Claudia Dellacasa wins Society for Italian Studies Postgraduate Prize

We wish to extend our warmest congratulations to Claudia Dellacasa (PhD in Italian Studies, MLaC) who is the winner of the 2021 Society for Italian Studies (SIS) Postgraduate Prize. The prize was awarded for her thesis titled ‘Italo Calvino in Japan, Japan in Italo Calvino: A Cross-Cultural Encounter’, supervised by Dr Katrin Wehling-Giorgi and Dr Fusako Innami, which aims to restore the cross-cultural dynamics of East-West dialogues to the author’s writings. The thesis highlights Calvino’s gradual reassessment of post-Cartesian European thought in response to Eastern philosophies that promote intimations of the undifferentiated nature of different forms of life. Calvino’s work shows that Japanese gardens and temples were the places in which Calvino developed a landmark feature of his distinctive cultural ecology: a renewed awareness of the interdependency between human and other-than-human life. 

Claudia is currently a Teach@Tübingen Fellow, where she teaches between the Romance Seminar and International Literatures, as well as a Fellow of the Centre for Culture and Ecology at Durham University. We wish her wish her all the best for a bright future ahead! 

Find out more about Dr Claudia Dellacasa here.