generative AI applications adopted in the classroom or in research that can provide models or guidance at this stage? Which specific aspects of Italian Studies are or will be affected the most, such as language/culture instruction, theoretical or technological approaches to traditional issues, career paths, etc.? Are there Italian writers, artists, or scholars who have tackled the challenges posed by emerging technologies and who can help us face the present challenges?

The Editors of the volume welcome approaches focusing on both theory and practice according to the following five thematic sections.

I
Artistic Practices and AI in Italian Studies.
To be edited by Adele Bardazzi (a.bardazzi@uu.nl)

This thematic section delves into the intersection of contemporary Italian literary works, including intermedial works, and recent advancements in AI with the aim to investigate to what extent, if at all, it can be helpful to approach these works from an Italian Studies perspective. The inquiry thus intends to investigate how to situate AI-generated works within Italian Studies as well as World Literature. We welcome contributions focusing on questions of authorship, originality, and creativity.

II
Digital Game-Based Scholarship, Teaching, and Learning.
To be edited by Brandon Essary (bessary@elon.edu)

Video games are ubiquitous. According to a substantial body of research in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL), they are powerful teaching and learning tools. Many games have complex narratives imbued with literary elements that treat serious topics. These games offer the chance to engage students and scholars with the study of Italian literature, culture, history, and the humanities more broadly, in an engaging, digital way.

III
Author and Authorship Between DH e AI.
To be edited by Paola Italia (paola.italia@unibo.it)

Through DH and AI, the authorial function can be investigated in all types of manuscripts: from autograph to apograph, and from apocrypha to fake. The application of automated methods to famous literary cases have shown the usefulness of an integrated approach not only in the resolution of philological cases, but also in investigating more analytically the mechanisms of literary creation and the multiple forms in which authorship expresses itself at the moment of fragmentation and sharing in the digital ecosystem of textual responsibility.

IV
The AI Emergenc/e/y.
To be edited by Massimo Riva (massimo_riva@brown.edu)

As generative AI applications, Chatbots and similar technological advancements become more accessible and pervasive, at a societal level, scholars and teachers of Italian Studies face both theoretical and practical dilemmas. Combined with other pre-existing pressures targeting in particularly the humanities, these new difficulties may perhaps amount to an existential challenge to our profession, in addition to many others. This section intends to look at concrete applications of generative AI in the classroom or in research that can provide models or guidance at this stage of technology.

V
Born-Digital Literature and Hybrid Archives.
To be edited by Michelangelo Zaccarello (michelangelo.zaccarello@unipi.it)

In the last decades, hybrid archives, which combine paper materials with digital (usually magnetic) resources, have flourished. This section seeks to investigate the first authors to adopt a personal computer for their literary creations, and to assess the difficult task of securing their documents, conceived and written in digital form, as well as to evaluate the normative practices for their acquisition and preservation, integrating them into a methodologically sound editing protocol.

***

This volume will be published in the fall of 2025. Interested scholars are invited to contact the appropriate guest editor of the theme related to their topic, submit a 300-word abstract, and provide a short biographical note. The abstract and biographical note will be due by 31 December 2023. Guest editors will provide to each contributor guidelines to follow and deadlines to respect. Articles will be due by September 2024. Early submissions are encouraged.

Authors should write in the language they are most familiar with, either Italian or English. Typically, articles range between 6,000 and 10,000 words. They should conform to the style-sheet of Annali d’italianistica for “Notes” and “Works Cited” (https://annali.org/publishing/). All articles will be refereed according to the peer-review policy of the journal (https://annali.org/peer-review-statement/).

For any questions, please contact one of the guest editors:

Adele Bardazzi, Utrecht University (a.bardazzi@uu.nl)
Brandon Essary, Elon University (bessary@elon.edu)
Paola Italia, Università di Bologna (paola.italia@unibo.it)
Massimo Riva, Brown University (massimo_riva@brown.edu)
Michelangelo Zaccarello, Università di Pisa (michelangelo.zaccarello@unipi.it)

AdI 2024 (Vol. 42)

