Joseph Pivato
Encyclopedia
Joseph Pivato is a Canadian writer and academic who first established the critical recognition of Italian-Canadian
literature and changed our perception of Canadian writing
.
, a town about 40 Km north of Venice, Italy. His mother, Meri Sabucco, was from Udine
in the Friuli region east of Venice. This Italian origin was to have a profound influence on his whole life and career as a writer, researcher and academic. The family emigrated to Toronto
, Canada, in 1952 where the Catholic nuns changed his name to Joseph. He attended St. Michael's College School
, an academic high school for boys, were he studied languages and literature. He enrolled at York University
were he studied with modernist scholar, D.E.S. Maxwell, feminist and medievalist, Beryl Rowland, Canadian writer, Irving Layton
, met poet/professor Miriam Waddington, French poet Hedi Bouraoui and poet-critic, Eli Mandel
. In the summers he worked with Italian bricklayers to help pay for his university fees. In 1968 he founded and edited the first literary magazine at York, Voodoo Poetry at Vanier College. His honours thesis was on Ezra Pound's The Cantos and Marshall McLuhan. In 1970 he earned a B.A. (Combined Honours, English and French) from York and moved to Edmonton to study comparative literature at the University of Alberta
. His 1971 M.A. thesis was on Dante
and Baudelaire
. There he studied with E.D. Blodgett a writer and academic who was his advisor for his Ph.D. thesis on hermetic poetry. At the University of Alberta he also met Canadian writer Henry Kreisel
and began to work on Canadian authors publishing his first critical essay in Canadian Literature No. 58 (1973) while he was still a graduate student. By the end of his doctoral program (1977) he began to work at the newly established Athabasca University
, a distance education institution modeled after the British Open University. At Athabasca he helped to develop the first courses in English literature, Canadian literature, comparative literature and theory. He was promoted to Full Professor in 1986 and because of his publications was invited as visiting professor to universities in Canada and abroad. In 1986 he was founding president of the Association of Italian-Canadian Writers which advances the work of these ethnic minority authors through critical publications, biennial conferences, book launches and literary readings across Canada and in Italy. At Athabasca Pivato was Chair of the Centre for Language and Literature on three separate occasions and developed the first courses in creative writing. In 2010 he was founding professor of the new M.A. in Literary Studies which is part of the MA-IS program. He is married to Alberta psychologist and disabilities advocate Dr. Emma Pivato.
. As a literature which exists in three languages: English, French and Italian, it lends itself to discussions on translation, influences, ethnic identity, migration and appropriation. His discovery began in 1978 when his poems were included in Roman Candles, the first anthology of Italian-Canadian poets edited by Pier Giorgio DiCicco. This inspired him to present the first paper on Italian-Canadian writers at a national conference at Dalhousie University, Halifax in May, 1981. This paper was rejected by several journals and was eventually published as “The Arrival of Italian-Canadian Writing,” in Canadian Ethnic Studies 14,1 (1982).
In 1984 Pivato was Research Fellow in the Ethnic and Immigration Studies Program at the University of Toronto
. In Toronto he edited his first book, Contrasts: Comparative Essays on Italian-Canadian Writing (1985) which became a seminal volume for the promotion of ethnic minority literature in Canada. He conceived and co-edited the “Italian-Canadian Connections” issue of Canadian Literature 106 (1985). Pivato spent the year 1987-88 at York University in the Mariano Elia Chair in Italian-Canadian Studies where he developed and taught the first course on Italian-Canadian writers. The Research Institute for Comparative Literature in Edmonton invited him to edit Literatures of Lesser Diffusion (1990), the first collection of studies of writing by 20 different ethnic groups in Canada. In 1991 he was Canadian Visiting Fellow at Macquarie University
in Sydney, Australia. This sojourn resulted in the publication of Echo: Essays on Other Literatures (1994), a collection of original critical studies on comparative literature and minority writing, translation, oral influences on writing, ethnic women writers, ethnic self-hatred and ethnic authors in Quebec. The critical foreword is by feminist scholar, Sneja Gunew (Deakin & U.B.C.). He returned to Canadian Ethnic Studies in 1996 by editing a special issue on “Literary Theory and Ethnic Minority Writing.” The major volume Pivato edited was The Anthology of Italian-Canadian Writing (1998) which included 53 authors working in English, French or Italian and which has been used as a text in many college and university courses. Among the authors included are Linda Hutcheon, Nino Ricci, Pasquale Verdicchio, Mary di Michele, and Marco Micone. Pivato's poetry has appeared in Poetry Canada Review, Seven Persons Repository, Manna, Canadian Ethnic Studies,' and his short fiction in Threshold (1999) and Passages (2002).
