SPECIAL GUESTS

Allievi Stefano (University of Padua – Italy)

E-mail: stefano.allievi@unipd.it

Director of the Master Course on Islam in Europe, University of Padua. President of the master’s degree course in Sociology at the University of Padua. Professor of Sociology, University of Padua, Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Education and Applied Psychology. His main research interests, during the last 20 years, have been Islam in the West, religious pluralism, immigration, multiculturalism and related issues: Muslims in Europe, the role of media and communication, the political use of Islam and Islamophobia, the construction of reciprocal images and imaginaries, religious conversions, the establishing of religious-based networks, the production and dissemination of Islamic knowledge, mixed couples, family ties, interreligious and social dialogue, conflicts about mosques, identity formation, political and cultural pluralism, body and health representations, and many others.

Bimbi Franca (University of Padua – Italy)

E-mail: franca.bimbi@unipd.it

Full Professor of Sociology at the University of Padua. She is the Coordinator of the Department Research Unit: Hermes. Intercultural Research on Mobility, Religions, Family, Genders. She is the Director of the Editorial Series: Intersections and Asynchronies. Sociology, Social Research, Cultural Studies, Milan.

Bitbol Michel  (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique – Paris – France)

E-mail: michel.bitbol@ens.fr

Michel Bitbol is “Directeur de recherche” at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, in Paris (France). He teaches Philosophy of modern physics and Epistemology. He received, successively, his M.D. in 1980, his Ph.D. in physics in 1985, and his “habilitation” in philosophy in 1997 in Paris. He worked as a research scientist in biophysics from 1978 to 1990. From 1990 onwards, he turned to the philosophy of physics. He edited texts by Erwin Schrödinger and developed a neo-Kantian philosophy of quantum mechanics. He also studied the relations between the philosophy of physics and the philosophy of mind, working in close collaboration with Francisco Varela. He is recipient of an award from the “Académie des sciences morales et politiques.”

Capozza Dora (Universy of Padua – Padua –Italy)

E-mail: dora.capozza@unipd.it

Dora Capozza is Emeritus Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Padua. Member of many international and national scientific sociaty, she has been nominated Fellow of the American Psychological Society (APS). Her research interests cover: stereotypes, intergroup relationtionships, prejudice and many more.

Caprara Gian Vittorio (University of La Sapienza – Rome – Italy)

E-mail: gianvittorio.caprara@uniroma1.it

Professor of Psychology at the Sapienza University of Rome, where he has served as Chair of the Psychology Department, Dean of the Faculty of Psychology, and President of the Federate University of Humanities, Economics and Law.
Director of the Interuniversity Center for Research on the Origins of Prosocial and Antisocial Motivations and a member of the faculty of the School for Advanced Studies (SAS), Sapienza University of Rome.
His research has addressed issues in personality psychology, social psychology, and political psychology.

De Leo Diego (Griffith University – Australia)

E-mail: d.deleo@griffith.edu.au

Professor at the Australian Institute for Suicide Research and Prevention of the Griffith University. Professor De Leo’s research expertise includes definitional issues in suicidology, culture and suicide, international trends and national suicide prevention programs. He is former President of the International Association for Suicide Prevention and the International Academy for Suicide Research. He serves as a board member of the Australian Suicide Prevention Advisory Council and is Chair of the Advisory Committee to the Queensland Government Suicide Prevention Strategy. He is founder/co-founder of the Italian Society for PsychoOncology, the Italian Association for Suicide Prevention and the International Academy for Suicide Research.

De Misstura Staffan – Italy

Staffan de Mistura (born January 25, 1947) is a diplomat and former member of the Italian government. He was Secretary of State of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 29 November 2011 to 27 March 2013 and Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs from 27 March 2013 to 28 April 2013 under the Government Monti. Since July 2014 he serves as the director of the UN Special Envoy for Syria. On May 2014 he was appointed president of the newly formed European Institute of Peace, based in Brussels.
He has worked for 42 years in diplomacy and has taken part in 19 missions abroad, including some in war zones; in fact, in the course of his professional life, he traveled to many of the most politically unstable and problematic places of the contemporary world (Afghanistan, Iraq , Lebanon, Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan and the former Yugoslavia). He properly speaks seven languages: Italian, English, Swedish, French, German, Spanish and Arabic.

