My current research interests focus on problems of historical representation, urban space and political culture in modern Italy, Europe and the Mediterranean.
Fascism and Rome
I am currently working on a book manuscript based on my doctoral dissertation, "A Revolution in the Idea of Rome": Excavating Modernity in Fascist Italy. This project examines the intersection of ideology, history and archeology, and the idea of Rome (romanità) under Mussolini's regime.
In this work, I argue that Fascism's appropriation of the classical past should be understood not as an expression of its theatricality or retrograde tendencies, but rather as a literal and figurative excavation of modernity, an expression of the regime’s desire to regenerate and remake Italians through the Roman imperial virtues of discipline, hierarchy and harmony. Across a series of case studies – in historical scholarship, urban archaeology and museum display – I explore the ways in which Fascist intellectuals approached the Eternal City as a blueprint for contemporary life and a source of dynamic values. This vision of modernity also transcended Italy’s borders, as the legacy of Rome’s “universal empire” provided a foundation for Fascism’s conception of a new European order and overseas empire.
This project is based on research conducted at numerous archives, museums, institutes and libraries. In Rome, these include the Museo della Civiltà Romana, the Istituto Nazionale di Studi Romani, the Archivio Centrale dello Stato, the Archivio Storico Capitolino, the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, the Biblioteca di Storia Moderna e Contemporanea and the Biblioteca di Archeologia e Storia dell'Arte. I also had the privilege of serving as a research fellow at the Wolfsonian in Miami, FL. In Chicago, I drew upon the Special Collections at the libraries of the University of Chicago and Northwestern University, as well as the Center for Research Libraries. In Washington, DC, I benefited from the European Reading Room at the Library of Congress.
My research was financially supported by several institutions, including the Division of Social Sciences at the University of Chicago, the Government of Italy's Ministero degli Affari Esteri and the Fondazione Lemmermann.
Fascist Monuments in Postwar Italy
I am also in the early stages of a new project, which examines the afterlife and contemporary resonance of Fascist monuments in the decades after World War Two. Unlike the architectural remnants of National Socialism in Germany, the monumental remains of Italian Fascism were never turned into memorials or subjected to a comprehensive damnatio memoriae. I am interested in the political, social and aesthetic debates surrounding these sites and how they were integrated into the fabric of everyday life of the Italian Republic. In addition to questions of memory, I am interested in approaching these sites through theories of political iconoclasm. I am currently examining the current state of the Foro Italico, built as the regime's athletics complex and youth headquarters in the mid-1930s and today the object of a controversial redevelopment plan.
Mediterranean Cities
I am interested in situating the Italian experience of urban planning within the broader context of modernization and heritage conservation in southern and southeastern Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Do cities like Rome, Istanbul, Jerusalem and Alexandria face similar challenges in confronting the material traces of millennial pasts? Is there a common experience of Mediterranean modernity and modernization, and how is this expressed in spatial terms? I would especially like to hear from scholars working on these areas who might be interested in collaborating on transnational and comparative approaches to the Mediterranean city.