Clare College听
Memorial Court听
海角社区 听听
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Helena Sanson (PhD Reading, 2002) joined the Department of Italian in 2003 as a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow and in 2005 as a University lecturer. She is Full Professor of Italian, History of Linguistics, and Women's Studies and a Fellow of Clare College. Before coming to 海角社区, she taught at UCL, University College London (1998-2003).
She is the founder and general editor of the book series听Women and Gender in Italy (1500-1900)/Donne e gender in Italia (1500-1900), Paris, Classiques Garnier (for more information, see here) and of the interdisciplinary journal听Women Language Literature in Italy/Donne lingua letteratura in Italia听(see ).
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Helena Sanson teaches across various papers for the Italian Section, in all years of the UG degree course. For the MPhil in Literature, Culture and Thought she teaches on the modules 鈥榃omen and Writing in Italy鈥�, 鈥楢pproaches to Gender鈥�, 鈥楥ultures of the Renaissance鈥�, 鈥楳arginalities in the Nineteenth Century鈥�, and on the core course seminars 鈥楪ender: Theory and History鈥�. She also teaches on the MPhil in Multi-disciplinary Gender Studies (Centre for Gender Studies).
Professor听Sanson welcomes inquiries from potential MPhil and PhD students interested in doing research on topics related to language, literature, and culture in Italy, between the 16th and the early 20th century, in particular with reference to women's history, women writers, conduct literature, history of linguistic thought, and history of translation. Prospective students are encouraged to get in touch by email with a provisional research proposal. Interdisciplinary projects are particularly welcome. Professor Sanson is also happy to supervise students applying for an MPhil or PhD at the Centre for Gender Studies.
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Professor Sanson鈥檚 interdisciplinary research focuses on the history of the Italian language, literature and culture in Italy, between the Renaissance and the post-Unification period. She is particularly interested in the relationship between the history of linguistic thought and the history of women, as representative of the less learned, as well as in the role of women writers and women readers, in the same period. She has published a number of articles and chapters on these issues and is the author of Donne, precettistica e lingua nell鈥橧talia del Cinquecento: un contributo alla storia del pensiero linguistico (Florence: Accademia della Crusca, 2007) and Women, Language and Grammar: Italy 1500-1900 (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 2011; this book was one of the winners of the 鈥楤ritish Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship Monograph Series鈥� competition). Another strand of interest is the vast production of conduct literature for and about women that aimed to define women鈥檚 nature and their role in society. She has prepared modern editions of sixteenth-century texts on conduct, and among these Lodovico Dolce鈥檚 Dialogo della instituzion delle donne, secondo li tre stati che cadono nella vita umana (1545) (海角社区: MHRA, 2015),听Isabella Sori鈥檚 Ammaestramenti e ricordi, Difese, Panegirico (1628) (海角社区: MHRA, 2018; Alessandria: Edizioni dell'Orso, 2021), and听听Annibale Guasco, Ragionamento [...]听a Donna Lavinia sua figliuola, della听maniera del governarsi ells in corte (1586). Con una scelta di lettere (Alessandria: Edizioni dell'Orso, 2022). She also co-edited the volume听Conduct Literature for and about Women in Italy, 1470-1900: Prescribing and Describing Life (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2016).
Her current research also focuses on women's role in and contribution to the history of translation in Italy.听On this topic she recently published the edited volume Women and Translation in the Italian Tradition (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2022).
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Among Professor Sanson's recent publications is the co-edited volume听Women in the History of Linguistics听(Oxford: Oxford University Press, December 2020), a ground-breaking exploration of the role women have played in the history of language codification and the history of linguistic thought across a range of European and non-European traditions. Click for more information. Professor Sanson is currently completing a new monograph,听Knowledge across Boundaries: Women, Language and Translation in Italy's Long Eighteenth Century,听which investigates the role of women translators in the circulation of new ideas and the popularization and dissemination of knowledge in Italy from Arcadia to the beginning of the 19th century. Thanks to a Leverhulme Research Fellowship (2021-2023), she to continued to explore the history of the Italian language from a gender perspective. Her project听Women and Linguistic Culture in Eighteenth and Nineteenth-Century Italy听examines the uncharted landscapes of women's everyday linguistic experience within both the domestic and the public sphere - across regions and social classes.
