Meet the Team
Faculty Leads
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Dr. Paola Bonifazio
Chair; Professor, Italian Studies
PhD, New York University
pbonifazio@austin.utexas.edu
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Dr. Valerie McGuire
Associate Professor of Instruction, Italian Studies;
Undergraduate Italian Faculty Advisor
Ph.D., New York University
vmcguire@utexas.edu
Graduate Assistant
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Francesca Passeseo
Italian Studies - Graduate Student, Assistant Instructor
MRes Italian Studies, BA English Literature and Italian, University of Reading
francesca.passaseo@utexas.edu
Undergraduate Research Assistants
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Ilaria Cielo
Majoring in Italian Studies & Biomedical Engineering
Ilaria is a senior from Vicenza, Italy, who loves learning about how migration, language, gender, and family shape people’s stories. Through the Italians in Texas Oral History Project, she wants to explore the connections between identity and Italian heritage in Texas.
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Allison Frank
Majoring in Italian Studies & History; Minoring in Philosophy & German
Allison is a senior interested in oral histories, language learning, and in exploring how Italian Texans interacted with other immigrant groups in the region throughout history.
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Simone Mericle
Majoring in Italian Studies & Radio, Television, and Film
Simone is a junior at the University of Texas interested in all things Italian and cinema. In her free time she watches lots of movies, and even makes some, too. She did a Maymester in Parma, Italy where she studied sustainable cinema in Italy. She chose to apply for "Italians in Texas" oral history project because of her interest in Italian studies and similar interviewing work with the Daily Texan.