Friedman Robi (Haifa University – Israel)

E-mail: robif@netvision.net.il

Clinical Psychologist and Group psychoanalist. He founded the Israeli Institute of Group Analysis and he is its President; Past-President of the Israeli Association for Group Psychotherapy. Born in Uruguay, to German and Czech refugees, married,  three children and four grandchildren. Clinical Psychologist and Group Analyst,  President of the Group Analytic Society (International). Works in private practice and teaches at the IIGA and  Haifa University, conducts conflict dialogues with Palestinians and co-leads with Volkan and Alderdice a West/Islam dialogue called IDI (International Dialogue Initiative).

Giovannini Dino  (University of Modena and Reggio Emilia- Reggio Emilia – Italy)

E-mail: dino.giovannini@unimore.it

He began his academic career at the “Alma Mater Studiorum” University of Bologna. Full Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Trento (1994-2002) and at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (2002-2015), where in 2006 he founded the Research Centre on Interethnic Relations, Multiculturality and Immigration (http://www.rimilab.unimore.it) and where he actually teaches Community Psychology. During his career he has been Scientific Coordinator of many research programs funded both by national and local public institutions and by private companies.

His research interests within the field of Social Psychology concern intergroup relations, prejudice reduction techniques, intergroup contact, implicit attitudes, acculturation processes.

Guolo Renzo (University of Padua – Italy)

E-mail: renzo.guolo@unipd.it

Sociologo italiano. Insegna Sociologia e Sociologia delle religioni presso le Università di Trieste, Padova e Torino. Tiene corsi di Sociologia della politica e Sociologia dell’Islam presso l’Università degli Studi di Padova, dove è professore di prima fascia. Interessato ai rapporti tra religione e politica, studia i fondamentalismi contemporanei, l’Islam italiano ed europeo, la geopolitica del mondo musulmano e le contraddizioni delle società multiculturali e globalizzate.
È stato membro del comitato di direzione del Forum internazionale ed europeo di ricerche sull’immigrazione (FIERI) e dell’International Board della rivista ” Religioni e società”. Collabora con La Repubblica e con riviste quali il Mulino, Limes, Micromega, Religioni e Società. G. ha all’attivo numerose pubblicazioni, tra le ultime: L’Islam è compatibile con la democrazia (2007), Identità e paura – Gli italiani e l’immigrazione (2010), Chi impugna la croce – Lega e Chiesa (2011) e L’ultima utopia. Gli jihadisti europei (2015).

Hafez Haidar (Università degli Studi di Pavia)

E-mail: hafez.haidar@unipv.it

Hafez Haidar, nato in Libano, Accademico Emerito, Cavaliere della Repubblica Italiana, Presidente del Comitato per i Diritti Umani del Ministero degli Esteri Italiano, candidato al Premio Nobel per la Pace, Direttore Generale della Sezione Internazionale della Camerata dei Poeti di Firenze, insegnante dell’Università Degli Studi Di Pavia, esperto nelle Religioni del Libro. Presidente di giuria di innumerevoli premi Letterari e Scientifici in Italia e all’Estero, ha collaborato con il Cardinale Gianfraco Ravasi  e ha scritto numerosi articoli nella rubrica “Echi del Mediterraneo”, da lui diretta. La sua traduzione di Le mille e una notte (Oscar Mondadori, Mondolibri, Donna moderna) ha suscitato l’interesse del mondo letterario. Da anni diffonde l’arte della narrativa e della saggistica nelle scuole e nelle università italiane ed estere. Ha iniziato la sua carriera letteraria traducendo in arabo i libri di Oriana Fallaci per Mondadori. Ha pubblicato numerosi libri e bestseller per Mondadori, Rizzoli, Piemme, Mondolibri, Donna Moderna e Fabbri Editore.

