Vetri Nathan

Professor Vetri Nathan is an Associate Professor in the Department of European Languages and Transcultural Studies (ELTS) at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He founded and directs the Multispecies Futures Lab, previously known as the Cybercene Lab, which explores the intersections of environmental and digital humanities through multispecies kinship and ecocultural sustainability. His scholarly work spans Italy, the Mediterranean, and global contexts, focusing on migration, cinema, and food studies.

• Education:
  • Ph.D., Italian Studies, Stanford University (2009)
  • M.A., Italian Studies, Stanford University
  • B.A., Connecticut College

Professor Nathan’s research investigates cultural foundations of environmental wellbeing, multispecies solidarity, and hybrid cultural identities, particularly in Italy and the Mediterranean. His lab projects analyze the digital revolution’s impact on ecological systems, Indigenous knowledge, and biopolitical conflicts.

His publications include Marvelous Bodies: Italy’s New Migrant Cinema (2017) and recent articles on topics like Somali culinary identity (2023), Mediterranean ecocultural hybridity (2011), and affect theory in Italian cinema (2010). Future work includes the monograph The Cybercene: Multispecies Healing and Habitability in a Transformed World, which defines a new ecocultural sub-era of the Anthropocene.

Scientific awards:

• Outstanding Faculty Annual Award, UPCEA (2013)

He collaborates with institutions like Montclair State University and advisory scholars from Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and Rutgers University. The lab trains graduate and undergraduate research assistants in multispecies thick mapping and interdisciplinary methodologies.