Serena Anderlini-D’Onofrio

Serena Anderlini-D’Onofrio was born in Rome, Italy, in 1954. She graduated with a Laurea in lingue moderne from the University of Sassari in 1979. In 1981 she came to the United States to pursue graduate studies and earned her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of California, Riverside.

From 1987 to 1991 she has taught French and English at two universities, Illinois State University, in Normal, and Vanderbilt University, in Nashville, Tennessee. In 1991 Anderlini-D’Onofrio moved to the San Diego area. For six years she was an independent scholar and activist in the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender community, working on safer-sex education and serving as a coordinator in the Bisexual Forum of San Diego. Simultaneously she studied the healing arts and became a practitioner of holistic healing therapy. When her book on women’s participation in modern theater was accepted for publication in 1997, she took a position as Assistant Professor at the University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez, where she is currently Associate Professor in the Humanities.

As a graduate student and new Ph.D., Anderlini-D’Onofrio received numerous study and research grants, including two Graduate-Council Fellowships, a Phi Beta Kappa International Award, and a research scholarship from the Italian Cultural Institute. Recently, she received the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center Fellowship, which she used in Austin, Texas to research the Lillian Hellman papers. The University of Puerto Rico awarded her a Seed-Money Grant to work on new Italian filmmakers and immigration.

Anderlini-D’Onofrio’s publications include: The “Weak” Subject: On Modernity, Eros, and Women’s Playwriting (New Jersey: Associated University Presses, 1998, 352 pages.) This book is a comparative study of women’s authorship in the modern theater. She has published numerous articles in Atenea, Carte Italiane, Diacritics, Feminist Issues, Italian Culture, The Journal of Dramatic Criticism and Theory, The Journal of Gender Studies, Leggere Donna, Theater, VIA: Voices in Italian Americana, Women’s Studies International Forum, Zengers, and Z Magazine. She has also contributed to numerous books, including Feminine Feminists: Cultural Practices in Italy, Natalia Ginzburg: A Voice of the Twentieth Century, and Franca Rame: A Woman Onstage. She is the co-translator of In Spite of Plato, a book of feminist theory by Italian philosopher Adriana Cavarero, for Polity Press, 1995. Anderlini-D’Onofrio has finished a memoir, Sacred Bi Love, and is at work on a book of ecofeminist theory focusing on the Gaia Hypothesis and the controversies in AIDS science.

Email: serena1@centennialpr.net

WebSite: www.geocities.com/serenaserena2000