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What do you teach at Ca’ Foscari? What are your main research interests? 
My name is Alessandro Mistrorigo and I was born in the province of Venice. In Venice I obtained my PhD in Iberian Studies in 2007. From 2008 to 2012 I was Visiting Research Fellow at the Queen Mary University of London, doing research and teaching also at the London Metropolitan University and the Royal Holloway University. I am Adjunct Professor at Ca' Foscari and I teach Spanish Literature. My research activity has focused mainly on 20th and 21st century Spanish poetry, the role of voice in poetic language, performativity, digital technologies, hybridisations and verbal and visual experiments. I am the creator of "Phonodia", a multilingual digital online repository where you can listen to poets reading some of their texts aloud.

What are your professional role models / references?
Role models and references are many. There are real people, professors we met at a conference or those we have a long-standing relationship with that we can call mentors. A relationship that over the years has turned into a true friendship: fundamental people who are part of our lives. And then there are those we met in the pages of books: relationships that are no less exciting and from which we can draw great lessons for our research and teaching activities. You can always learn from everything and everyone in life and in your job. You can certainly learn a lot from your more experienced colleagues, but also from students. After all, the model is that of wonder, of curiosity.

Have you always known that this was going to be your path?
The idea of continuing my studies started during my first degree and was reinforced later during my PhD. There have been difficult moments over the years, but I have never given up on this career. Studying, researching and teaching were my destiny. I live these activities as a kind of vocation; as a passion that drives me towards improvement as a researcher and teacher, but also on a personal level. This passion for studying and my subject is also what I try to convey to my students. I myself have had the good fortune to meet competent and passionate teachers who, along with their knowledge, have passed on to me their enthusiasm for their subject. This has been a key factor in my life.

What is the aspect of your research you are most passionate about?
Discovery. In the field of Spanish Literature - contemporary, but not only - what excites me most is the possibility of discovery. Of discovering, for instance, a forgotten author or work, or one that no one has yet read and analysed. Or finding a new meaning in a specific text and revealing its inner value even after decades to us, today's readers. In the end, this is what research is all about: looking for what is hidden and bringing it to light. In this sense, my specific field of research is a very rich mine where works of rare beauty can be discovered - and rediscovered.

What does teaching and researching mean to you?
The two activities are inherently linked. Bringing your own research, often very specialised, into the classroom is an important moment for a teacher because students can give immediate and relevant feedback. Teachers, on their side, must be able to take it in and process it while adjusting to the level of their audience and finding new and more effective presentation strategies. Teaching requirements are equally important, since they mean that teachers must never lose sight of the general context of the subject in which their research is carried out. This keeps them up to date and with a broader outlook. This open approach can stimulate the teacher's curiosity, eventually broadening and enriching his panorama of academic interests.