Fifty Years of La Storia: Elsa Morante Beyond History

La Storia (1974) is arguably Elsa Morante’s most influential novel. In Italy, it became an instant bestseller spurring a highly controversial debate at the time of its publication. The complex ethical and aesthetic questions that are at the center of the novel, however, are all too relevant for today’s divided world, torn by inequality, war, and dissymetries of power. The year 2024 marks the 50th anniversary of its publication, and prompts renewed reflection on Morante’s work in an Italian and transnational contexts. To celebrate this event, Annali d’italianistica solicits articles that propose new interpretations of Elsa Morante’s multifaceted ouvre and its afterlife. We invite contributions that engage with contemporary critical debates in Morante Studies and put her works in dialogue with approaches including Gender, Cultural Memory, and Cognitive Literary Studies; Trauma, Feminist, Translation, Adaptation, Affect, and Emotional Theory; Environmental Humanities, Ecocriticism, Posthumanism, New Materialism, and Animal Studies. Comparative essays focusing on Morante’s presence in the works of contemporary authors, thinkers, and visual artists are most welcome.  

Interested contributors are invited to contact the guest editors to discuss the content of their articles. A 300-word abstract and a short biographical note should be submitted by January 31, 2023. Articles will be due between September 1 and December 31, 2023. Early submissions are encouraged. The volume will be published in the fall of 2024.  

Articles can be written in Italian or English and, typically, are between 6,000 and 10,000 words. They should conform to the style-sheet criteria set forth by Annali d’italianistica for “Notes” and “Works Cited” (https://annali.org/publishing/). All articles will be refereed and authors should expect to revise their submissions following the guest editors’ comments and suggestions. 

Franco Baldasso, Bard College (baldasso@bard.edu) 
Ursula Fanning, University College Dublin (ursula.fanning@ucd.ie) 
Mara Josi, Ghent University (mara.josi@ugent.be) 
Stefania Porcelli, Hunter College (sp1122@hunter.cuny.edu) 
Katrin Wehling-Giorgi, Durham University (katrin.wehling-giorgi@durham.ac.uk) 

AdI 2023 (Vol. 41)

Il fascismo nella cultura italiana: 1945-2022

Il centenario dell’ascesa al potere del fascismo (1922-2022) offre l’occasione ideale per ripensare alle molteplici maniere in cui la cultura italiana ha meditato sulla memoria storica del totalitarismo. Annali d’italianistica sollecita contributi specialistici per un numero monografico (volume 41 del 2023) incentrato sulla rappresentazione del fascismo nella produzione culturale italiana dal dopoguerra ai nostri giorni. Il volume ha l’obbiettivo di analizzare criticamente in qual modo la letteratura, il cinema e le arti visive abbiano rappresentato e continuino a rappresentare il passato fascista e come queste manifestazioni multiculturali abbiano contribuito alla valutazione della memoria storica della dittatura.

Si sollecitano contributi che esaminino la rappresentazione del fascismo in specifici prodotti culturali: letteratura, cinema, arti visive e altre forme di espressione e valutazione artistica. Un approccio intermediale è particolarmente ben accetto.

Gli studiosi interessati a contribuire sono invitati a contattare i curatori del volume il prima possibile per discutere il contenuto del proprio intervento e inviare poi una sinossi di circa 300 parole assieme ad una breve nota biografica possibilmente entro il 31 gennaio 2022.

I contributi che verranno selezionati dovranno essere inviati possibilmente entro il 1 settembre 2022. Qualora possibile, si invitano gli autori a mandare il proprio contributo prima della scadenza.

Il volume verrà pubblicato nell’autunno 2023.

I saggi possono essere scritti in italiano o in inglese, devono avere una lunghezza compresa tra le 6.000 e le 10.000 parole e devono attenersi alle norme editoriali indicate sul sito degli Annali d’italianistica per l’organizzazione interna del saggio, le note e la bibliografia (https://annali.org/publishing/). Tutti i saggi saranno sottoposti ad un procedimento di peer-review e i contributori devono essere disposti a rivedere il saggio attraverso diverse fasi editoriali.

Per ulteriori informazioni si prega di contattare Guido Bartolini (gbartolini@ucc.ie) ed un altro curatore affine alla propria area di specializzazione, secondo le indicazioni elencate qui sotto.

