Michael Farina

Michael Farina is a Senior Lector I of Italian and a member of the Yale Faculty Senate. His studies focus on Italian Language Pedagogy, AI-Pedagogy, Translation, Italian Medieval & Renaissance Literature, and the History of Italian Cooking.

Before coming to Yale in 2005, Michael taught for the University of Connecticut, where he founded the Outreach Program to High School Students of Italian. At Duke University he founded their Italian Language Program at ICCS in Rome, and at Trinity College, he served as Residential Dean and Professor of Italian. In addition to teaching here, Michael has served on the Executive Council of the National Italian American Foundation, the Executive Council of The UNICO Foundation, and the Board of Trustees at Pomfret School. He also serves in political office locally, has run the political campaigns for 3 members of Italian parliament, and has been a Senior Advisor to New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker since 2013.

He is the former Director of Yale’s Italian Program in Siena.

Michael has published many reviews, articles, and translations, including “Selections from Caproni, Ungaretti, & Montale” (2010), “Tasso’s Fifty Conclusions about Love: An Introduction” (2004), “Tasso’s Cinquanta conclusioni amorose: Text and Translation” (2004), “Regarding the Interludes and Epilogue of Tasso’s Aminta” (2003), and “Tasso’s Amor fuggetivo” (2003). A selection of his conference presentations have been given on “Internet Reading and Communicative Language Teaching” (2003), “Tasso & Love, Or Prison and the Slow Dissipation of Poetic Vitality” (2004), “The Use of Facebook in Second Language Acquisition” (2007), “Innovations in Intermediate Italian” (2007), “The Italian Antecedents to Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet” (2010), “L1 Student-created Videos” (2023), “Project-Based Instruction in Elementary Italian” (2023), “ChatGPT and the Future of Higher Education” (2023), “The Primacy of Vocabulary Assessment” (2024), “AI and the Future of Language Learning” (2024), “Babel Rebooted: AI, Universal Translation, and the Avatar Age of Language Learning” (2024) and “Custom OER Language TutorBots” (2025). Michael has taught for the Yale Faculty Academy (“Teaching and Learning with ChatGPT,” Scholars as Learners program) and courses for all levels of Italian language; Italian Translation; Baroque Opera; Dante’s Divine Comedy; Renaissance Literature; the Poetry of Michelangelo; as well as Greek Civilization, Roman Civilization, and Classical Mythology.

His B.A. is in both Philosophy and Italian from the University of Connecticut, as is his M.A. in Italian Language & Literature.