Pivato was in the forefront of research and advocacy for a multicultural view of Canadian literature. Writer George Elliott Clarke points to his work as an example that other ethnic minority writers should follow in establishing a distinct identity for their publications. Pivato has been a visiting speaker and researcher at the University of Udine
several times and has contributed to conferences and publication at their Centro di Cultura Canadese founded by Prof. Anna Pia De Luca. He focused some of his research on Canadian writers with backgrounds in Friuli. In 2004 he was visiting fellow at the University of Wollongong, Australia, where he collaborated with Prof. Gaetano Rando. Over the years Pivato has been an invited speaker at the University of Calgary
, the University of Toronto
, The University of Montreal, Laurentian University
, the California State University, Long Beach
, the University of Warwick
, U.K. the University of Venice
, the University of Melbourne
and other institutions.
Since 2000 he has been general editor of the Writers Series with Antonio D’Alfonso at Guernica Editions (Toronto and Montreal). By 2011 the series had reached an impressive 35 volumes, each a monograph on a Canadian author including: Sharon Pollock
, Aritha Van Herk
, Gail Scott, David Adams Richards
, Nicole Brossard
, Margaret Atwood
, Anne Hébert
, Gary Geddes
, Joy Kogawa
, and Jack Hodgins
. Each is edited by a prominent academic such as Lianne Moyes, Anne Nothof, Louise H. Forsyth, Monique Tschofen, Christl Verduyn
, Robert Nunn, and Sheena L. Wilson. In 2009 he first identified the Sherbrooke School of Comparative Literature as instrumental in the development and study of Canadian writing in English and French and published this new proposal in 2011.
At the Athabasca University site for faculty research Pivato has posted 10 of his most recent published essays on ethnic minority writing in Canada. Joseph Pivato created and maintains the Canadian Writers site at Athabasca University, the most extensive site on the authors of Canada.
Italian-Canadian
An Italian Canadian is a Canadian of Italian descent or heritage. According to the 2006 census of Canada, 1,445,335 Canadians consider themselves to be of Italian origin. The Italian-Canadian population climbed by more than 12% and half have combined Italian origins along with another ethnic...
literature and changed our perception of Canadian writing
Canadian literature
Canadian literature is literature originating from Canada. Collectively it is often called CanLit. Some criticism of Canadian literature has focused on nationalistic and regional themes, although this is only a small portion of Canadian Literary criticism...
.
Biography
He was born Giuseppe Pivato in Tezze sul BrentaTezze sul Brenta
Tezze sul Brenta is a town in the province of Vicenza, Veneto, Italy. It is northeast of SP51.-Sources:*...
, a town about 40 Km north of Venice, Italy. His mother, Meri Sabucco, was from Udine
Udine
Udine is a city and comune in northeastern Italy, in the middle of Friuli-Venezia Giulia region, between the Adriatic sea and the Alps , less than 40 km from the Slovenian border. Its population was 99,439 in 2009, and that of its urban area was 175,000.- History :Udine is the historical...
in the Friuli region east of Venice. This Italian origin was to have a profound influence on his whole life and career as a writer, researcher and academic. The family emigrated to Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, Canada, in 1952 where the Catholic nuns changed his name to Joseph. He attended St. Michael's College School
St. Michael's College School
St. Michael's College School is a private, all-boys Roman Catholic day school in Toronto, Canada. Currently administered by the Basilian Fathers, it is the largest school of its kind in Canada, with an enrollment of approximately 1,080 students from grades 7 to 12. St...
, an academic high school for boys, were he studied languages and literature. He enrolled at York University
York University
York University is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's third-largest university, Ontario's second-largest graduate school, and Canada's leading interdisciplinary university....
were he studied with modernist scholar, D.E.S. Maxwell, feminist and medievalist, Beryl Rowland, Canadian writer, Irving Layton
Irving Layton
Irving Peter Layton, OC was a Romanian-born Canadian poet. He was known for his "tell it like it is" style which won him a wide following but also made enemies. As T...
, met poet/professor Miriam Waddington, French poet Hedi Bouraoui and poet-critic, Eli Mandel
Eli Mandel
Eli Mandel was a Canadian poet, editor of many Canadian anthologies, and literary academic.-Biography:...
