Tell us about yourself: where you come from, what you teach at Ca' Foscari, what are your interests and research areas
My name is Gianluca Briguglia, I teach History of Political Thought, but I am in fact a medievalist. I have focused on Medieval and, in part, Renaissance political thought, and on the wide range of its relations with philosophy, theology, ecclesiology, and literature, although I have also ventured into other periods and topics. Specifically, I have worked on authors such as Marsilius of Padua, Aegidius Romanus, John of Paris, Brunetto Latini, on the extensive discussions on original sin and its consequences on how we think about politics, on political theologies in the XIII and XIV centuries, on metaphors in political thought, but also on the impact of vernacular languages on medieval political philosophy. I have written many specialist books on these topics, but some of my more general and introductory knowledge on this area is perhaps most accessible in my volume "Il pensiero politico medievale" (Medieval Political Thought), Einaudi 2018.
Tell us about your academic path.
I have a degree and a PhD in Philosophy from the University of Milan (and a master's degree in Economics and Business Administration from Bocconi, the CEGA, which opened up a world that was also intellectually interesting). Like many young scholars of my generation (young twenty years ago, of course), I soon realised that spaces in Italy risked being very limited. After a research fellowship at the Firpo Foundation in Turin, I decided to expand my institutional and research career to the European level. I had a wonderful fellowship from the Humboldt Foundation (an institution we should copy in Italy too!) and I worked for two years at the University of Munich (LMU); then I was in Paris for three years, at the EHESS, with a European Union Marie Curie (and I am very happy that Ca' Foscari focuses so much on European projects, which are one of the EU's best actions). The experience in Paris was a real turning point in my career, partly because it is perhaps the best city in the world for the kind of studies and research I do. In those years I also earned the Habilitation à diriger des recherches, at the Sorbonne University, which opens the door to the highest positions in research (it is a particular scheme, of which there is no space to speak here, but if you are interested you can google it...). I then went to Vienna, two years at the university, and one year at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. I then had an associate professor (MC) position at the University of Strasbourg, where I was also director of the Philosophy Department, a very interesting experience. When I realised it was time to work in Italy too, Ca' Foscari and the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage really welcomed me with open arms. And I was amazed to find such an open, dynamic environment where you can work so well.
What are your professional references?
I had no real references. And I also reject the idea of ‘mentor’, which in the academic world, not only in Italy, is a term that carries terrible ambiguities and misunderstandings. However, my international (but also Italian) career has led me to meet exceptional people in the various countries and institutions where I have worked and who have been, at different times and stages, of great inspiration to me. I am grateful to all these people, intellectuals, researchers, friends of this job, both intellectually and personally and, I would say, for the feelings they have stirred in me along the way. Then there are those I have not met, of course, but whose writings are constant references. I greatly appreciate those who write well today, as they did in the 60s, for instance. I am a little wary of those who never get to the point and who shield themselves with academic drawl and stylistic elements inherited from God knows who; or perhaps they simply bore me.
What has given you the greatest satisfaction in your career?
I want to share a non-ordinary one, because it may help someone. Participating in a public competition, which I lost, some 15 years ago was a great accomplishment for me. At a certain point in my career I realised that I wanted to work in France, even though I had not yet set foot there (except, marginally, as part of my Milan PhD), but France has a very peculiar system, not easy to understand, with very high competition. Besides, my French was a bit of a mess and I was completely alone. I didn't have any school support or concrete references, or simply anyone who could advise me. I applied for a position at CNRS, when I was already working in Germany. I lost. But I had followed my own project, I had all in all made a good impression, I had even understood the questions (I wasn't sure I could) and I felt I had begun to understand something of that system and that institutional culture. I could do it. And I became a professor in France years later.
Can you offer any advice to researchers in the early stages of their career?
The world is full of beautiful things, dynamic environments (which university is not), important world-changing jobs, exciting projects and occupations. Certainly, university is also a nice place - even if it can be extremely inhospitable at first -, but if you approach academic research because of a professor's fetish, because you think studying is your only comfort zone, because you think you are clinging to someone's skirts waiting for something to happen, I would reply like Bartleby the scrivener: "I prefer not to". Otherwise, try to think bigger, go abroad for a few years (it is not true that you have to be rich to do it, you just have to win competitions), see how they do it in other countries, have fun, open projects but also know how to close them.