The four quarterly numbers of Italian Studies that will be published in 2020 mark the seventy-fifth issue of the journal. To mark the occasion, the Senior Editors decided to commission a set of collaboratively produced articles for a Special Issue dedicated to ‘Key Directions in Italian Studies’. For Volume 75 of the journal, the moment seemed right to invite colleagues to join us for an examination of areas of research that we view as representative of the state of the art in 2020 of Italian Studies as a discipline, and key to its future development. We sought to identify several broad thematic areas that are currently particularly productive across the arc of research fields and methods that the journal addresses, seeking to open dialogues between our contributors and our readers that could produce a long view and broad spread of discussion relating to the selected research areas. An important consideration was to identify topics that were not confined by traditional chronological divides but could put researchers in the early period into contact with researchers in the modern period, for the purposes of producing collaboratively written articles addressing their shared areas of expertise, and offering fruitful reflections for readers active in the many and diverse fields that make up contemporary Italian Studies as a discipline or set of disciplinary and methodological concerns. Each of the articles in this Special Issue is the result of collaborative dialogue between two or three scholars, who were invited to shape their response to the argument proposed in the way that seemed most fruitful to the writing team. They were asked to reflect, of course, on what they felt to be the particular contribution made by Italian Studies to the specified area. We also invited them to review their topics both as evolving from a tradition of scholarly work, long-standing or more recent in nature, and as offering scope for important future developments. Thus, the selected topics have already contributed to varying degrees to a reshaping or reorienting of Italian Studies as a discipline, and to the way that different methodologies or theoretical frameworks are seen as pertinent to Italian Studies research as it is currently developing. Co-writing holds a special significance: it is in itself a mode of academic writing that has moved from the margins to the mainstream of research in our journal which, over the past few years, has seen an increasing number of co-written articles and collaborations (in the shape of clusters of short essays, roundtable discussions, and mini-Special Issues); such developments reflect new modes of engagement between scholars and a desire to stretch disciplinary expertise. The identification of topics for our Special Issue was inevitably challenging, and readers will no doubt be surprised by both the exclusions and the inclusions in the chosen titles and article contents. Beginning with a large set of possible themes in our initial discussions about the Special Issue, we attempted to identify categories that would permit a range of methods, theories, and concerns to be articulated. Some themes were identified on the basis of their long-standing and continuing prominence within almost all departments and centres concerned with Italian Studies; other titles were formulated so as to let our contributors accommodate more established approaches or areas of scholarship alongside newly emerging ones within a broadly conceived remit. Several of our themes have provided opportunities for reflection on the way that scholarly practice is evolving

中文翻译：

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意大利研究的主要方向

将于2020年出版的《意大利研究》每季度出版四期，这是该期刊的第七十五期。为了纪念这一场合，高级编辑决定委托合作出版一系列文章，专门讨论“意大利研究的关键方向”。对于该期刊的第75卷而言，现在正是时候邀请同事加入我们，研究我们认为这是2020年意大利研究领域最新技术的一门学科，并且是其未来发展的关键。我们试图确定几个广泛的主题领域，这些领域目前在该期刊所涉及的研究领域和方法的各个方面尤其富有成效，寻求在我们的撰稿人和读者之间进行公开对话，以期产生与选定研究领域有关的长远看法和广泛讨论。一个重要的考虑是确定不受传统时间顺序限制的主题，但可以使早期的研究人员与现代的研究人员接触，以产生针对他们共同的专业知识领域的合作书面文章，并提供富有成果的成果。对于活跃在构成当代意大利研究的众多领域的读者的反思，是一门学科或一门学科和方法论问题。本期特刊中的每篇文章都是两三个学者之间进行协作对话的结果，他们被邀请以对写作团队似乎最富有成果的方式来回应他们提出的论点。当然，要求他们反思他们认为意大利研究在特定领域做出的特殊贡献。我们还邀请他们回顾他们的主题，这些主题既是从学术工作的传统演变而来的，它既具有悠久的历史也具有近代性，并为未来的重要发展提供了空间。因此，选定的主题已经在不同程度上促进了意大利研究作为一门学科的重塑或重新定位，并为不同的方法论或理论框架被视为与当前正在发展的意大利研究相关的方式做出了贡献。共同写作具有特殊的意义：它本身就是一种学术写作模式，已经从边缘发展到了我们期刊的主流研究。在过去的几年中，这种形式越来越多的共同撰写的文章和合作（以集群形式出现）短文，圆桌讨论和迷你特刊）；这种发展反映了学者之间互动的新模式以及对学科专业知识的延伸。确定本期特刊的主题不可避免地具有挑战性，并且毫无疑问，读者对所选标题和文章内容中的排除和包含都会感到惊讶。在有关“特刊”的最初讨论中，从一系列可能的主题开始，我们试图确定可以阐明各种方法，理论和关注点的类别。在几乎所有与意大利研究有关的部门和中心内，由于长期存在和持续突出的特点，确定了一些主题；还制定了其他名称，以使我们的撰稿人能够在一个广泛设想的职权范围内，与新兴的方法或奖学金领域相适应。我们的几个主题为反思学术实践的发展方式提供了机会