Karla Mallette
Karla Mallette is professor of Italian and Mediterranean Studies and chair of the Department of Middle East Studies at the University of Michigan. She is the author of The Kingdom of Sicily, 1100-1250: A Literary History (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005), European Modernity and the Arab Mediterranean (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010), and Lives of the Great Languages: Arabic and Latin in the Medieval Mediterranean (University of Chicago Press, 2021).
Written by Karla Mallette
Communication and language
idea
The allure of cosmopolitan languages to courtiers and pop fans
The song Despacito tells a truth about cosmopolitan language, or the ‘mistress tongue’ – we desire it before we know it
by Karla Mallette
History of ideas
idea
How 12th-century Genoese merchants invented the idea of risk
From the docks of 12th-century Genoa to the gambling tables of today, risk is a story that we tell ourselves about the future
by Karla Mallette