Opportunities for students and faculty alike is what makes St. Lawrence special, says Marcella Salvi, associate professor of modern languages and literatures (Italian and Spanish). In particular, she cites the numerous options for study abroad, via 14 international study programs and the International Student Exchange Program (ISEP).

“My most rewarding experience as a teacher was as the director of SLU’s study program in Spain,” she adds. “Spending the year with a group of our students and helping them learn and watching them grow in another country (and in another language) was an indescribable experience. And, as my research interest is 17th -century Spanish and Italian theater, the time in Spain was doubly enjoyable and enriching. The time spent living there and my experience with the students abroad has helped me become a better teacher and advocate for international education here on campus.”

Seventeenth-century Spanish and Italian theater (known also as Baroque theater) is the subject of several articles Professor Salvi has published in professional journals.  It is also the topic of a book, Escenas en conflicto: el teatro español e italiano desde los márgenes del Barroco (Staging Conflicts: Spanish and Italian Theatre from the Margins of the Baroque), which was published in the fall of 2005 in the series Ibérica (Peter Lang Inc., New York). “I am now expanding my research into other areas of study, such as opera, and into a new period, the 18th century,” she says.