Loredana Polezzi Named Alfonse M. D’Amato Endowed Chair in Italian American and Italian Studies

Loredana Polezzi has been named the Alfonse M. D’Amato Endowed Chair in Italian American and Italian Studies, positioned in the College of Arts and Sciences Department of European Languages, Literatures and Cultures. The D’Amato Chair, established in 2008, was made possible by a fundraising effort led by then Stony Brook University Council Chair and current Stony Brook Foundation Board member Richard Nasti, along with former SUNY Distinguished Service Professor Mario Mignone. The Chair is the first endowed chair in the College of Arts and Sciences.   

Dr. Polezzi’s work concentrates on multiple forms of mobility, their history, their representation and theorization. Her recent work focuses on diasporic Italian cultures (especially Italian American and Italian Australian cultural production) and on multilingual education in Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa. She has worked on the history of travel from the 18th to the 21st century, on contemporary Italian writing and its translation, and on the theorization of the links between translation and migration as well as the translingual practices of contemporary migrant authors. 
“I am excited to join such a leading, innovative institution as Stony Brook University, and I am honored to hold the Alfonse M. D’Amato Endowed Chair in Italian American and Italian Studies, with its distinguished tradition,” Dr. Polezzi said. “I look forward to collaborating with colleagues, many of whom I have known and admired for a long time. With my teaching, research and community work, I hope to contribute to placing Stony Brook University at the center of the renewal of the transdisciplinary, transnational area of modern languages. We will work together to underline the importance of linguistic and cultural awareness and their centrality for an educational project that focuses on social justice, cohesion and diversity.” 
Dr. Polezzi will be collaborating closely with the Center for Italian Studies in organizing talks and panel discussions and in reaching out to our large community of those with Italian origins in our region. She will teach both Italian and Italian American culture in the Department of European Languages, Literatures and Cultures and she is already collaborating with other units, such as the Center for Multilingual and Intercultural Communication and the Institute for Globalization Studies.  
“The Department of European Languages, Literatures and Cultures is delighted to welcome Dr. Loredana Polezzi as the Alfonse M. D’Amato Endowed Chair in Italian American and Italian Studies,” said Sarah Jordain, associate professor and chair, Department of European Languages, Literatures and Cultures. “We look forward to Dr. Polezzi’s new perspectives on scholarship and teaching to reinvigorate our Italian American and Italian Studies programs through her wide-ranging international collaborations and her established excellence in her fields of inquiry.” 
Dr. Polezzi previously served as a full professor of Translation Studies at Cardiff University and as associate professor and reader in the Department of Italian at the University of Warwick, UK. In addition to having published monographs, textbooks, edited volumes, translations, and articles in leading journals and collections, she is also one of the editors of the ‘Transnational Modern Languages Series and co-editor of Transnational Italian Studies (2020) and Transcultural Italies: Mobility, Memory and Translation (2020). 
“I met Loredana several years ago and have followed her career with great interest,” said Mary Jo Bona, professor, Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. “Based on what I know and have learned over the years, Loredana is not one to rest on her many laurels: her passionate intensity dictates against anything other than a form of superlative excellence and energy I find truly extraordinary. She will continue to be a central voice for the fields of Italian and Italian American studies and her scholarly portfolio reveals someone who consistently shows high quality performance as a scholar, teacher, and community leader. We are lucky to have her.”  
“I am thrilled to welcome Loredana to Stony Brook,” said Richard Nasti, who is also chair of the Center for Italian Studies Advisory Council. “Her appointment was the result of a worldwide search, and she impressed the search committee with her distinguished scholarship as well as her willingness to play an integral role in the future of the Center for Italian Studies. I also want to thank Dean Nicole Sampson for her steadfast leadership and support in bringing Loredana to campus.” 
Polezzi is a fellow of the Learned Society of Wales. She serves as a member of the UK’s Arts and Humanities Research Council’s Peer Review College and of its Strategic Overseas Development Aid College, and in 2020 also acted as a member of the UK Research and Innovation Global Challenges ResearchFund/Newton Fund Covid-19 Agile Response team. Polezzi is also the current chair of the International Association for Translation and Intercultural Studies and co-editor of the leading international journal The Translator. 
“Loredana Polezzi is a field changer,” said Celia Marshik, professor in the Department of English. “Under her dynamic leadership, translation studies and Italian and Italian American studies around the world are becoming more transnational, and more globally engaged, areas of inquiry. Polezzi highlights the importance of mobility and migration in understanding languages and cultures, and she thus offers a model of scholarship and teaching for our profoundly interconnected world.”