. In the summers he worked with Italian bricklayers to help pay for his university fees. In 1968 he founded and edited the first literary magazine at York, Voodoo Poetry at Vanier College. His honours thesis was on Ezra Pound's The Cantos and Marshall McLuhan. In 1970 he earned a B.A. (Combined Honours, English and French) from York and moved to Edmonton to study comparative literature at the University of Alberta
University of Alberta
The University of Alberta is a public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford, the first premier of Alberta and Henry Marshall Tory, its first president, it is widely recognized as one of the best universities in Canada...
. His 1971 M.A. thesis was on Dante
Dante Alighieri
Durante degli Alighieri, mononymously referred to as Dante , was an Italian poet, prose writer, literary theorist, moral philosopher, and political thinker. He is best known for the monumental epic poem La commedia, later named La divina commedia ...
and Baudelaire
Charles Baudelaire
Charles Baudelaire was a French poet who produced notable work as an essayist, art critic, and pioneering translator of Edgar Allan Poe. His most famous work, Les Fleurs du mal expresses the changing nature of beauty in modern, industrializing Paris during the nineteenth century...
. There he studied with E.D. Blodgett a writer and academic who was his advisor for his Ph.D. thesis on hermetic poetry. At the University of Alberta he also met Canadian writer Henry Kreisel
Henry Kreisel
Henry Kreisel, OC was a Canadian writer. Born in Vienna, Austria, he was educated at the University of Toronto.Kreisel's mother was born in Poland and his father in Romania....
and began to work on Canadian authors publishing his first critical essay in Canadian Literature No. 58 (1973) while he was still a graduate student. By the end of his doctoral program (1977) he began to work at the newly established Athabasca University
Athabasca University
Athabasca University is a Canadian university in Athabasca, Alberta. It is an accredited research institution which also offers distance education courses and programs. Courses are offered primarily in English with some French offerings. Each year, 32,000 students attend the university. It offers...
, a distance education institution modeled after the British Open University. At Athabasca he helped to develop the first courses in English literature, Canadian literature, comparative literature and theory. He was promoted to Full Professor in 1986 and because of his publications was invited as visiting professor to universities in Canada and abroad. In 1986 he was founding president of the Association of Italian-Canadian Writers which advances the work of these ethnic minority authors through critical publications, biennial conferences, book launches and literary readings across Canada and in Italy. At Athabasca Pivato was Chair of the Centre for Language and Literature on three separate occasions and developed the first courses in creative writing. In 2010 he was founding professor of the new M.A. in Literary Studies which is part of the MA-IS program. He is married to Alberta psychologist and disabilities advocate Dr. Emma Pivato.
Scholarly work in comparative literature
Joseph Pivato promotes Italian-Canadian writing by using the theories of comparative literatureComparative literature
Comparative literature is an academic field dealing with the literature of two or more different linguistic, cultural or national groups...
. As a literature which exists in three languages: English, French and Italian, it lends itself to discussions on translation, influences, ethnic identity, migration and appropriation. His discovery began in 1978 when his poems were included in Roman Candles, the first anthology of Italian-Canadian poets edited by Pier Giorgio DiCicco. This inspired him to present the first paper on Italian-Canadian writers at a national conference at Dalhousie University, Halifax in May, 1981. This paper was rejected by several journals and was eventually published as “The Arrival of Italian-Canadian Writing,” in Canadian Ethnic Studies 14,1 (1982).
In 1984 Pivato was Research Fellow in the Ethnic and Immigration Studies Program at the University of Toronto
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...
. In Toronto he edited his first book, Contrasts: Comparative Essays on Italian-Canadian Writing (1985) which became a seminal volume for the promotion of ethnic minority literature in Canada. He conceived and co-edited the “Italian-Canadian Connections” issue of Canadian Literature 106 (1985). Pivato spent the year 1987-88 at York University in the Mariano Elia Chair in Italian-Canadian Studies where he developed and taught the first course on Italian-Canadian writers. The Research Institute for Comparative Literature in Edmonton invited him to edit Literatures of Lesser Diffusion (1990), the first collection of studies of writing by 20 different ethnic groups in Canada. In 1991 he was Canadian Visiting Fellow at Macquarie University
Macquarie University
Macquarie University is an Australian public teaching and research university located in Sydney, with its main campus situated in Macquarie Park. Founded in 1964 by the New South Wales Government, it was the third university to be established in the metropolitan area of Sydney...
