Inside this issue:

James Walston
International Relations Professor James
Walston recorded several radio and
television interviews on topical subjects
such as the political consequences of the
Wall Street collapse and the effects of
the world financial crisis on the Italian
economy (Press TV, Bloomberg News
(Rome), Radio Città Futura), the US
Presidential elections (Radio Città Futura,
Radio 24 “Viva Voce”, YouDem), the
camorra and the threats to Roberto
Saviano (Ireland’s Newstalk “Wide
Angle”), the Alitalia crisis (Press TV). On
the invitation of the Criminal Intelligence
Service of Ontario Prof. Walston
attended their Fall Conference on
“Traditional Organized Crime: Old is
New” in North Bay, Ontario and
presented a 90 minute paper titled
“Organized Crime in Italy: Tradition &
Globalization” to officers from Canadian
provincial and federal agencies and
agencies and services from the north
east US.
He presented Departmental activities at
a meeting of Tavolo 3 of the Rome City
Council Committee on Cooperation and
met with British Member of Parliament
and OSCE delegate, Bruce George to
brief him on Italian electoral laws.
Bjorn Thomassen
International Relations Department Chair
Prof. Bjorn Thomassen has collaborated
with other professors and academics
from around the world to create
International Political Anthropology, a
peer-reviewed journal providing a forum
for inter-disciplinary and comparative
scholarship addressing problems and
concerns of the contemporary political
world through the lens of anthropology.
The first issue was released in May 2008
in both English and Italian. The editors
plan to release another issue in late Fall
2008. You can visit the journal online at
www.ipa3.com. The main editors of the
journal include Prof. Thomassen, Agnes
Horvath from the Catholic University of
Milan, and Harald Wydra from
Cambridge University. Additionally, Prof.
Thomassen has enlisted the help of a
number of AUR students and alumni:
Caitlin Bagby - International Relations
major and Senior AUR student, Derrick
Fiedler – AUR Alumni currently attending
The University of Chicago, and Lyndsay
Krebs – International Relations major
and AUR graduate in December 2008.
Catherine
Ramsey-Portolano
Italian Department Acting Chair, Prof.
Ramsey-Portolano's article “Da
Fogazzaro a Gallone: L’interpretazione
‘pittorica’ dell’isteria femminile,” on
female acting styles in early Italian
cinema, was published in the Fall 2008
volume of the US Italian Studies journal
Forum Italica.
In July 2008 Prof. Ramsey-Portolano
presentedthe paper “Representation of
sexual and ethnic otherness in Cabiria’s
adult and child female figures” at the
conference “Re-envisioning the child in
Italian Cinema” held atthe University of
Exeter.
Paul Zinder and Maurizio
Marmorstein
Communication Department Chair Paul Zinder’s short
documentary Uno degli Ultimi (One of the Last) continued its
success at international film festivals in summer 2008. The film
won the Best Short Documentary Award from the 2008
Washougal International Film Festival in Washington State and
an Honorable Mention from the 2008 Est Film Festival in
Viterbo, Italy. Prof. Maurizio Marmorstein, who served as the
Producer of the film with Prof. Zinder, represented the film at
the Est Film Festival. As of October 2008, Uno degli Ultimi has
been selected to screen at 25 international film festivals and
has won three awards, including a First Prize – Juror’s Choice
Award from the Black Maria Film and Video Festival, which
was announced in January.