A double major may seem intimidating, especially if you're learning a new language along the way. But the road to a double major in Spanish is shorter than you might think! Join us for a conversation with four students as they speak on their experiences double majoring, studying abroad, and more.

Once again, the Department of Romance Languages has paired with the Italian Consulate in Boston to bring a selection of Italy's best contemporary films to UVM! Join us starting Monday, October 29th and continuing for the next two Mondays for screenings of La macchinazione (David Grieco, 2016), The Start-up: Accendi il tuo futuro (Alessandro D’Alatri, 2017), and Ci vuole un fisico (Alessandro Tamburini, 2018). All films will be shown with English subtitles.

It's time for the semesterly gathering of the French program! Stop by to speak with an advisor, chat with fellow majors and minors, and eat plenty of pizza!

Attention all Spanish majors & minors! Feeling lost before signing up for classes? Curious about whether your minor could be a major? Get some help—come chat with your professors about the program and enjoy some free pizza!

We were to welcome Prof. Irena Mata of Wellesley College to campus! Her talk, "A Seat on the Bus," situated the recent protest No Papers No Fear Ride for Justice at the center of an analysis informed by previous histories of resistance, including the Civil Rights Movement’s Freedom Riders, the Chicano community’s use of lowrider art and murals, and queer Latinx immigrant youth organizing. Reading the Ride through a historical lens allows us to identify the powerful organizing tool that art and performance provide our social movements and encourages us to consider the role the activist body plays in cultural transformations.

Whale watching has become an important source of revenue for many coastal communities in Central America. Because the activity is primarily boat-based, a number of unintended factors are affecting the well-being of coastal whale populations in the region. In this talk, Dr. Laura Collado (UVM) shared her research and her experiences as a Costa Rican researcher interacting with  the communities of Manzanillo Gandoca. She focused on two aspects of her work: how tour-boat noise is changing animal health and the space in which animals communicate, and how to engage local communities in building a community-based plan to protect the whales and the health of coastal marine habitats.

Sigma Delta Pi (the Spanish Honors Society) presented a special 35th anniversary screening of El Norte! Telling the tale of two siblings as they flee their village in Guatemala and travel through Mexico to reach the United States, the film's message remains timely to the present day. Attendees also received free pizza!

Prof. Rebecca Janzen from the University of South Carolina came to talk about immigration to Mexico. She discussed how and why the Mexican government welcomed two religious minorities – Mennonites and Mormons – in the late 19th and early 20th century. Then – using this historical context – she turned to a discussion of the current reality for immigrants and foreigners in Mexico within a context of violence associated with drug trafficking.

We were honored to welcome Dr. Dr. Federica Sereni, the Consul General of Italy in Boston, and Prof. Adamo Castelnuovo, the Director of the Education Office, to UVM! Introduced by President Sullivan, they spoke and led the audience in a discussion on the state of Italian education in the United States.

In Paraguay, women’s rights have become a focus of certain legislative and human rights efforts. However, failure of legal and societal systems result in a lack of protection for women suffering from intersectional forms of discrimination, which also extends to the normalization of child labor in the case of criadazgo, and to attitudes toward sex and sex work. Kuña is a documentary project in which the systems of gender oppression are explored, their connections analyzed, but most importantly, vibrant sites of resistance are upheld. Dr. Eva Romero will describe the creative process and how the goals of the documentary were transformed through feedback from research subjects. She will also address how having theorized issues of representation made representing gender violence challenging in specific ways, as she balanced these challenges with the desire to establish an emotional connection with the spectator.

The Italian Program and the Vermont Italian Cultural Association were pleased to welcome Andrew John-Christopher Nucatola to UVM! A renowned stonemason and philosopher, he spoke on the state of Italian historic conservation in Venice.

Honoring his promotion to Full Professor, Antonello Borra will be delivering a lecture on contemporary Italian poetry and its impact on the environment. The lecture will be immediately followed by a reading Prof. Borra's new collection of poetry about the treatment of Italy's mentally ill.

Professor E. Bruce Hayes is Associate Professor of French and Chair of the Department of French and Italian at the University of Kansas. A world renowned specialist of farce in the late Middle-Ages and the Renaissance and François Rabelais, he is the author of Rabelais's Radical Farce. Late Medieval Comic Theater and Its Function in Rabelais (Ashgate, 2010). He is also the author of numerous articles and book chapters, and the co-editor of a Special Issue of Yale French Studies celebrating the scholarship of Edwin Duval. His presentation tonight is taken from his current book project, Castigating Comedy: Polemical Humor during and before the French Wars of Religion.

Tuesday, April 3, 2018
Art exhibit: 1:00-5:00 pm
Reception and meet the artists: 3:30-5:00 pm - FREE
Williams Hall, Third Floor (outside the Colburn Gallery)

Artists: Nora Ciottoli, Diana Danelli, and Elena Parati

The artists' collective ticon3 was formed in 2008, with the purpose of examining the concept of time in the flow and transformation of nature and the human body. The artists' gaze dwells on internal and external landscapes, and on the infinite variables of perception, representation, and memory. Sponsored by the Department of Romance Languages & Linguistics; Art & Art History; Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies; and European Studies. Questions? Contact Professor Cristina Mazzoni at cmazzoni@uvm.edu.