Cohabition, Violence and Difference

Speaker Bios

Silvia Benso (Rochester Institute of Technology, USA)

Silvia Benso is professor of philosophy and director of the women’s, gender, and sexuality studies program at Rochester Institute of Technology (USA). Besides having authored and co-authored several books and articles on ancient and contemporary philosophy, she is the co-editor of Contemporary Italian Philosophy: Between Ethics, Politics and Religion (2007), Between Nihilism and Politics: The Hermeneutics of Gianni Vattimo (2010), Thinking the Inexhaustible: Art, Interpretation, and Freedom in the Philosophy of Luigi Pareyson (2018), Open Borders: Encounters between Italian Philosophy and Continental Thought (2021), Contemporary Italian Women Philosophers: Stretching the Art of Thinking (2021), and Rethinking Life: Italian Philosophy in Precarious Times (2022). She is the general co-editor for the SUNY Press series on Contemporary Italian Philosophy and the co-director of the Society for Italian Philosophy (SIP), which she co-founded.

Pantaleone Condello (University of Messina, Italy)

Pantaleone Condello obtained a Master’s Degree in Contemporary Philosophy (2022) from the University of Messina, with a final grade of 110/110, cum laude and a thesis entitled: La differenza antropologica: Heidegger, Agamben, Derrida (Supervisor: Prof. C. Resta – SSD M-FIL/01). He is in his third year of the PhD program in Humanities at the same university. His research program is focused on the analysis of the deconstruction of power, following the works and the reflections of Martin Heidegger and Jacques Derrida. The title of the research project is Il pensiero del Walten fra Heidegger e Derrida. Violenza, potenza, evento (SSD M-FIL/01), supervisor Prof. R. Fulco; co- supervisor Prof. C. Resta. He is also interested in the themes of contemporary Philosophy, like life, sovereignty, potentiality, and language, with a special focus on Giorgio Agamben and Reiner Schürmann. He has also studied the relationship between geophilosophy and literature, developing an interpretation of Stefano D’Arrigo’s Horcynus Orca.

His publications include: Agamben e il campo come paradigma biopolitico, in V. Surace, A. Reid (eds.) Pained Screams from Camps. Collected Essays, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin/Boston 2024, pp. 35–45.; Della morte del mare. Per una lettura geofilosofica di Horcynus Orca, in Il mondo è Stretto. Per i cinquant’anni di Horcynus Orca di Stefano D’Arrigo, G. Forni, E. M. Ghirlanda and M. M. Vitale (eds.), Cesati Editore, Florence (forthcoming); La stasis della Potenza nel pensiero di Giorgio Agamben, in “Peloro. Rivista del dottorato in scienze umanistiche”, Anno X, 2 – 2025, pp. 767-776 (forthcoming); To a Geophilosophy of the Unworld. Reading Horcynus Orca, in “Shift. International Journal of Philosophical Studies” (forthcoming).

Rita Fulco (University of Messina, Italy)

Rita Fulco is Associate Professor in Theoretical Philosophy at the Department of Ancient and Modern Civilizations at the University of Messina, where she teaches Philosophical Hermeneutics and Philosophies of the 20th Century. From 2016 to 2021, she was a research fellow in Theoretical Philosophy at the Scuola Normale Superiore (Pise, Italy). Her publications include: Corrispondere al limite: Simone Weil, il pensiero e la luce (Studium, 2002); Il tempo della fine: L’Apocalittica messianica di Sergio Quinzio (Diabasis, 2007); Essere insieme in un luogo: Etica, politica, diritto nel pensiero di Emmanuel Levinas (Mimesis, 2013); R. Fulco and T. Greco (eds.), L’Europa di Simone Weil: Filosofia e nuove istituzioni (Quodlibet, 2019); Soggettività e potere: Ontologia della vulnerabilità in Simone Weil (Quodlibet, 2020); R. Fulco (ed.), Essere contemporanei della fine del mondo. Saggi su Manlio Sgalambro (Mimesis, 2022); R. Fulco and B.M. Esposito (eds.), Martirio e testimonianza. Saggi di filosofia, storia e teologia politica (Edizioni della Normale, 2023).

