Programme 2025
The (Re-)Visiting the Mediterranean Spring School, held between May 26 and June 7 at the Valletta Campus of the University of Malta, included a wide-ranging programme of lectures and seminars delivered by participating lecturers from the University of Malta, the National University of Ireland Maynooth, Università degli Studi di Firenze, University of Cyprus, and Carthage University.
Students attended two lectures a day, followed by a two-hour seminar in which they debated and discussed the content from the lectures in greater detail.
The Spring School also included a public lecture on Maltese literature and the Mediterranean, delivered by Prof. Adrian Grima, and it concluded with a two-day Postgraduate Symposium on the theme of ‘Communities’.
Week 1
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Welcome Address | Prof. Stella Borg Barthet, Dr Marija Grech | 9:30am - 9:45am | Rm 201 |
| 2 | Psyche at Sea: A Memory in Fragments | Prof. Norbert Bugeja | 9:45am - 11:15am | Rm 201 |
| 3 | Mediterranean Hybridity and the Blue Humanities | Dr Marija Grech | 11:45am - 1:15pm | Rm 201 |
| 4 | Seminar | Prof. Fernando Cioni, Prof. Evy Varsamopoulou, Prof. Norbert Bugeja, Dr Marija Grech | 2:30pm - 4:30pm | Rm 201 |
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | From Blood Feuds to Civic Justice: Thematic Evolution in The Oresteia | Prof. James Corby | 9:30am - 11:00am | Rm 201 |
| 2 | Tragedy in Context: Aeschylus and the Mediterranean Framework of The Oresteia | Prof. James Corby | 11:30am - 1:00pm | Rm 201 |
| 3 | Seminar | Prof. Fernando Cioni, Prof. Evy Varsamopoulou, Prof. James Corby | 2:30pm - 4:30pm | Rm 201 |
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Odyssey and the Mediterranean Framework | Prof. Maria Frendo | 9:30am - 11:00am | CHBO-213 |
| 2 | Shakespeare and the Mediterranean | Prof. Fernando Cioni | 11:30am - 1:00pm | CHBO-213 |
| 3 | Seminars 1&2 | Prof. Fernando Cioni, Prof. Evy Varsamopoulou, Prof. Maria Frendo | 2:30pm - 4:30pm | CHBO-213, 212 |
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Conceptions of the Self: Seneca’s Influence on Elizabethan tragedy and the Rise of the Essay | Prof. Mario Aquilina | 9:30am - 11:00am | Rm 201 |
| 2 | Florentine Legends and Romantic Authors | Prof. Ilaria Natali | 11:30am - 1:00pm | Rm 201 |
| 3 | Seminars 1&2 | Prof. Fernando Cioni, Prof. Mario Aquilina, Prof. Ilaria Natali | 2:00pm - 4:00pm | Rms 202, 203 |
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ‘The isle is full of noises’: Arboreal Worldmaking in Shakespeare’s The Tempest and Elif Shafak’s Island of Missing Trees | Prof. Stephen O’Neill | 9:30am - 11:00am | Rm 201 |
| 2 | Specters of the Eastern Mediterranean | Prof. Rita Sakr | 11:30am - 1:00pm | Rm 201 |
| 3 | Seminars 1&2 | Prof. Stephen O’Neill, Prof. Rita Sakr | 2:30pm - 4:30pm | Rms 202, 203 |
| 4 | Public talk: ‘Towards the Sun and other Mediterranean Classics’ | Prof. Adrian Grima | 6:00pm - 8:00pm | Aula Magna |
Week 2
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Fancy Macaroni? The Mediterranean and Queer Imagination during the Long Eighteenth Century | Dr Aaron Aquilina | 9:30am - 11:00am | Rm 201 |
| 2 | The Victorians and the Mediterranean | Prof. Petra Caruana Dingli | 11:30am - 1:00pm | Rm 201 |
| 3 | Seminars 1&2 | Dr Aaron Aquilina, Prof. Norbert Bugeja, Prof. Petra Caruana Dingli | 2:30pm - 4:30pm | Rms 202, 203 |
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dislocation, Revolt and History in Camus’s L'Étranger | Prof. Maria Frendo | 9:30am - 11:00am | Rm 201 |
| 2 | H.D.’s Thalassopoetics, from Sea Garden to ‘Hippolytus Temporizes’: The Vegetal Marine World, the Sea and Coastal Areas, the ‘Wild’ vs the Polis | Prof. Evy Varsamopoulou | 11:30am - 1:00pm | Rm 201 |
| 3 | Seminar 1&2 | Dr Aaron Aquilina, Prof. Norbert Bugeja, Prof. Maria Frendo, Prof. Evy Varsamopoulou | 2:30pm - 4:30pm | Rms 202, 203 |
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Partial Views: The Mediterranean in ‘Theory’ and Contemporary Fiction | Prof. Ivan Callus | 9:30am - 11:00am | Rm 201 |
| 2 | Reading Edward Said After Gaza – A Geographical Ethics of Criticism | Prof. Conor McCarthy | 11:30am - 1:00pm | Rm 201 |
| 3 | Seminar 1&2 | Dr Aaron Aquilina, Prof. Norbert Bugeja, Prof. Ivan Callus, Prof. Conor McCarthy | 2:30pm - 4:30pm | Rms 202, 203 |
| 4 | Film screening at Urban Valley | 6:00pm - 8:00pm | Urban Valley hotel |
| # | Topic | Speaker | Time | Hall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ‘The Sea of Stories’: Crossing the Mediterranean between Hope and Despair in Laila Lalami's Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits (2005) and Tahar Ben Jelloun’s Leaving Tangier (2009) | Prof. Safia Sahli, Prof. Stella Borg Barthet | 9:30am - 11:30am | Rm 201 |
| 2 | Seminar | Prof. Safia Sahli, Prof. Stella Borg Barthet, Prof. Norbert Bugeja | 12:00pm - 1:00pm | Rm 201 |
| 3 | Creative Writing workshop | Dr Aaron Aquilina | 2:30pm - 4:30pm | Rm 201 |
No Schedule
No Schedule