Dr Camilla Russell

Camilla Russell joined Newcastle University in 2009. She completed her undergraduate studies and an MA in History at the University of Melbourne, before going on to her PhD in History at Royal Holloway, University of London, awarded in 2003. Camilla has taught at Monash University, Melbourne, Queen Mary, University of London, and the University of Newcastle in the North of England. In 2008 she was appointed Hanna Kiel Fellow at Villa I Tatti, the Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies in Florence.

Between 2012 and 2013, she held the positions of Visiting Scholar at ‘Sapienza’ University of Rome (Department of History, Cultures and Languages) and at ‘Roma Tre’ University (Department of History, Geography and Anthropology). Camilla Russell is the author of Giulia Gonzaga and the Religious Controversies of Sixteenth-Century Italy (Brepols, 2006), as well as a number of articles on the religious and cultural history of early modern Italy. Her current research includes European responses to the overseas missionary enterprise in the early modern period, and the development of a "collective biography" of Italian Jesuits, 1540-1640.

All of her work is underpinned by archival research, and by an abiding interest in the cultural history of religion and of religious life for women and for men; the history of information, of self-narrative documents, and epistolary exchange in Europe and beyond. Her teaching interests range from Late Medieval, to Renaissance and Early Modern Europe, especially the religious and cultural history of Europe, and Europe in the wider world.

Research Expertise
Camilla Russell is the author of Giulia Gonzaga and the Religious Controversies of Sixteenth-Century Italy (Brepols, 2006). Her monograph is to be re-issued in Italian translation in 2015 (Giulia Gonzaga e le controversie religiose dell'Italia del XVI secolo, trans. F. Minonzio, Polyhistor). She is the author of a number of articles on the religious and cultural history of early modern Italy, especially heterodox reforming currents at the time of Europe's Reformations.

Her current research is in the field of Jesuit Studies, with several published and forthcoming articles about the Jesuit overseas missions, and a forthcoming monograph on the first century of Italian Jesuits (1540-1640), recounted substantially in the Jesuits' own words through "ego-document" self-narratives that were produced throughout the Jesuit career.

Teaching Expertise
Areas of supervision cover any aspect of late-medieval and early-modern European history, especially cultural and religious history, globalizing Europe, gender, and the history of communication. Dr Russell currently supervises 3 Doctoral students, and has been responsible for 6 Honours supervisions, 2 of which won Faculty Medals (one subsequently was awarded an International Scholarship for an MA in European History at Warwick University, UK, another was awarded an Australian Postgraduate Award for doctoral studies at Newcastle).

Administrative Expertise
Camilla Russell was a member of the Board of the Faculty of Education and Arts between 2010 and 2013.