My work combines food studies research, global education, and administrative leadership. For more details, see my LinkedIn and Academia.edu profiles. I currently teach classes with the Global Studies program at UCLA’s International Institute and the Rothman Family Institute for Food Studies. Previously, I served as the Graduate Program Director at Columbia University’s Committee on Global Thought, where I taught and advised for the Master of Arts degree, leading a team of colleagues across campus to create an interdisciplinary education for a diverse group of young professionals.

My career as an international researcher and educator started as a student in Bologna, Italy in 2008. Since then, I have worked as a curriculum designer with Global Nomads Group in New York, a program leader with the Experiment in International Living, and a program designer and instructor for University of California’s Education Abroad Programs in Italy and the Mediterranean. My courses and the programs I design focus on connecting theory to practice, questioning assumptions, and developing robust toolkits and global perspectives.

My research and first book project examine the creation of some of Italy’s most famous wines in the UNESCO heritage zones of Piedmont, highlighting the roles of settled and seasonal immigrant labor in reproducing prized viticultural landscapes, and keeping traditional forms of working the land in practice. By exploring the co-dependent relations between native Italians, Balkan employees, and the vineyards they care for, I show how immigrants are often the custodians of Italian material heritage and traditions, and likely the protagonists of these crafts’ futures. My next project examines how winegrowing communities in Italy and California are adapting to the pressures and challenges of climate change as part of an increasingly global conversation among farmers and producers.

From 2010 to 2019, I managed two peer-reviewed research journals, both dedicated to promoting the work of emerging scholars and reaching audiences beyond the academy. Environment and Society: Advances in Research (Berghahn) publishes literature reviews of breaking social science on the pressing environmental issues of our times. Gastronomica: The Journal of Critical Food Studies (University of California Press) features work from across the humanities and social sciences on the myriad of human relationships with food, agriculture, and gastronomy.