Lo Verso Girolamo (University of Palermo – Palermo – Italy)

E-mail: girolamo.loverso@unipa.it

Girolamo Lo Verso is Professor of Clinical Psychology and has been the scientific coordinator for the PhD in Psychology at the University of Palermo. He teaches Relational Psychotherapy and Psychology of Mafia at the Kore University of Enna.
His work concernes with the scientific coordination of the research groups on the evaluation of psychotherapy, the mafia psyche, clinical groups, identity and culture. He is the founder of the theoretical clinical model of Subjectual Gruppoanalisi.
Author of numerous works on the subject of mafia as: La mafia dentro. Psicologia e psicopatologia di un fondamentalismo (2002); La psiche mafiosa. Storie di casi clinici e collaboratori di giustizia (2002); Come cambia la mafia. Esperienze giudiziarie e psicoterapeutiche in un paese che cambia, (1999).

Manconi Luigi (Libera università di lingue e comunicazione IULM – Milan)

E-mail: luigi.manconi@gmail.com

Born in Sassari (February 21, 1948) is a sociologist and Senator of the Italian Republic. He teaches sociology of political phenomena at the IULM of Milan. Politician, since 2013 is the head of the Extraordinary Commission for the protection and promotion of human rights. As a journalist, he has worked with most of the major Italian newspapers such as: Il Messaggero, La Repubblica, Il Corriere della Sera, La Stampa, L’Unità, Il Foglio. Of his many publications and works with the book “Italian Terrorists – The Red Brigades and the total war 1970-2008” published by Rizzoli.

He is a member of Amnesty International and the International Antiprohibitionist League. With Laura Balbo he has promoted the association “Italia-razzismo”. Moreover, he is president of “A buon diritto Onlus” and member of the Transnational Radical Party.

Pace Vincenzo (University of Padua – Italy)

E-mail: vincenzo.pace@unipd.it

Professore ordinario di Sociologia delle religioni nel corso triennale di Scienze Sociologiche e di Religioni e Società nella Laurea Magistrale in Sociologia. E’ inoltre titolare del modulo Islam and Human Rights nell’European Master on Human Rights and Democratization. E’ stato Direttore del Dipartimento di Sociologia dell’Università di Padova ed è attualmente Direttore del Centro Interdipartimentale di Studi Interculturali e delle Migrazioni (CIRSIM) e Coordina il Gruppo di ricerca LABREL (Laboratorio Religioni). E’ stato Presidente dell’International Society for the Sociology of Religion (ISSR/SISR) e Coordinatore della Sezione di Sociologia della religione dell’Associazione Italiana di Sociologia.

Schwartz Shalom – University of Jerusalem & the Higher School of Economics (Moscow)

E-mail: msshasch@mscc.huji.ac.il

Shalom H. Schwartz is a social psychologist, cross-cultural researcher and creator of the Theory of Basic Human Values. He also contributed to the formulation of the values scale in the context of social learning theory and social cognitive theory. In 2007 Schwartz was awarded the Israel Prize in psychology.  In 2014 he obtained a Distinguished Career Award of the American Sociological Association section of Altruism,Morality, and Social Solidarity. He coordinates an international project in more than 70 countries that studies the antecedents and consequences of individual differences in value priorities and the relations of cultural dimensions of values to societal characteristics and policies.

Severino Emanuele (University of San Raffaele – Milan – Italy)

Emanuele Severino (Brescia, 1929), he graduated in 1950 at the University of Pavia. From 1954 to 1970 he taught philosophy at the Catholic University of Milan. The University Ca ‘Foscari of Venice has called him and there it is one of the founders of the Faculty of Humanities. Since 2001 he has been professor of theoretical philosophy, he directed the Institute of Philosophy until 1989; he also taught Logic, History of Modern and Contemporary Philosophy and Sociology. In 2005 the Venetian universities proclaims professor emeritus. Currently he teaches at San Raffaele Hospital in Milan. It is academic of the Lincei. For several years working with the Corriere della Sera.

