Elena Sottilotta

Dr. Elena Sottilotta is a Research Fellow at Murray Edwards College, University of Cambridge, with expertise in women’s and gender studies, folklore and fairy-tale studies, children’s literature, and intermedia studies. Affiliated with the Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics, she has held visiting roles at Brown University and Harvard University, and serves on the Scientific Committee of the European Fairy Tale Route.

• Research Focus: Non-canonical voices in European folk and fairy-tale traditions, contemporary media adaptations, Italian-Irish literary crossings, and Mediterranean island studies.
• Teaching: Supervises Italian language and literature courses (IT1, IT5), postgraduate research, and long essays, with a focus on creative pedagogy and storytelling.
• Awards: British Academy/Leverhulme Small Research Grant, Fulbright scholarship, Erasmus Mundus scholarship, and others.
• Public Engagement: Co-organizer of Cambridge Research Network for Fairy-Tale Studies, Fairy-Tale Trouble conference, and outreach programs on diversity and social justice.

Her 2025 monograph Seekers of Wonder (Princeton University Press) examines women’s roles in 19th-century Italian and Irish folk-tale collection, while her articles span topics from neo-Victorian media to gender subversion in Italian cinema. She actively participates in international lectures, conference organization, and interdisciplinary collaborations.