Professor Sanson听was the UK host and co-applicant of the Newton International Fellowship project听Female Portraits in Italian and British Travellers' Accounts from Poland (1600-1700)听carried out by Dr Ma艂gorzata Trzeciak Cygan听(2018-2022). As part of the project, they have co-edited the volume Women and Their Worlds: The Perspectives of Early Modern European Travellers (London: Palgrave Macmillan, forthc.).
Together with Francesco Lucioli (Sapienza Universit脿 di Roma), she is co-editing three volumes on Le donne听e la storia della听letteratura italiana听which will be published by Carocci听in Rome.
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Prizes and awards:
Professor Sanson is the recipient of a number of prizes and awards; among these: British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship; British Academy Small Research Grant; AHRC research leave grant; British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship Monograph Series competition; CRASSH (Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities) Early Career Fellowship; Isaac Newton Trust research grant; British Academy Conference Grant; MHRA conference grant; 海角社区 Humanities Research Grant; Leverhulme Research Fellowship. In 2018-19, she was awarded a Senior Visiting Fellowship at the Institute of Advanced Studies, Alma Mater Studiorum, University of Bologna, where she also was Visiting Research Fellow at the Department of Classic Philology and Italian Studies in 2019-20 and Visiting Professor in 2023.
She is also the recipient of a .
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Selected publications:
Books:
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Annibale Guasco, Ragionamento 摆鈥 a Donna Lavinia sua figliuola, della maniera del governarsi ella in corte (1586). Con una scelta di lettere, ed. by Helena Sanson (Alessandria: Edizioni dell鈥橭rso, 2022), 288 pp. |
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Women and Translation in the Italian Tradition, ed. by Helena Sanson (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2022), 449 pp. |
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Isabella Sori,听Ammaestramenti e ricordi, Difese, Penegirico,听ed. by Helena Sanson (Alessandria: Edizioni dell'Orso, 'Contributi e proposte', 2021), 312 pp. |
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Women in the History of Linguistics听(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020; co-edited with W. Ayres-Bennett), 672 pp. |
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Isabella Sori,听Ammaestramenti e ricordi, circa a' buoni costumi, che deve insegnare una ben creata madre ad una figlia, da citella, d'accasata e da vedova;听[...]听divisi in dodeci lettere听[...].听Con听[...]听dodeci Difese, datte contro alcuni sinistri giudicii,听[...]听e nel fine un Panegirico听[...]听dell'Illustrissima citt脿听d'Alessandria听(1628), ed. by Helena Sanson (海角社区: MHRA, 2018, 'Critical Texts Series', vol. 48), xi+ 264 pp. |
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Da madri a cittadine: le donne italiane fra l'Unificazione e la Repubblica,听co-edited with S. Delmedico and M. Di Franco. Special issue of听The Italianist,听2018, 38(3), 298-459, 162 pp. |
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Conduct Literature for and about Women in Italy, 1470-1900: Describing and Prescribing Life,听co-edited with F. Lucioli (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2016), 438 pp. |
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500 Years of italian Grammar(s), Culture, and Society in Italy and Europe: From Fortunio's Regole (1516) to the Present, co-edited with F. Lucioli. Special issue of听The Italianist,听2016, 36(3), 154 pp. |
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Lodovico Dolce,听Dialogo della instituzion delle donne, secondo li tre stati, che cadono nella vita humana (1545), ed. by Helena Sanson (海角社区: MHRA, 2015, 'Critical Texts' Series, vol. 30), x+212 pp. |
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Women and Gender in Post-Unification Italy: Between Private and Public Spheres,听co-edited with K. Mitchell (Bern and Oxford: Peter Lang, 2013; 'Italian Modernities' series), x+272 pp. |
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Women, Language and Grammar in Italy, 1500-1900听(Oxford: Oxford University Press for the British Academy, 2011), xiv+432 pp.32 illustrations (this volume was a winner of the British Academy Postdoctoral Monograph Series Competition) |
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Donne precettistica e lingua nell'Italia del Cinquecento: un contributo alla storia del pensiero linguisticio听(Florence: Accademia della Crusca, 2007), xviii+382 pp. |
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Selected articles/book chapters:
- 鈥榃omen, Language, Education in Italy鈥檚 Long Eighteenth Century: The Views of French and British Travellers鈥�, in Women and Their Worlds: The Perspectives of Early Modern European Travellers, eds Helena Sanson and Ma艂gorzata Trzeciak-Cygan (London: Palgrave Macmillan), forthc.
