Distinguished journalist to give lecture

NEW PALTZ — Alexander Stille, a distinguished journalist and author, will give a lecture on the SUNY New Paltz campus, called “Italian Jews Under Fascism,” at 7 p.m. on Feb. 26, in room 100 of the Lecture Center. The lecture is sponsored by the Traverso Endowment and the Italian Studies Committee of SUNY New Paltz.

Stille is the son of an Italian Jewish exile, Ugo Kamenetzki, who fled Italy during Mussolini’s rule. He speaks with personal note about the holocaust that took place in Italy at the time of Mussolini’s rule. “I think it is extremely important, especially in a time like today,” said Professor Emeritus, Giancarlo Traverso. “I think the more people know about it, the greater chance we have of becoming more human.”

Stille is a distinguished journalist and author of three highly acclaimed books: the prize-winning Benevolence and Betrayal: Five Italian Jewish Families; Excellent Cadavers: The Mafia and the Death of the First Italian Republic and the recently published The Future of the Past, an analysis of the role technology plays in preserving and destroying the past. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, The London Review of Books, The New York Times, and La Repubblica, one of Italy’s most influential newspapers. Stille is also the chief editor of Correspondence: An International Review of Culture and Society.

A speaker at many campuses across the country, in the fall of 1999 he was Distinguished Gladys Delmar Professor at Vassar College, and during 2000-2001 a Regents’ Lecturer at the University of California at Santa Barbara. He is currently teaching Journalism and Italian History at New York University.

The Luigi and Anita Traverso Endowment has been created by Professor Emeritus Giancarlo Traverso to honor his and his brother Giuseppe’s parents. It provides funding for scholarships to benefit SUNY New Paltz students interested in Italian Studies and for an annual lecture series open to the public. The endowment seeks to increase enrollment in the Italian Studies program, to expand the program’s service to the Hudson Valley community, to offer forums for discussion on the Italian and Italian-American experience and to help establish a major in Italian Studies.