Louis Moffa
Graduate Admin Fellow
Italian

Louis is currently a sixth year Ph.D. candidate in Italian and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. He grew up in Franklin Township, a small town in southern New Jersey, before attending Vassar College. As an undergraduate, Louis spent a semester at the Università di Bologna through the ECCo Program; in the Spring of 2018 Louis received a B.A. in Italian Studies with honors from Vassar College.

 

Louis joined Columbia’s Italian Department as a Ph.D. candidate in the Fall of 2018; he has been a member of Columbia’s Institute for Comparative Literature and Society (ICLS) since the Spring of 2019. In 2019 Louis received an M.A. in Italian, and in 2021 he received an M.Phil. in Italian and Comparative Literature, both from Columbia University. Louis’s M.Phil exams were proctored by Teodolinda Barolini (Italian/ICLS, Columbia), Katja Vogt (Philosophy, Columbia), and Patricia Grieve (Latin American and Iberian Cultures/ICLS, Columbia). His exams focused on Dante and astronomy/astrology; physics, metaphysics, and cosmology in Plato and Aristotle; and the novella/frame-tale tradition from antiquity to the 20th century. Louis has taught both Elementary Italian I and II, and Intermediate Italian I and II at Columbia.

 

Presently, Louis’s research focuses on representations of the stars and the cosmos in the Divina Commedia; Louis’s dissertation is tentatively titled Dante, Poet of the Stars. Louis is a Preceptor in the Core Curriculum at Columbia University, teaching Literature Humanities. Passionate about digital humanities and scholarship, Louis serves as an assistant editor for Digital Dante and as the copy-editor for Synapsis. Louis has been awarded a dissertation fellowship from the Institute for Religion, Culture, and Public Life, and works as a Consultant at the GSAS Writing Studio at Columbia. In his free time, Louis enjoys playing soccer, practicing the piano, going to the ballet, and reading poetry.

 The Heyman Center for the Humanities, Room B-101
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New York, NY, 10027
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