Dr Gabriele Galluzzo

I joined the University of Exeter in 2013 and I am currently Associate Professor in Ancient Philosophy in the Department of Classics, Ancient History, Religion and Theology (CAHRT). In almost twenty years of career in Italy, Germany and the UK, I developed an interdisciplinary research agenda, which builds bridges and establishes connections between the history of metaphysics and the revival of metaphysics in contemporary analytic philosophy. At the centre of this research agenda is Aristotle’s metaphysical thought and its reception in the Middle Ages and in modern times.

I am the author of three monographs: Aristotle’s Metaphysics Book Zeta: The Contemporary Debate (Edizioni della Normale 2006); Breve storia dell’ontologia (Carocci 2010); the two-volume The Medieval Reception of Book Zeta of Aristotle's Metaphysics (Brill 2013). I have also co-edited three successful collections, which explore a number of metaphysical themes in ancient, medieval and contemporary thought and are the result of important international collaborations: (with R. Chiaradonna) Universals in Ancient Philosophy, (Edizioni della Scuola Normale 2013); (with F. Amerini) A Companion to Latin Medieval Commentaries on Aristotle’s Metaphysics (Brill 2014); (with M.J. Loux) The Problem of Universals in Contemporary Philosophy (CUP 2015). Since 2013, I am the general co-editor of the international journal Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale.

Since July 2021, I am co-director of the Centre for the Study of Science, Technology, Ancient Medicine and Philosophy (STAMP), which I co-founded with a team of colleagues in 2016. The STAMP (Centre for the study of Science, Technology, Ancient Medicine and Philosophy (STAMP) | Research Centres | University of Exeter) centre is the most interdisciplinary centre in CAHRT, as it is a platform for research in a number of areas including ancient medicine, technology, philosophy, sex and gender, and literary criticism. It hosts every year international conferences and talks by invited speakers, and fosters grant applications by colleagues at all stages of career.

My aspiration is for my research agenda to shape my teaching at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. To this end, I designed the 3^rd-year module Being and Not-Being in Ancient Philosophy and the MA module Truth and Knowledge in Ancient Philosophy. I also have an interest in the study of ancient Greek scientific and technical language, and I have always contributed to the Department’s Greek language teaching at all levels.

I am strongly committed to the idea that engagement with ancient philosophical thought may be beneficial to modern societies and concerns. I therefore developed and conduced a range of impact and public engagement activities, which try to promote engagement with ancient material in relation to such major themes as happiness, wellbeing and mental health. I am for instance one of the founding members of the international network Modern Stoicism (Modern stoicism), which engages the general public with principles of Stoic philosophy and promotes medical research on the positive impact of Stoicism on mental health and levels of happiness.

Biography:

I trained as a philosopher and a philologist at the Scuola Normale Superiore of Pisa, where I obtained my BA, MA and PhD (fully funded by a Scuola Normale Superiore PhD scholarship). Thanks to the Scuola Normale Superiore’s International Exchange and Visiting Programme, I completed my education and research training at international level by spending extensive periods of study at the École Normale Supérieure of Paris (first as an undergraduate in 1997 and then as a postgraduate student in 1999) and at the University of Oxford (as a visiting PhD student and then visiting scholar in 2002-2006). In 2005 I took up a seven-year post of Senior Research Fellow at the Scuola Normale of Pisa. During the tenure of the fellowship, I developed an interdisciplinary and innovative research agenda, which centres on Aristotle’s Metaphysics and its reception through different ages, and combines textual and historical analysis with engagement with contemporary debates in metaphysics, especially in the analytic tradition. In 2012 I obtained a post of Assistant Professor (Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter) at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität of Munich and I was appointed as the general co-editor of the international journal Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale. My research achievements have been recognised through the awarding in 2013 of a highly competitive and prestigious Alexander von Humboldt scholarship for Experienced Researchers, from which I withdrew to take a position of lecturer in the Department of Classics and Ancient History in 2013. I progressed to Senior Lecturer in 2018 and to Associate Professor in 2023. In recognition of my work on the reception of ancient thought in the Middles Ages, I have been invited in 2013 to be a permanent member of the Medieval Texts Editorial Committee (Auctores Britannici) of the British Academy.