Il Postino Fall 2025
Below you'll find Dr. Vettore's introduction to the Fall 2025 issue of Il Postino, the Graziadio Center's semesterly newsletter. To read the rest of this semester's issue, visit the Il Postino tumblr page!
Dear Friends of Il Postino,
Perhaps a little later than usual, but we are happy to welcome you back to the 2025-26 Academic Year with the fall issue of our newsletter.
Before we discuss the fall semester, let’s take a look at the Summer of 2025 during which we were able to send some twenty students to our study abroad program in Recanati, Italy. There, they spent four weeks (some of them in June, some in July) learning Italian while being fully immersed in the culture. Our students enjoyed this beautiful city in the Marche region and came back ready to continue their studies in Italian at CSULB.
Thanks in part to this renewed enthusiasm in our returning students, we saw an increase in both our majors and minors. We already have four new Minors in Italian Studies this semester, and three who will be new majors next semester!
As for the 2026 Recanati program, our Program Assistant, Diego Brol Batres, and I toured our classes and other institutions and are happy to report that we have already a higher number of students who applied in comparison to last year at this time.This sounds promising, and it should allow us to send a strong cohort in 2026.
With this also comes a new lineup of officers for our club, Club Italia:
President: Isabella Borgese
Vice President: Brenda Villarreal
Treasurer: Martha Martinez
Secretary: Isa Lucas-Zerbe
Social Media: Alexa Clement
They are getting acquainted and are hoping to host events next semester.
This issue of Il postino features interviews with one of our new majors, Alondra Rueda, who will share her experiences in Recanati and passion for Italian. We are very happy to host her thoughts and enthusiasm on these pages. Thank you for your contribution to Il Postino–we wish you the best for this semester and your overall academic career.
For our faculty and alumni spotlight we are glad to have been able to interview Dr. Aparna Nayak, Professor of French Studies and Chair of the RGRLL Department, Cristina Galvan, alumna of our MA program, and Mary Caputi, alumna of our MA program and retired political science lecturer at CSULB. Their interviews won’t fail to inspire our students and friends of Il Postino alike, as they allow us a deeper look into their careers as teachers, scholars, interpreters/translators but also about the amazing journey that is the exploration of languages and cultures.
Finally, the Graziadio Center has hosted (and will host) a handful of events during this semester:
Our alumna and food expert Victoria Ambruso (MA in Food Culture, Communication and Marketing from the University of Gastronomic Sciences, Pollenzo, Italy) presented on the variety of the Italian culinary culture (and also prepared delicious samples of it!) to two of our classes on October 9.
Dr. Giuliana Muscio (emerita, University of Padua, UCLA) gave a fabulous presentation on her documentary that discusses the life and impact of Italian American tenor Enrico Caruso on November 14.
On December 9, at 7 PM, environmental experts Larry Rich and Samantha Duzy, who work for the City of Long Beach, will discuss sustainability and how it ties to the film Happy as Lazzaro.
Finally, in the Spring, renowned scholar Serenella Iovino (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill) will give a talk about environment and literature.
This is all for now–– happy Thanksgiving to you all and have a nice last fews weeks of the semester!
A presto
