Invited by <\/span>Anna Maria Di Tolla<\/span><\/a>, an associate professor of Berber languages and literature in the Berber Studies program, Becker <\/span>lectured on indigenous North African, knowns as Amazigh, art, including ceramics, jewelry and textiles, vernacular architecture, women in artistic production, Amazigh weddings and North African Black Muslim, known as Gnawa, spirit possession ceremonies, among other topics.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI talked about language and visual culture, and students talked about the intersections of visual art, performances, poetry and weddings,\u201d Becker said. \u201cIt was wonderful to meet the students and see how engaged they are. Di Tolla had established relationships with universities across northern Africa, so I had the privilege of listening to students from Morocco and Algeria present their research and advise them on their work. It reinvigorated me and influenced the North Africa HAA course that I am teaching now.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n While she was there, Becker heard bits and pieces of other BU professors\u2019 time at the Italian university, which is <\/span>famous for its language studies and is one of the only universities in Italy that teaches multiple African languages<\/span><\/p>\n Although Becker knew about the existing Universit\u00e0 degli Studi di Napoli L\u2019Orientale (<\/span>IUO<\/span><\/a>) faculty exchange opportunity, she did not know about past BU professors\u2019 work at Naples in African studies specifically.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s interesting that BU has sent professors over here and they’ve sent professors there,\u201d Becker added. \u201cI kept hearing about [this collaboration] while I was in Naples and then I would meet people and they confirmed it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The project with Fattovich yielded novel and new information about ancient Egypt\u2019s seafaring ventures on the Red Sea in the Middle Bronze Age, and led to Bard\u2019s <\/span>election to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 2010, and her Boston University Lecture in 2011, both of which furthered Bard\u2019s archeological career.<\/span><\/p>\n Jim McCann, professor emeritus of history, also collaborated with colleagues at IUO to research his speciality in Ethiopian and east African history. McCann visited Napoli twice, and called BU\u2019s connection to IUO a \u201clong-standing and productive scholarly engagement.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201c<\/span>For my work on Ethiopian history I was able to consult with l’Orientale’s superb group of Semiticist linguists who helped me translate documents on malaria and agricultural history,\u201d McCann said. \u201cMy work on modern Ethiopian agricultural history benefited from my access to l’Oriental’s wonderful collection of published journals and exchanged visits in Boston and Naples.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Becker said that, like Bard and McCann, her own research has been changed by her time in Naples. She and Di Tolla\u2019s have thoughts for collaborative ideas in the future, including a possible field school or an exchange in Morocco or Tunisia. Becker also admires Di Tolla\u2019s push to raise awareness and appreciation for North African Art, which, she said,\u00a0 is not usually displayed in Italian museums.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cTogether we hope to design an exhibition of North African art in Italy \u2014 it’s exciting that we have these ideas for future projects,\u201d Becker said. \u201cI made a good friend with another professor to collaborate with in the future. It will be great to learn from each other.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Becker will teach the upcoming course, Kongo to Cuba: Art, Exchange, and Self-determination in Africa and Latin America (AH114) with Ana Maria Reyes, associate professor of Latin American art & architecture. <\/span><\/i>This course is an introduction to the arts of a wide variety of cultures and time periods in Africa and Latin America. It aims to explore the rich diversity of each continent\u2019s artistic production and highlight the impact on art of their intertwined\u00a0 histories.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" While teaching at the University of Naples, Cynthia Becker found an unexpected connection to BU.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21329,"featured_media":70327,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[195],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70324"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21329"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70324"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70324\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70347,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70324\/revisions\/70347"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70327"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/cas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"\/cas\/files\/2023\/04\/thumbnail_me_instagram-e1590083478215-600x600-1-150x150.jpg\")
Becker, a professor of African art, traveled to Italy last fall to teach North African art history, her speciality, to graduate students at the University of Naples, l’Orientale or the Istituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli (IUO), which specializes in the study of non-European languages and culture.<\/span><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"\/cas\/files\/2023\/04\/becker-at-IUO-620x1024.png\")
She learned that <\/span>Kathryn Bard<\/span><\/a>, professor emerita of archaeology and classical studies at CAS, was involved in the IUO exchange to study the origins of societies in northeastern Africa. Bard collaborated with <\/span>Rodolfo Fattovich<\/span><\/a> of the Istituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli for 25 years on multiple projects: the two directed excavations together in Aksum, Ethiopia and Mersa\/Wadi Gawasis, Egypt, and regularly visited each others\u2019 universities to work with colleagues.<\/span><\/p>\n