Congratulations to Dr. Elizabeth Grace Elmi who has been offered a tenure track position of Assistant Professor in Musicology at Williams College (MA), starting in Fall 2023. She was Visiting Professor at UNC Chapel Hill for the 2021-2022 academic year and she has spent the last year in Italy, first as a Fulbright fellow at the University of Basilicata (Potenza) and currently as a Rome Prize fellow in Renaissance and Early Modern Studies at the American Academy in Rome. She has been conducting archival research on the topic “Inscribing the Self in Occupied Southern Italy”, which will be the basis for her post-dissertation book project. Along with her husband Dorian Jackman (JSoM DM in double bass), she is looking forward to beginning her next chapter at Williams College, a top-ranked private liberal arts college in Williamstown, Massachusetts.
Dr. Elmi received an M.A. in Italian literature and a Ph.D. in musicology from Indiana University. Her research on “the vernacular song practices of 15th- and 16th-century Italy, as well as other cultural contact zones of the Mediterranean, through questions of orality and literacy, creative agency, politics, and identity” soon yielded international recognition. Her 2019 dissertation, titled “Singing Lyric among Local Aristocratic Networks in the Aragonese-Ruled Kingdom of Naples: Aesthetic and Political Meaning in the Written Records of an Oral Practice,” and advised by Professor Massimo Ossi, received the Outstanding Dissertation Award from the International Musicological Society (IMS). Shortly after, Dr. Elmi was awarded the 2021 Susan J. Ridyard prize for her conference paper, “L’arboro captivo fa captivo fructo: Pastoral Politics in the Lyric Song of Late-Fifteenth Century Southern Italy” at the Sewanee Medieval Colloquium, held at the University of the South in Sewanee (TN).
Dr. Elmi extends her gratitude to the department for all the support over the years. Of her advisor, she says that, “Massimo Ossi was a steadfast teacher and mentor to me throughout my PhD. Our discussions about music, literature, manuscripts, the humanities, and so much more remain some of the most intellectually stimulating and influential of my career.” She also feels “particularly indebted to the other members of my dissertation committee, Giovanni Zanovello and Giuliano Di Bacco, for their feedback on my dissertation project and to Peter Burkholder for his guidance in questions of both pedagogy and research.”
We welcome Dr. Elmi back to the U.S. for her new position and wish her the very best start to her well-earned professorship.
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