Albert Russell Ascoli (Berkeley), Emma Bond (Oxford), Zygmunt Baranski (Cambridge), Gary Cestaro (Chicago), Sara Fortuna (Roma, Berlin), Stefano Gensini (Roma), Carlo Ginzburg (Pisa), Manuele Gragnolati (Oxford, Berlin), Ruedi Imbach (Paris), Giulio Lepschy (Cambridge), Laura Lepschy (London, Cambridge), Bettina Lindorfer (Berlin), Elena Lombardi (Bristol), Franco Lo Piparo (Palermo), Lino Pertile (Harvard), Giorgio Pressburger (Trieste, Roma), Irène Rosier-Catach (Paris), Francesca Southerden (Oxford), Mirko Tavoni (Pisa), Jürgen Trabant (Berlin, Bremen)
Already in 1929 Erich Auerbach highlighted the innovative character of Dante's oeuvre which, in contrast with its traditional interpretation as the culmination and summa of a medieval Weltanschauung, he associated with a modern representation of the human being in its individuality and historical reality. This conference invites scholars from different disciplines (literary studies, history, linguistics, philosophy, queer theory, theater) and cultural traditions (Germany, United Kingdom, USA, Italy, France) to discuss the role that language plays in Dante’s transition towards modernity indicated by Auerbach.
Dante’s discussion of language is encompassed in all his work: from the often disregarded seeds of Vita Nuova, through the position of Convivio and the core discussion of the De vulgari eloquentia, all the way to Paradiso, the problem of language is ever present and pressing to an author who, as all critics agree, automatically aligned his practice of poetry with theoretical reflection. The question with which this conference engages is to what extent Dante’s linguistic theory and praxis, which can be understood in terms of a strenuous defense of the vernacular language, in tension with the prestige of Latin, both informs and reflects a new configuration of the relationship between authority, knowledge and identity that is imbued with a strong element of subjectivity and opens up towards modernity.
