Roberta Cauchi-Santoro

I am an Assistant Professor at St. Jerome's University, federated with the University of Waterloo.  From September 2013 until December 2018, I taught European Studies and Italian Studies at the School of Languages and Literatures at the University of Guelph. I started teaching Italian Studies at St. Jerome’s University in January 2015 and I am now an Assistant Professor at the university. My first book titled Beyond the Suffering of Being: Desire in Giacomo Leopardi and Samuel Beckett (Firenze University Press, 2016) has been positively reviewed. 

My current research focuses on Italian writer Elena Ferrante and the influence on her work of various facets of psychoanalytic feminist criticism of the 1970s.  I have a particular interest in Italian (and specifically Mediterranean) women writers, but I have published on and taught about a variety of aspects of Anglo-Italian literary relations.

The content that follows may only represent a portion of the faculty member's work.

Books

Roberta Cauchi-Santoro & Costanza Barchiesi, Ferrante Unframed: Authorship, Reception and Feminist Praxis in the Works of Elena Ferrante. Florence: Società Editrice Fiorentina, 2021.

Beyond the Suffering of Being: Desire in Giacomo Leopardi and Samuel Beckett. Florence (Italy). Firenze University Press, 2016. Series: Studi di italianistica moderna e contemporanea nel mondo anglofono/Studies in Italianistica in the Anglophone World.

Chapters

“A Porous Mediterranean Écriture Féminine: Elena Ferrante’s L’amore molesto.” Unframing and Reframing Mediterranean Identities. Eds. Giovanna Summerfield and Rosario Pollicino. Netherlands: Brill, 2023, pp.88-102.

"Elena Ferrante's Women Intellectuals: Writing and the paradoxical Relationship to the Mother." Female Cultural Production in Modern Italy: Literature, Art, and Intellectual History. Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2023. 53-66.

“Writing from the Womb: A Cixousian Reading of Elena Ferrante’s La figlia oscura.” Femminismo e femminismi nella scrittura italiana dall'Ottocento al XXI secolo. Eds. Michela Prevedello and Sandra Parmegiani. Florence: Società Editrice Fiorentina, 2019. 141-156.

“Una morte seducente: eros-thanatos, il desiderio e la “jouissance” lacaniana nelle poesie del ciclo di Aspasia di Giacomo Leopardi.” Il pensiero della poesia. Eds. Enrico Minardi and Cristina Caracchini. Florence (Italy): Firenze University Press. 105-118.

Articles

"Service-Learning in the Italian Classroom: The Pedagogical Value of Student Interviews in the Italian Heritage Project." Italica. vol.101: 4. Forthcoming.

“Nostos and 19th-century Italian-Canadian Immigration: Mapping the earliest Latin Quarters.” Patterns of Nostos in Italian-Canadian Narratives. Ed. Gabriel Niccoli. Special Issue of Italian Canadiana. Vol. XXXV, (2021) Thematic Issue on “Nostos.” 71-77.

“Ridendo dei nostri mali trovo qualche conforto”: Giacomo Leopardi’s Humour. International Studies in Humour. Ed. Ephraim Nissan. (2018). 5.1: 2-19.

“Mapping Intangible Cultural Heritage: Safeguarding the Memories of a City’s Historic Core.” Cultural Mapping: Making the Intangible Visible. City, Culture and Society. Vol. XXX. Eds. Nancy Duxbury and Alys Longley.  (2015).

“Compassion in Giacomo Leopardi: A Levinasian Reading of ‘La Ginestra o il fiore del deserto’” Italica.92.3 (Fall 2015). 796-812.

“‘Non che la speme, il desiderio è spento’: Giacomo Leopardi, Samuel Beckett and the Quietist Tradition.” Italian Culture. XXXIII.I (2015): 39-54.

Book Reviews

Frontiers of Feminism: Movements and Influences in  Quebec and Italy, 1968-89 by Jacinthe Michaud, Vancouver/Toronto: UBC Press, 2021.pp. 209. In Italian Canadiana. Vol. XXXVII.1. Spring 2023. 283-86.

ITAL101: Introduction to Italian Language 1

ITAL102: Introduction to Italian Language 2

ITAL 155: Intensive Introductory Italian Language

ITAL 201: Intermediate Italian 1

ITALST 111/SMF 111: Marriage and Family Traditions in Italy

ITALST 112/SMF 112: Sexual Identities and Relationships in Italy

ITALST 291: Italian Culture and Civilization 1

ITALST 292: Italian Culture and Civilization II

ITALST 296: Special Topics in Contemporary Italian Society [Topic: Mediterranean Black Italy]

ITALST 391: Italian Novel and Cinema

Grants

2024 SJU Faculty Research Grant

2023 SSHRC-UW Exchange Grant "Waterloo Italian Heritage Project"

2023 SJU Faculty Research Grant

2023 Istituto Italiano di Cultura Funds for Cattedre d’italiano (with K.Lappin-Fortin and B.Tremblay)

2020 SSHRC-UW Explore Grant “From Leopardi to Joyce, Beckett and Levinas: Aesthetic Melancholy in the European Quietist Tradition”

OGS, Ontario Graduate Scholarship (September 1st 2010- August 31st 2011)

Fellowships

Mitacs Postdoctoral Fellowship (May 1st 2013- April 30th 2015)

Awards

CEL shortlisted nominations for Award in Best Online Course Design. Course shortlisted: ITAL 101 Introduction to Italian Language I. (2024)

Sessional Faculty Teaching Performance Review, Tenure and Promotion of the School of

Languages and Literatures, University of Guelph (2016-2017) Rating: Outstanding

Sessional Faculty Teaching Performance Review, Tenure and Promotion of the School of

Languages and Literatures, University of Guelph (2015-2016) Rating: Outstanding

Wait-listed for SSHRC [Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada] postdoctoral fellowship, 2014-15. Overall Score 3.95/6. Committee 1: Rank 45/192. Waiting list starts at rank 40.

Anthony Camisso Research Award, Awarding Body: Canadian Society for Italian Studies (June 2013)

USC Teaching Honour Roll UWO Award of Excellence (2009-2010)

USC Teaching Honour Roll UWO Award of Excellence (2008-2009)

USC Teaching Honour Roll UWO Award of Excellence (2007-2008)

Best Graduate Essay Award: Canadian Society for Italian Studies (CSIS) (2010)

The content that follows may only represent a portion of the Faculty member’s work.

Administrative

St Jerome’s University

Acting Chair, Department of Italian and French Studies  (2024-to present)