Federica G. Pedriali is Professor of Literary Metatheory and Modern Italian Studies at the University of Edinburgh and Research Affiliate at the Edinburgh Futures Institute. She is Head of Italian Studies (2020-; 2009-2014), Director of Research of the Department of European Languages and Cultures (2020-), Director and General Editor of the Edinburgh Journal of Gadda Studies (2000-), Chair of the Edinburgh Gadda Prize (2010-), and Director of the Italo-Scottish Research Cluster (2012-). 

Federica’s approach to academic work combines a marked theoretical drive and a highly collaborative research ethos. Her work intersects Biopolitics, Cognitive Narratology, Continental Philosophy, Decolonial Studies, Migration and Diaspora Studies, the Environmental Humanities, Performance Studies, and Political Theory. She is currently working on biopower, dissonant heritages, and the future of change, having worked, among other things, on the spatialities of war, totalitarian Europe, and the digital humanities also through several ongoing public engagement projects. She is the author or editor of 24 volumes (monographs; regular and special issues; single and joint-edited volumes; reference and encyclopaedic works). Her recent books include: (ed), “Roberto Esposito’s Italian Thought” (Edinburgh University Press, in press); (co-ed), “Mobilizing Cultural Identities in the First World War” (Palgrave MacMillan, 2020); (ed), “Gadda: interpreti a confronto” (Cesati, 2020). She has recently secured an MHRA Research Associateship (2023-2024) to complete the print edition of the Gadda Encyclopaedia (Fabrizio Serra, 2025 – pilot online editions 2002, 2004, 2008, 2014).

Federica was awarded the 2018 Runner-up Marcel Proust Prize for “Nella lettera della Storia: per un approccio biopolitico alla guerra di Gadda” (2017) and was Visiting Professor at Harvard (2000-2001, 2014-2016) and Pavia (2012). She was recently elected to the Italian Ambassador’s Scientific Council, London (2022-), and appointed to the UKRI Talent Panel College, UK Research and Innovation (2022-). She has served as International Jurer on the Strega Prize (2022), and is Co-Chair of the Steering Committee of Europe and World, one of six Research Hubs of UNA Futura, UNA Europa, Brussels (2023-2025). 

• Biopower and Geontopower
• Cognitive Narratology
• Continental Philosophy
• Decoloniality and Decolonial Studies
• Environmental Humanities and Ecocriticism
• French and Italian Theory
• Material Culture
• Migration and Diaspora Studies
• Modern and Contemporary Italian Culture
• Performance Studies
• Political Theory

School of Languages Literatures and Cultures

• Academic Promotions Committee — LLC Representative
• UNA Europa (WP5: BAES) — LLC Representative
• UNA Europa (WP5: BAES Certificate) — Edinburgh Subgroup Leader

Department of European Languages and Cultures

• DELC Director of Research
• DELC Research Seminar Series Coordinator
• Scottish Graduate School, MEL Catalyst Plus — DELC Representative

Italian Section

• Head of Italian

• Visiting Professor, Harvard University, July 2014 to December 2015
• Visiting Professor, Pavia University, 2012
• Promotion to Personal Chair, 2008
• Visiting Fellow, Harvard University, 2005
• Promotion to Reader 2004
• Visiting Professor, Harvard University, 2000-2001

THE EDINBURGH GADDA PROJECTS

The Edinburgh Gadda Projects were founded by Federica Pedriali in 2000. In the twenty years since the launch of the first of the Projects — the Edinburgh Journal of Gadda Studies (EJGS) — they have made Edinburgh an international leader in the subject area.

Outcomes span outputs, environment and impact, and include early career training opportunities and public engagement events. Knowledge exchange and commitment to the user community have been central to the Projects from the start. Impact data, including levels of web user traffic, other professionals involvement and wider engagement in the community, are both robust and in the public domain.

Virtual communities

EGP web users are consistently global. Early Milestone Data (National statistics — UCL 2007 Census) showed the Projects claiming 7.3% all of traffic to the Edinburgh servers, making the Edinburgh Gadda Projects the third most accessed resource in the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences. 

Initiatives on the ground

Six major international event programmes, including six editions of the Edinburgh Gadda Prize — Edinburgh 2010, Milan 2011, Edinburgh 2012, Montecassino 2013, Harvard 2015, and Edinburgh 2019 —, were delivered in the ten years since the launch of the Prize.

Milestone event — Edinburgh 2012

Edinburgh 2012 brought together several communities — academic, other professional, wider educational, general audience — at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, 20-22 September 2012, for the UK premiere of Fabrizio Gifuni’s award-winning play Gadda Goes to War. 

Milestone event — Montecassino 2013
http://vimeo.com/79044984

THE ITALO-SCOTTISH RESEARCH CLUSTER

The ISRC Italo-Scottish Research Cluster was founded by Federica Pedriali in 2012. Stage One of the project (2012-2013) was generously funded by the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland. 

The ISRC Archive is the first online archive in Scotland and the UK to preserve historical documentation relating to one of Scotland’s largest immigrant communities over the last 130 years. 

TEACHING AY 2022-2023

Course Coordination

• Biopower: Troubling Power from Foucault to Agamben
• Italy by Design: Materiality, Intermediality, Commodification 
• Migration Diaspora Exile: The Politics of Representation

Semester Courses

• Biopower: Troubling Power from Foucault to Agamben
• Italy by Design: Materiality, Intermediality, Commodification

Undergraduate Modules on Host Courses

• Decolonisation Impossible: Europe, Italy, Rome
• (Dys)topian Posthuman City
• Guarded Sea: Biopolitics of Immunity and Exoneration

Postgraduate Modules on Host Courses

• Affirmative Biopolitics: Agamben, Levi, Benigni and the Holocaust
• Designing for Dissonant Heritage

Module on Core Course — UNA Europa BA in European Studies

• Postocolonial and Decolonial Studies (Core Course: European Cultures and Societies)