- 鈥榃omen in the History of Italian鈥�, in The Oxford Handbook of the Italian Language, eds Adam Ledgeway and Martin Maiden (Oxford: Oxford University Press), forthc.
- 鈥楲earning Languages for Marriage: The Linguistic Experience of Aristocratic Women in Early Modern Europe鈥�, in Women in the History of Language Learning and Teaching: Hidden Pioneers of Practice from Europe and Beyond (1400-2000), eds Sabine Doff, Giovanni Iamartino, and Rachel Mairs (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press), forthc.
- 鈥楾he Question of Language and the Languages of Literature鈥�, in The Oxford Handbook of Italian Literature, ed. Stefano Jossa (Oxford: Oxford University Press), forthc.
- 鈥楩rench and Eighteenth-Century Italian Women: Language of Vanity or Language of Scholarship?鈥�, in Historical and Sociolinguistic Approaches to French, eds Janice Carruthers, Mairi Mclaughlin, and Olivia Walsh (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2024), pp. 144-160
- 鈥楾wo Nun Translators in Early Modern Italian Convents: Angelica Baitelli and Maria Stella鈥�, in Women and Language in the Italian Tradition, ed. by Helena Sanson (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2022), pp. 129-166听
- 鈥業ntroduction: Women and Translation in the Italian Tradition Italy: From the Renaissance to the Present鈥�, in Women and Translation in the Italian Tradition, ed. by Helena Sanson (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2022), pp. 9-51
- 'Women's Social Status and their Access to Learning in Multilingual Early Modern Italy', in听Literature, Learning, and Social Hierarchy in Early Modern Europe,听ed. by N. Kenny (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 'Proceedings of the British Academy鈥�, 2022), pp. 46-70
- "Io che donna indotta e minima sono": Women, Translation and Classical Languages in Early Modern Italy,听Women Language Literature in Italy,听2021, 3, 29-51
- 'Women in the History of Linguistics: Distant and Neglected Voices', in W. Ayres-Bennett and H. Sanson (eds),听Women in the History of Linguistics听(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020), pp. 1-29 (with W. Ayres-Bennett)
- 'Women and Language Codification in Italy: Marginalized Voices, Forgotten Contribution', in W. Ayres-Bennett and H. Sanson (eds),听Women in the History of Linguistics听(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020), pp.59-90
- 'Women and Conduct in the Italian Tradition, 1470-1900: An Overview', in听Conduct Literature for and about Women in Italy, 1470-1900: Prescribing and Describing Life,听2016, pp. 9-38
- 'Vittoria Colonna and Language', in听Companion to Vittoria Colonna,听ed. by A. Brundin, T. Crivelli Speciale, M.S. Sapegno ( Leiden: Brill, 2016), pp. 195-233
- 'Ma e in latino nulla? Qualcosa s矛, ma tanto poco, che paja un nulla:听donne e latino in Italia fra Sette e Ottocento',听Romanische Forschungen,听2015, 127 (4), 449-81
- "Simplicit茅, clart茅听et pr茅cision": Grammars of Italian 'Pour les Dames' and Other Learners in Eighteenth - and Early Nineteenth-Century France',听Modern Language review,听2014, 109 (3), 593-616
- '"Femina proterva, rude, indocta [...], chi t'ha insegnato a parlar in questo modo?": Women's "voices" and Linguistic Varieties in Written Texts听(Italy, 16th-17th Centuries)',听The Italianist,听special issue, 2014, 34 (3), 400-17
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For more information on Professor Sanson's publications and scholarship, see here.
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PhD supervisor of:
