John Picchione teaches Italian literature and culture. He has published extensively on modern and contemporary Italian poetry and narrative, avant-garde movements, literary and cultural theory. Both his research and teaching are centered on an interdisciplinary orientation that pays close attention to the dialogue between literature, the arts, and other fields of knowledge. The objective of his courses and publications is to investigate the role of literature and other cultural expressions in creating worldviews, ideologies, aesthetic models, belief-systems, personal and collective identities.

Research Interests

• 2000-01 Faculty of Arts Fellowship - 2000-01
• 2005- Book Prize of The American Association of Italian Studies for the volume on the new avant-garde (2004) - 2005

Current Research Projects

John Picchione teaches Italian literature and culture. He has published extensively on modern and contemporary Italian poetry and narrative, avant-garde movements, literary and cultural theory. Both his research and teaching are centered on an interdisciplinary orientation that pays close attention to the dialogue between literature, the arts, and other fields of knowledge. The objective of his courses and publications is to investigate the role of literature and other cultural expressions in creating worldviews, ideologies, aesthetic models, belief-systems, personal and collective identities.

His research interests include modern and contemporary Italian poetry and narrative, avant-garde movements, literary and cultural theory, modern/post-modern aesthetics. He has published books, entries in encyclopedias and articles in journals, among which Novecento, Encyclopaedia of World Literature, Dictionary of Literary Biography, Il Verri, Strumenti critici, The Review of National Literatures, Parol: quaderni d'arte e di epistemologia, Studi novecenteschi, Otto/Novecento, Letteratura italiana contempranea, Italica. He has devoted particular attention to the authors of the Italian new avant-garde (Porta, Sanguineti, Giuliani, Balestrini, Pagliarani) and to poets and novelists, such as Ungaretti, Palazzeschi, Volponi, Quasimodo, Zanzotto, Giulia Niccolai, Aldo Nove. He has written on several theoretical topics: structuralism and deconstruction, reader-response criticism, postmodernism, literature and the issue of the subject, literature and new technologies, poetry and cognition, poetic forms and ideology, poetry and the materiality of language. He is the author of The New Avant-Garde in Italy: Theoretical Debate and Poetic Practices for which he has been awarded the 2005 Book Prize of the American Association for Italian Studies, and of Introduzione a Antonio Porta [Introduction to Antonio Porta]. He is the editor of I discorsi della critica in America [Critical discourses in North America] (essays on Bloom, Frye, Jameson, Fish, Said and others), co-editor of Twentieth-Century Italian Poetry: An Anthology and of Edoardo Sanguineti: Literature, Ideology and the Avant-Garde. He has been on the editorial board of the journal Quaderni d’ italianistica and he is currently the Canadian editor of Parol: quaderni d’arte e di epistemologia. He is an evaluator for publishers, including Minnesota University Press, University of Toronto Press, Wilfrid Laurier University Press, Peter Lang (UK), and for several journals in Europe and North America. He is the Canadian representative of the Centre for the Studies on Cesare Pavese (Italy). He has given papers, lectures, and conducted seminars at numerous universities, including The City University of New York, Yale University, University of Toronto, University of Bologna, and the universities of Rome La Sapienza, Macerata, Trento, Ankara, and Zagreb. He has served on Ph.D. committees and as external examiner for several theses. He has contributed to the Venice Art Biennale and to Performa (New York Performing Arts Biennial). He is the co-founder of York Summer Studies Program (Florence and Rome).

Degrees

Professional Leadership

Member - Editorial Board, Parol: quaderni d'arte e di epistemologia (2002-2020). Member - Editorial Board of the literary series "I sensi del testo" [The Meanings of the Text], for the publisher Mimesis, Milan (2017-2020) Member - Canadian representative for the Centre on Studies of Cesare Pavese, Santo Stefano Belbo, Italy, (2002-10). Member - Advisory Board, Quaderni d'italianistica, (2003-10). Member - Editorial Board (Associate Editor), Quaderni d'italianistica, journal of the Canadian Society for Italian Studies, (1989-98).

Community Contributions

He has written for various Italian-Canadian newspapers and magazines (Mosaico, Forze Nuove, Corriere Canadese, Nuovo Mondo, Il Giornale di Toronto, Our Times). He has been interviewed on social, educational, cultural, and political issues related to the Italian-Canadian community and Italian culture: RAI (Italian National Television) for its regional programs in Molise, Radio 24 (Il Sole 24 Ore, Italy), Channel 47 for its programs "Incontri," "Agenda," "Noi Oggi," and Radio Uno, 1220 AM. He has read papers on cultural issues, immigration, education, Italian-Canadian youth, at numerous conferences and events sponsored by Italian-Canadian organizations. He has worked with the Italian-Canadian community and the Italian Cultural Institute to organize events and conferences.

Research Interests

Awards

• 2000-01 Faculty of Arts Fellowship - 2000-01
• 2005- Book Prize of The American Association of Italian Studies for the volume on the new avant-garde (2004) - 2005