Believing in languages: twelve years of Giovanni Gobber’s deanship at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore

What does it mean for a university to believe in languages? For Giovanni Gobber, the answer took shape in a faculty where learning a language means, above all, opening oneself to understanding the other. With the end of his mandate, after twelve years as Dean of the Faculty of Linguistic Sciences and Foreign Literatures at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan, a long journey comes to a close, one that has widened the space the University grants to languages and cultures.

Gobber’s own academic path began at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, where he studied under Eddo Rigotti before becoming a full professor of Glottology and Linguistics. After a long scholarly career spanning decades of research on language and communication, one of his books has reached the Arabic-speaking public directly: Lingue, culture ed esperienza (Vita e Pensiero), which was originally published in Italian, was later published in Arabic in 2022 by Almutawassit.

During his deanship, the Arabic language and culture found steady support. The Research Centre for Arabic Language (CARA in Italian) was able to consolidate the scientific study of Arabic, from its phonetic and morphosyntactic dimensions to the pragmatic one, and to experiment with methodologies for teaching Modern Standard Arabic, with a direct impact on teaching and on the tools available to students.

Research was joined by the International Festival of Arabic Language and Culture, which over nine editions brought together scholars and writers, artists and intellectuals from Italy, Europe and the Arab world, setting conferences and readings in dialogue with music, cinema and, finally, poetry. The Arabic Cultural Institute (ACI) of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore belongs to this trajectory: founded in 2024 in collaboration with the Sharjah Book Authority, it is a permanent space where research and education meet public outreach.

The baton now passes to Professor Federica Missaglia, elected Dean for the 2026-2030 term. The Institute is deeply grateful to Giovanni Gobber for having supported, with trust and foresight, a path that has made the Arabic language a living presence in the university community. It is a legacy destined to continue and to find new occasions for encounter.