in Sydney, Australia. This sojourn resulted in the publication of Echo: Essays on Other Literatures (1994), a collection of original critical studies on comparative literature and minority writing, translation, oral influences on writing, ethnic women writers, ethnic self-hatred and ethnic authors in Quebec. The critical foreword is by feminist scholar, Sneja Gunew (Deakin & U.B.C.). He returned to Canadian Ethnic Studies in 1996 by editing a special issue on “Literary Theory and Ethnic Minority Writing.” The major volume Pivato edited was The Anthology of Italian-Canadian Writing (1998) which included 53 authors working in English, French or Italian and which has been used as a text in many college and university courses. Among the authors included are Linda Hutcheon, Nino Ricci, Pasquale Verdicchio, Mary di Michele, and Marco Micone. Pivato's poetry has appeared in Poetry Canada Review, Seven Persons Repository, Manna, Canadian Ethnic Studies,' and his short fiction in Threshold (1999) and Passages (2002).
Pivato was in the forefront of research and advocacy for a multicultural view of Canadian literature. Writer George Elliott Clarke points to his work as an example that other ethnic minority writers should follow in establishing a distinct identity for their publications. Pivato has been a visiting speaker and researcher at the University of Udine
University of Udine
The University of Udine is a university in the city of Udine . It was founded in 1978 as part of the reconstruction plan of Friuli after the earthquake in 1976...
several times and has contributed to conferences and publication at their Centro di Cultura Canadese founded by Prof. Anna Pia De Luca. He focused some of his research on Canadian writers with backgrounds in Friuli. In 2004 he was visiting fellow at the University of Wollongong, Australia, where he collaborated with Prof. Gaetano Rando. Over the years Pivato has been an invited speaker at the University of Calgary
University of Calgary
The University of Calgary is a public research university located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Founded in 1966 the U of C is composed of 14 faculties and more than 85 research institutes and centres.More than 25,000 undergraduate and 5,500 graduate students are currently...
, the University of Toronto
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution of higher learning in Upper Canada...
, The University of Montreal, Laurentian University
Laurentian University
Laurentian University , was incorporated on March 28, 1960, is a mid-sized bilingual university in Greater Sudbury, Ontario, Canada....
, the California State University, Long Beach
California State University, Long Beach
California State University, Long Beach is the second largest campus of the California State University system and the third largest university in the state of California by enrollment...
, the University of Warwick
University of Warwick
The University of Warwick is a public research university located in Coventry, United Kingdom...
, U.K. the University of Venice
University of Venice
Ca' Foscari University is a university in Venice, northern Italy. It was founded in 1868 as the first Italian business college. The main building of the University, Ca’ Foscari Palace, is placed in a strategic position on the bend of the Grand Canal, in the heart of the city...
, the University of Melbourne
University of Melbourne
The University of Melbourne is a public university located in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1853, it is the second oldest university in Australia and the oldest in Victoria...
and other institutions.
Since 2000 he has been general editor of the Writers Series with Antonio D’Alfonso at Guernica Editions (Toronto and Montreal). By 2011 the series had reached an impressive 35 volumes, each a monograph on a Canadian author including: Sharon Pollock
Sharon Pollock
Sharon Pollock is a Canadian playwright, actor, director, who lives in Calgary, Alberta. She has been Artistic Director of Theatre Calgary , Theatre New Brunswick and Performance Kitchen & The Garry Theatre, the latter which she herself founded in 1992. In 2007, she was made a Fellow of the Royal...
, Aritha Van Herk
Aritha Van Herk
Aritha van Herk is a Canadian writer, critic, editor, and university professor.She was born in Wetaskiwin, Alberta . Her parents and elder siblings immigrated to Canada from the Netherlands before she was born. She grew up in a bilingual home, speaking English and Dutch. In 1974, she married...
, Gail Scott, David Adams Richards
David Adams Richards
David Adams Richards, CM, ONB is a Canadian novelist, essayist, screenwriter and poet.Born in Newcastle, New Brunswick, Richards left St. Thomas University in Fredericton, New Brunswick, three credits shy of completing a B.A.. Richards has been a writer-in-residence at various universities and...
, Nicole Brossard
Nicole Brossard
Nicole Brossard, O.C. is a leading French Canadian formalist poet and novelist.She lives in Outremont, a former city in Montreal, Quebec. She wrote her first collection in 1965, Aube à la maison. The collection L'Echo bouge beau marks a break in the evolution of her poetry...
