Andrea Celli

Associate Professor

Italian Literature and Cultural Studies

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Areas of Expertise:

– Italian and Mediterranean studies (13th-16th centuries)

– Dante Studies

– History of ideas, with a focus on early-modern representations of Islam

– History of Arabic and Islamic studies in Spain, France, and Italy

– Intercultural studies and cross-cultural poetics

Bio:

Andrea Celli teaches Italian and Mediterranean Studies at the University of Connecticut. He graduated in Italian Philology at the Università di Padova (Italy), where he also received his PhD Degree (2004). Before moving to UConn, he lectured at the University of Lugano, Switzerland. In addition to several books, articles, and translations from Arabic and French authors, he recently published Dante and the Mediterranean Comedy: From Muslim Spain to Postcolonial Italy (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022). He is currently working on two book projects: a monograph on early-modern representations of Hagar and Ishmael, as genealogical symbols of religious conflict; and a book on Muslims and the Eucharist, from medieval legends to modern medievalism. For a full list of his publications, see here.

On the web:

– “The Rose of Paradise.” The Center for Italian Studies at Stony Brook (May 4, 2021)

– “Paradiso 16: Modernity, Purity, and Confusion.” With Joseph Tumulo. Canto per Canto, Department of Italian Studies and Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimò at NYU  (released on February 15, 2021)

– “Inferno 28: Scandalous Words, Split Bodies.” With Akash Kumar. Canto per Canto, Department of Italian Studies and Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimò at NYU  (released on June 2, 2021)

– “Dante’s Crusades: From Personal Myth to Modern Video Games.” Virginia Tech Religion & Culture (September 28, 2021)

– “Anatomy of Florence: Illness and Body Politics in the Comedy.” Dante and the Sciences of the Human Medicine, Physics, Soul. CSMBR Pisa (October 23, 2021)

– “Franciscan Diet, Spiritual Trees: Jacopone da Todi and Dante on Hunger and Thirst.” The Tree of Life: Interconnecting Religions, Artistic Traditions, and Scientific Knowledge Conference. UConn (April 27, 2023)

– New Books Network. Presentation of Dante and the Mediterranean Comedy: From Muslim Spain to Post-Colonial Italy (Palgrave MacMillan, 2022), October 11, 2023