Solomon Sheldon (Skidmore College – Saratoga Springs – New York)

E-mail: ssolomon@skidmore.edu

Sheldon Solomon is Professor of Psychology at Skidmore College. He is best known for developing Terror Management Theory, along with Jeff Greenberg and Tom Pyszczynski which is concerned with how humans deal with their own sense of mortality. His studies of the effects of the uniquely human awareness of death on behavior have been supported by the National Science Foundation and Ernest Becker Foundation, and were featured in the award winning documentary film Flight from Death: The Quest for Immortality.  He is co-author of In the Wake of 9/11: The Psychology of Terror and The Worm at the Core: On the Role of Death in Life.  Sheldon is an American Psychological Society Fellow, and a recipient of an American Psychological Association Presidential Citation (2007), a Lifetime Career Award by the International Society for Self and Identity (2009), and the Association of Graduate Liberal Studies Programs Annual Faculty Award (2011).

Ines Testoni

Ines Testoni is Psychologist and psychodramatist Psychotherapist. She is Associate Professor of Social Psychology at the Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Pedagogy and Applied Psychology (FISSPA) of the University of Padua. She is Coordinator of the High Formation Course “For contrast to the Social Mafia”. She is also Scientific Director of the Conferences organized by Endlife.it (www.endlife.psy.unipd.it). She is author of many national and international publications and she is member of national and international Scientific Associations.. She leaded the European Project “Empower”, Daphne programme, besides another European Project for Grunddtvig empowerment. She contributed to many national and international research projects.

Her main fields of research are psychology of loss, death and mourning; social psychology of the sociatry phenomena and their management through psychodramatic practices; psychology of gender differences, with a focus on gender based violence

Voci Alberto

Alberto Voci is PhD in Social Psychology and Personality Science. He is currently Professor of Social Psychology at the Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Pedagogy and Applied Psychology (FISSPA) of the University of Padua. He holds the courses of Group Psychology and Prejudice Reduction Strategies. He spent periods abroad at the School of Psychology of the University of Wales (Cardiff), the Department of Experimental Psychology at the Oxford University and the Department of Psychology at Ohio State University (USA). He is member of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, of the European Association of Social Psychology and of the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues. He is member of the editorial board of the European Review of Social Psychology, Social Psychology Quarterly and of Psicologia Sociale. He is Direction Advisor of TPM – Testing, Psychometrics, Methodology in Applied Psychology.

His main fields of research are prejudice reduction through intergroup contact; perspective taking and empathy; relationship between religiosity and prejudice, relationship between awareness, altruism and well-being.

Zamperini Adriano

Adriano Zamperini is Psychologist and Psychotherapist. He is currently Associate Confirmed Professor of Social Psychology at the Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Pedagogy and Applied Psychology (FISSPA) of the University of Padua. He holds various positions within the University, including: Vice – President of the second-cycle degree course in Social, Work and Communication Psychology; Scientific Coordinator of FRAME courses (Training and Advanced Methods of Data Processing), Scientific Coordinator of the Department of Psychology Library “Fabio Metelli” and President of the Library Centre Committee for the Psychology Department, member of the Teaching Body of the PhD School in Social Sciences : Interactions, Communication and Cultural Construction at the University of Padua. He is co-founder and President of the Italian Society of Psychosocial Sciences for Peace (SISPa – www.sispa.it). He is serving as a referee research reviewer for numerous national and international scientific journals.

His main fields of research are Social Psychology of Interpersonal Relationship; Social Psychology of Health; Social Psychology of Interethnic Relationship and of Migration Processes; Social Psychology of Violence and Peace.