Dominic Harkin (Queen’s University Belfast, UK)

Dr Dominic Harkin is a Teaching Fellow at Queen’s University Belfast. His research explores the
intersections of Late Victorian and Modernist literature with the Philosophy of Science. His thesis
examined the convergences between the New Empiricism – particularly the Vienna and Berlin Schools of
Logical Positivism – and the work of Irish Modernist Brian O’Nolan. His wider interests include the
emergence of detective and science fiction at the turn of the century and their reliance on models of
scientific reasoning, as well as the environmental humanities, new materialisms, and biopolitical literary
criticism. His work has appeared in collections such as Locked Up: Pained Screams from Camps (De
Gruyter, 2024) and Mind the Gap: Borders, Limits and Frontiers (De Gruyter, 2025), and in the special
edition “A Hundred Years of Kafka” (2025) of the Logoi Journal of Philosophy.

Giusy Mantarro (University of Messina, Italy)

Giusy Mantarro is a PhD candidate in Humanities (Philosophy track) at the University of Messina. Her research, conducted within the field of theoretical philosophy, focuses on Emmanuel Levinas’s philosophy of the outside, investigating its ontological, ethico-political, and hermeneutical implications. She has presented papers at national and international scientific conferences and she is the coordinator of the Permanent Seminar in Philosophy, organized annually by the PhD candidates of the PhD Program in Humanities (Philosophy track) at the University of Messina. Her publications include: Emmanuel Levinas tra silenzio e ambiguità: il sionismo e il conflitto israelo-palestinese, in “Shift. International Journal of Philosophical Studies”: Transits. Life, Politics, Institutions in Italian Thought, n. 2, 2024, pp. 227-236; Ermeneutiche dell’evento. Sul rapporto tra evento, processo e istituzioni, in “Giornale critico di storia delle idee. Rivista internazionale di filosofia”: L’uomo nell’era digitale: coscienza, pensiero critico e spazio politico all’epoca di internet e dell’intelligenza artificiale, n. 2, 2022, pp. 291-303; Prisoners’ Rebellion Against the Silence of God: André Neher and Elie Wiesel, in A. Reid, V. Surace (edited by), Pained Screams from Camps. Collected Essays and an Italian-English Edition of Aldo Quarisa’s Diary, De Gruyter, Berlin/Boston 2024, pp. 85-94.

Noele Di Nuzzo (University of Messina, Italy)

Dr. Natale Emanuele Di Nuzzo is currently pursuing a PhD in Psychology at the Magna Graecia University of Catanzaro and the University of Messina. His research interests include inclusive pedagogy and issues related to critical pedagogy in contemporary society, such as gender relations, intercultural challenges, the use of digital technologies, and the role of artificial intelligence in education. He has participated in several pedagogical projects at both the national level—such as the promotion of the Philosophy for Children teaching practice in schools in Messina and Reggio Calabria—and the international level, including an Erasmus Plus project on inclusive education. He serves as Editorial Managing Editor of the Italian-German journal Rassegna Pedagogia and has authored several publications, including the monograph co-authored with Anna Maria Passaseo, The Ideal of the Homo Complexus: An Introduction to Edgar Morin’s Philosophy of Education.

Annamaria Passaseo (University of Messina, Italy)

Anna Maria Passaseo is associate professor in General Pedagogy at the DICAM Department of the University of Messina (Italy), where she teaches General Pedagogy, Intercultural Education and Philosophy of Education. She got a master in Peace Studies from the University of Bradford (UK) and a Ph.D. in Intercultural Education from the University of Messina. She is a member of the teaching board of the Catanzaro-Messina Interuniversity Doctorate in Psychology and editor of the international journal “Rassegna di Pedagogia-Pädagogische Umschau”, as well as the series of studies “Teoria dell’educazione” published by Armando Siciliano Editore. Her main research interests are focused on social education issues and theoretical pedagogy issues. Her publications include L’ideale dell’Homo complexus. Introduzione alla filosofia dell’educazione di Edgar Morin (Siciliano, Messina 2024), Educazione e teoria pedagogica. Problemi e direzioni di ricerca (Armando, Roma 2021), Formare la persona libera. Un progetto di educazione per capacità (Anicia, Roma 2015).

