SIS Conferences
The Society for Italian Studies supports research across the discipline by holding three conferences: the Biennial Conference; the Themed Conference (previously known as the Interim), and the Postgraduate Colloquium. The Society also supports research by providing some funding to conferences and symposia run by SIS members.
Biennial Conference
Biennial Conference 2024: 19–21 June 2024 – Royal Holloway, University of London
The 2024 Biennial Conference of the Society for Italian Studies, the largest scholarly society in the UK and Ireland for the study of Italian language, literature, and culture, will take place in person at Royal Holloway, University of London. The conference programme is available here.
Both presenting or not-presenting attendees can register at this link. Please remember to also subscribe to the Society for Italian Studies in order to participate in the conference.
Should you have any questions, please contact: SIS.biennial.2024@rhul.ac.uk
Themed Conference
Themed Conference 7-8 September 2023
The Society holds a smaller, themed conference on alternate years to the Biennial Conference.
The 2023 SIS Themed Conference ‘Affect, Emotion, Sensation’ took place on the 7–8 September 2023 at the University of Cambridge, Selwyn College.
Over recent years, a growing interest in affect theory and history of emotions has enriched the scholarly discussion on Italian literature and art, offering innovative interpretive perspectives. However, in certain branches of Italian Studies, a rigorous working out and historicizing of terms like emotion, affect, and sensation is still in its earliest phases. Whilst affect theory has had a significant impact in some fields of research, in other areas, there has been little sustained engagement with either affect theory or the history of emotions and sensation.
This conference wanted to promote a fruitful dialogue on the perception and the representation of emotions between scholars working across different periods and different media. It investigated how emotional repertoires and vocabularies for identifying affects and sensations evolved and changed in Italian language, literature, and the visual arts, from medieval to contemporary production. In order to further enrich the discussion, the conference included comparative sessions with colleagues working on other Romance literatures, thus offering a comprehensive overview of ‘Italian’ thought before, after, and beyond the concretization of national boundaries.
You can find the conference programme here.
The conference was organised by Prof. Heather Webb, Dr Aistė Kiltinavičiūtė, Dr Nicolò Crisafi, Dr Alessia Carrai, Dr Giulia Boitani, George Rayson, and Orsolya Petocz.
Postgraduate Colloquium
The Society holds an annual Postgraduate Colloquium. See this page for further details.
Hosting the SIS Biennial Conferences
The form for the registering of interest in holding the Biennial Conference is available below. Please complete the form as fully as possible, bearing in mind that not all questions will be relevant to the Biennial Conference (the form covers both this and the Themed Conference) and return to Gigliola Sulis, as Hon. Secretary at g.sulis@leeds.ac.uk.
SIS Previous Conferences
Previous Conferences
- The 2019 Conference was hosted by the University of Edinburgh from 26th-28th June 2019. The programme is available to download here.
- The 2017 Conference was hosted by the University of Hull from 27th– 30th June 2017. The programme is available for dowload is available to download in PDF format.
- The 2015 Conference was hosted by the University of Oxford from 28 to 30 September 2015. The programme is available for download in PDF format.
- The 2013 Conference was hosted by Durham University from 8 to 11 July 2013. The programme is available for download in PDF format.
- The 2011 Conference was hosted by St Andrews University from 6 to 9 July 2011. The programme is available for download in PDF format.
- The 2009 Conference was hosted by Royal Holloway University of London, from 16 to 19 April.
Previous Themed Conferences
- The 2020 SIS Themed Conference ‘Visions of Italy’ was held virtually at the University of Kent on the 10 and 11 September 2020. The conference was organised by Dr Alex Marlow-Mann and Dr Alvise Sforza Tarabocchia. The keynote speaker was Prof Stephen Gundle.
- The 2018 Themed Conference, Resistance in Italian culture: Literature, Politics and Film was held at the University of Sussex, 5th and 6th April 2018 . The programme and the Conference Report are available for download in PDF format.
- The 2016 Themed Conference, Turning Points: Cultures of Transition, Transformation and Transmission , was held at Trinity College, Dublin, 29th and 30th April 2016. The programme is available for download in PDF format
- The 2014 Themed Conference, Interstitial Italy: Reassessing Global Questions Through the ‘Peculiar’ Italian Case, was held at the British School at Rome, 27 and 28 March 2014. The programme is available for download in PDF format.
- The 2012 Themed Conference, Transnational Italy: National Identity and the World Atlas, was held at the University of Reading’, 13 and 14 July 2012. The programme and abstracts are available for download in PDF format.
- The 2010 Themed Conference, Religion, Mysticism and Heresy in Italian Culture, was held at the Palazzo Pesaro Papafava, Venice, 16-17 April 2010. The programme is available for download in PDF format.
- The 2008 Themed Conference, Transmissions and Transformations of Italian Culture, took place at the Institute for Germanic and Romance Studies, University of London, on 25-26 April 2008. The programme and abstracts are available for download in PDF format.
SIS Gender Policy
Conferences and events organised by the SIS will follow our EDI Policies.