Rome and the Jubilee, 1300-2015 - An International Summer Seminar
Italian Studies at Notre Dame invites junior faculty and advanced graduate students to apply for the sixth annual Rome Seminar, hosted by Italian Studies at Notre Dame, which brings together 30 scholars and students from diverse fields across the globe to reflect, discuss and train on a topic related to Italian studies. Notre Dame's Rome Globa...
The document that not always defines us
By Gianni Pezzano There is a document that identifies and defines us throughout the world: the passport. The passport is required to enter into other countries and provides the authorities with the important details of our lives. For those who commit serious crimes, the passport is the first document that is confiscated in order to prevent...
OSCARS: Nine Films On Foreign Language Shortlist
by Nancy Tartaglione Last weekend, I profiled 15 films that had a lot of heat ahead of the Foreign Language Oscar shortlist unveiling today. Of those 15 (plus a handful of wildcards), seven have ended up among the Academy's nine selections that will move on to the second round of voting. As with many of the Oscar categories this year, this was a f...
The Monuments Men tells the true story of an unlikely bunch of soldiers who saved Europe’s art from Hitler
The small band of middle-aged art experts, artists, educators and architects who signed up during World War II to join President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's program to protect and secure European art treasures were on a mission to find the paintings, sculptures and cultural touchstones stolen by the Nazis for their art-obsessed Fuhrer. Their pheno...
Ennio Morricone Postpones Two Events in L.A.
Ennio Morricone has postponed his upcoming concerts in Los Angeles and New York until June, citing a back injury that is preventing him from traveling long distances. The five-time Academy Award-nominated movie composer had been scheduled to conduct concerts at the Nokia Theatre at L.A. Live on March 20 and at the Barclays Center's Cushman and...
Clint Eastwood :: Very, Very Lucky With His 'Jersey Boys'
On the walk to the Waldorf Astoria through midtown Manhattan, one thing is inescapable: the near-ubiquitous banners for the smash, Tony Award-winning musical, "Jersey Boys." Nine years after debuting on Broadway, the show is still going strong, with the original production and various touring versions selling out theaters around the globe....
Italian Men Are All The Rage With American Celebrities
By Sibilla Di Palma From Jessica Chastain to Zoe Saldana, from singer Lana Del Rey to "mean girl" Lindsay Lohan, Italians continue enchant American celebrities. And the news about relationships and weddings that constantly crop up in tabloids prove it. Jessica Chastain and Gian Luca Passi's love story has been in the spotlight for a while....
Honoring Fr. Vincent Capodanno
In December 1965, Father Capodanno received his commission as a lieutenant in the Navy Chaplain Corps. He was assigned to the First Marine Division in Vietnam in April 1966. At 4:30 am, September 4, 1967, during Operation Swift in the Thang Binh District of the Que Son Valley, elements of the 1st Battalion 5th Marines encountered a large North Vie...
La Dolce Vita
This issue of The Georgetowner celebrates the Italian lifestyle: La Dolce Vita. Perchè adesso (why now)? No special reason needed; Italy looms large in American lives. The history, cultures and fates of our two countries are intertwined, both in hugely important ways and in matters that we take for granted, things that have taken up permanent resi...
Diana Burdisso Britting: Italian of the Week
In this special edition of #ItalianoftheWeek, we learn more about Diana Burdisso Britting, the winner of the Sons of Italy's Do You Know Roots Contest. She writes about the journey to discover her roots and how My Italian Family helped her do just that. My decades-old search for the story of my family's roots began after my maternal grandm...
Female Friendship Puts 'New' Angle On Italian Classism And Machismo
by John Powers Some writers you read and move on, but every now and then you read one whose work knocks you back against the wall. This happened to me with the great Italian novelist Elena Ferrante. I first encountered her through her scalding 2002 novel, The Days Of Abandonment, whose narrator, Olga, may be the scariest jilted wife since...
An Italian Chocolatier Makes it Her Way in America
By Victoria Prather Chocolate is considered to be, by many, an aphrodisiac. People claim it has addictive qualities or that somehow it just invokes a passion within them. One thing is for certain: chocolate, when exquisitely prepared, it is truly a treasured treat that many find hard to resist. Some modern historians have estimate...