, Margaret Atwood
Margaret Atwood
Margaret Eleanor Atwood, is a Canadian poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, and environmental activist. She is among the most-honoured authors of fiction in recent history; she is a winner of the Arthur C...
, Anne Hébert
Anne Hébert
Anne Hébert, CC, OQ , was a Canadian author and poet. She is a descendant of famed French-Canadian historian Francois-Xavier Garneau, "and has carried on the family literary tradition spectacularly."...
, Gary Geddes
Gary Geddes
-Biography:He spent four years of his childhood on the Canadian prairies, but otherwise remained on the west coast until 1963, where he got his Bachelor’s Degree in English and Philosophy at the University of British Columbia. Geddes received his M.A. and Ph.D. in English at the University of...
, Joy Kogawa
Joy Kogawa
Joy Nozomi Kogawa, CM, OBC is a Canadian poet and novelist of Japanese descent.-Life:Born Joy Nozomi Nakayama in Vancouver, British Columbia, she was sent with her family to the internment camp for Japanese Canadians at Slocan during World War II...
, and Jack Hodgins
Jack Hodgins
For the fictional character from Bones see Jack Hodgins Jack Hodgins is a Canadian novelist and short story writer....
. Each is edited by a prominent academic such as Lianne Moyes, Anne Nothof, Louise H. Forsyth, Monique Tschofen, Christl Verduyn
Christl Verduyn
Dr. Christl Verduyn is Professor of English Literature and Canadian Studies at Mount Allison University. She is the 2006 recipient of the Governor General's International Award for Canadian Studies, awarded by the International Council for Canadian Studies...
, Robert Nunn, and Sheena L. Wilson. In 2009 he first identified the Sherbrooke School of Comparative Literature as instrumental in the development and study of Canadian writing in English and French and published this new proposal in 2011.
At the Athabasca University site for faculty research Pivato has posted 10 of his most recent published essays on ethnic minority writing in Canada. Joseph Pivato created and maintains the Canadian Writers site at Athabasca University, the most extensive site on the authors of Canada.
Books on literary studies
- Contrasts: Comparative Essays on Italian-Canadian Writing. Montreal: Guernica, 1985. Editor and contributor. Winner of Bressani Prize for multicultural literature for 1985.
- Literatures of Lesser Diffusion / Les littératures de moindre diffusion. Edmonton: Research Institute for Comparative Literature, 1990. Editor in collaboration with Steven Totosy and Milan Dimic.
- Echo: Essays on Other Literatures. Toronto: Guernica Editions, 1994. Author with foreword by Sneja Gunew.
- The Anthology of Italian-Canadian Writing. Toronto: Guernica, 1998, Editor.
- Caterina Edwards: Essays on Her Works. Toronto: Guernica, 2000. Editor
- F.G. Paci: Essays on His Works. Toronto: Guernica, 2003. Editor.
- Mary di Michele: Essays on Her Works. Toronto: Guernica, 2007. Editor and contributor.
- Pier Giorgio DiCicco: Essays on His Works. Toronto: Guernica, 2011. Editor and contributor.
- Special Editions of Journals edited by Joseph Pivato
- Canadian Literature 106, “Italian-Canadian Connections” (1985), Co-editor.
- Canadian Ethnic Studies 28,3 (1996) “Literary Theory and Ethnic Minority Writing.”
- The Toronto Review of Contemporary Writing Abroad 16,3 (1998) “Italian-Canadian Issue.”
Contributions to books (selected list)
- Reflections on Culture, eds Licia Canton, Venera Fazio, Jim Zucchero. Toronto: Frank Iacobucci Centre for Italian Canadian Studies, 2010.
- Investigating Canadian Identities, ed. Anna Pia De Luca. Udine: Forum, 2010.
- Writing Beyond History, eds. Licia Canton, Delia De Santis, Venera Fazio. Montreal: Cusmano, 2006.
- Literary Pluralities, ed. Christl Verduyn. Peterborough: Broadview Press, 1998.
- Floating the Borders: New Contexts in Canadian Criticism, ed. Nurjehan Aziz. Toronto: TSAR, 1999.
- Shaping History: L’Identita Italo-Canadese nel Canada Anglofono, eds Anna Pia De Luca & Alessanda Ferraro. Udine: Forum, 2005.
- The Dynamics of Cultural Exchange, ed. Licia Canton. Montreal: Cusmano, 2002.
- Social Pluralism and Literary History, ed. Francesco Loriggio. Toronto: Guernica, 1996.