Martine Prange (Tilburg University, Netherlands)

Martine Prange is Full Professor of Philosophy of Humanity, Culture and Society at the Department of Philosophy, a position she has held since 2016. Her field is continental philosophy and its history, with a focus on modern and postmodern thought. She specialises in Nietzsche’s philosophy, particularly his musical aesthetics, the Nietzsche-Wagner relationship, and Nietzsche’s indebtedness to Weimar Classicism, especially Goethe and Schiller. Her broader interests include German aesthetics, Enlightenment and Romanticism, philosophy of music, philosophy of art, philosophy of culture, Kant, Foucault, and media philosophy. She also pursues research in the philosophy of sport and women’s football. As principal investigator, she conducted and supervised a transdisciplinary investigation into the emancipatory power of football for girls and women in the Netherlands from 2013 to 2019. She recently completed a long-term research project on post-truth, parrhesia, and media, spanning 2016 to 2025.

Aisling Reid (Queen’s University Belfast, UK)

BIO: Aisling Reid is an Associate Lecturer in the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen’s University Belfast. Her research spans medieval studies, contemporary history, art history, critical theory, and translation. Her most recent article, ‘Revealing the Threshold: The Vierge Ouvrante as Liminal Devotion in Medieval Europe’, appeared in Venezia Arti (2025).

Caterina Resta (University of Messina, Italy)

Caterina Resta is a professor of Theoretical Philosophy at the Department of Ancient and Modern Civilisations at the University of Messina. Her research focuses on contemporary philosophy, both German and French. She has developed research related to nihilism, technology, the status of the human, the philosophy of difference, including gender, and the deconstruction of subjectivity. She has also explored perspectives on the Mediterranean and Europe, globalisation, and the environmental crisis from a geo-philosophical standpoint. She is the author of numerous books, articles, and essays, including: Il luogo e le vie: Geografie del pensiero in Martin Heidegger (Angeli, 1996); (with Luisa Bonesio), Passaggi al bosco: Ernst Jünger nell’era dei Titani (Mimesis, 2000); L’evento dell’altro: Etica e politica in Jacques Derrida (Bollati Boringhieri, 2003); L’Estraneo: Ostilità e ospitalità nel pensiero del Novecento (Il Melangolo, 2008); Stato mondiale o Nomos della terra: Carl Schmitt tra universo e pluriverso (Diabasis, 2009, new edition); Geofilosofia del Mediterraneo (Mesogea, 2012) and Geophilosophy of the Mediterranean, trans. A. Reid and V. Surace, ed. R. Fulco, S. Gorgone, G. Gregorio and V. Surace (Suny Press, 2024).t

Elvira Roncalli (Caroll College, Montana, USA)

Elvira Roncalli is Professor of Philosophy at Carroll College, Helena, Montana. Her research explores mechanisms of dominance and exclusion, the interplay between embodied subjectivity and lived space, the relationship between power and violence, and between agency and political visibility. She is the author of The Future of the World Is Open: Encounters with Lea Melandri, Luisa Muraro, Adriana Cavarero, and Rossana Rossanda, (SUNY Press, 2022), also published in Italian, Il futuro è aperto. Storia e prospettive del femminismo italiano. Lea Melandri, Luisa Muraro, Adriana Cavarero, Rossana Rossanda (Prospero Editore, 2023). She has co-edited, with Silvia Benso, Contemporary Italian Women Philosophers: Stretching the Art of Thinking (SUNY Press, 2021).

Valetina Surace (University of Messina, Italy)

Valentina Surace was a research fellow (Theoretical Philosophy) within the framework of the FISR project “The Refunctionalisation of the Contemporary” and holds a PhD in Methodologies of Philosophy (University of Messina). Her research focuses on German and French 20th-century philosophy and contemporary philosophy, particularly: Martin Heidegger’s ontology of life and its Lutheran roots; Jacques Derrida’s deconstruction, in its ethical-political implications; the question of human habitation on Earth from a geo-philosophical perspective; Judith Butler’s social ontology. Her publications include: L’inquietudine dell’esistenza: Le radici luterane dell’ontologia della vita di Martin Heidegger (Mimesis, 2014); Soggetti precari. L’ontologia sociale di Judith Butler (Mimesis, 2023); “Messianismo e politica: Il frammento teologico-politico di Walter Benjamin” and “Messianismi e cosmopolitica: Derrida oltre Kant,” in C. Resta (ed.), Schegge messianiche: Filosofia, Religione, Politica (Mimesis, 2017); V. Surace (ed.), Anacronie. L’inattualità del contemporaneo (Mimesis, 2022); V. Surace and A. Reid (eds.), Just in time / Giusto in tempo. Theorising the Contemporary / Pensare il contemporaneo (Mimesis International, 2023); V. Surace, S. Gorgone and G.