AdI 2022 (Vol. 40)

1922-2022: Pasolini e la libertà espressiva. Lingua, stile, potere

In occasione del centenario della nascita di Pier Paolo Pasolini, Annali d’Italianistica propone di dedicare il 40esimo volume (2022) alla sua opera e in particolare al legame tra sistemi espressivi, forme stilistiche e dispositivi di potere presente nei suoi scritti letterari, nei suoi film, così come nei suoi testi giornalisti e nelle sue riflessioni sulla letteratura e sul cinema. L’obiettivo è quello di comporre un volume di saggi capaci di porre al centro la questione della libertà espressiva, che Pasolini ha approfondito attraverso lo studio delle condizioni di possibilità politiche e sociali che un determinato contesto linguistico e culturale oppone al fare artistico. Si tratterà in questo senso di analizzare i modi e le forme che l’autore ha studiato e impiegato nella sua lotta per difendere il gesto artistico dai processi di alienazione e omologazione promossi dalla cultura egemone. In questa prospettiva verrà dato particolare spazio 1) allo studio del complesso, e talvolta contraddittorio, rapporto tra i saggi teorici, come ad esempio quelli raccolti in Passione e ideologia ed Empirismo eretico, e l’opera letteraria e cinematografica di Pasolini; 2) all’analisi delle opere-laboratorio, ovvero quei testi letterari e quei film in cui l’autore riflette sulla forma espressiva o in cui l’autore problematizza esplicitamente questioni di ordine semiotico, linguistico o teorico-letterario (ad esempio Romans, L’Italiano è ladro, La Ricotta, Alì dagli occhi azzurri, Teorema, Appunti per un’Orestiade africana, La Divina mimesis, Petrolio); e infine 3) agli articoli capaci di individuare i nessi tra le questioni poetiche inerenti al tema della libertà espressiva e le fonti, sia teoriche che critiche (ad esempio Ascoli, Auerbach, Contini, Gramsci, Goldmann, Jakobson, Šklovskij, Spitzer), che Pasolini in modo originale ha riletto in un senso politico con l’obiettivo di ricondurre la questione della lingua e dello stile all’indagine sui dispositivi di potere affermatisi in un dato momento storico.

The volume will appear in the fall of 2022. Interested scholars may contact any one of the volume’s guest editors:

Paolo Desogus (paolo.desogus@sorbonne-universite.fr)
Davide Luglio (davide.luglio@sorbonne-universite.fr)
Enrico Minardi (eminardi@asu.edu)
Colleen M. Ryan (ryancm@indiana.edu)

The deadline for final submissions is the fall of 2021.

Previous Calls

Annali d’italianistica – 2021 – Volume 39
Dante 2021: Unholy and Holy Violence, Silence, Names, Words
To celebrate the seventh centenary of Dante’s death in 2021, AdI plans to devote its 39th monographic volume to the connections between Christ’s violent sacrifice — the sine qua non for Everyman’s salvation — and the poetic rendering of the Pilgrim’s journey from Hell to Purgatory and Paradise. To this purpose, the editors of the volume plan to organize several sessions at national and international conventions on the volume’s topic and welcome paper proposals on the following issues: the torments of the damned in Inferno as a parody of Christ’s salvific sacrifice; the sufferings of the purgatorial souls, who, contrary to those in Hell, shed no blood, as the manifestation of their full acceptance of Christ’s Redemption; and the singing, dancing, and splendor of the blessed in Heaven as the glorification of Christ’s redemptive death. Although not sharing in the torments
of the souls in Hell, the Pilgrim actively participates in the purifications
of Purgatory and in the joy of the blessed. Dante the Poet plies his poetic craft to describe appropriately the spiritual condition of the souls and the Pilgrim’s journey in the afterlife. Dante the Poet does not eschew — in fact, he embraces it realistically and/or metaphorically — the language of violence needed to narrate the experience of the souls and of the Pilgrim in his threefold journey. Thus, for instance, the two terms which Capaneus employs to describe realistically his own defeat by Jove, folgore and percuotere, are the same that Dante the Poet uses to describe metaphorically the Pilgrim’s vision of the Triune God in Paradise. Also, word(s) and silence(s) characterize the souls’ experiences and the Pilgrim’s voyage. Thus, Dante’s name — which, like Christ’s, is never written or uttered in Inferno — is pronounced once only, by Beatrice, in an accusatory
manner in Purgatorio, and never in Paradiso, where his name is known to all the blessed and loved by them, thus becoming synonymous with the Augustinian definition of verbum: “cum amore notitia” (“knowledge with love,” De Trinitate 9: 10.15).
The volume will appear in the Fall of 2021. Interested scholars may contact
any one of the volume’s guest editors:
Dino S. Cervigni (cervigni@unc.edu);
Christopher Kleinhenz (ckleinhe@wisc.edu);
Giuseppe Ledda (giuseppe.ledda@UNIBO.IT);
Heather Webb (hmw53@cam.ac.uk).
The deadline for final submissions was the fall of 2020.