Joseph Buttigieg

Joseph Buttigieg
Born	Joseph Anthony Buttiġieġ II (1947-05-20)May 20, 1947 Ħamrun, Crown Colony of Malta
Died	January 27, 2019(2019-01-27) (aged 71) South Bend, Indiana, U.S.
Occupation(s)	Scholar, academic, translator
Spouses	Jennifer Montgomery ​ (m. 1980)​
Children	Pete Buttigieg
Academic background
Education	University of Malta (BA, MA) Heythrop College, University of London (BPhil) Binghamton University (PhD)
Thesis	Contexts for A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1976)
Doctoral advisor	Zack Bowen William B. Stein Robert Kroetsch
Academic work
Discipline	English
Institutions	New Mexico State University University of Notre Dame

Joseph Anthony Buttigieg II[1][2] (/ˈbuːtɪdʒədʒ/ BOO-tij-əj;[a] Maltese: Buttiġieġ [bʊtːɪˈd͡ʒɪːt͡ʃ] ^ⓘ; May 20, 1947 – January 27, 2019)[5] was a Maltese-American Marxist[6] literary scholar and translator.[7] He served as William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of English at the University of Notre Dame until his retirement in 2017, when he was named professor emeritus. Buttigieg co-translated and co-edited the three-volume English edition of Antonio Gramsci's Prison Notebooks.

Early life and education

Buttigieg was the eldest of eight children born to Joseph Anthony and Maria Concetta Buttigieg (née Portelli) in Ħamrun, Malta.[5] He began his education in Ħamrun, completing undergraduate work and a master's degree at the University of Malta.[8] He earned a second bachelor's degree, a B.Phil., from Heythrop College of the University of London and a Ph.D. in English (1976; with a dissertation on aesthetics in James Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man) from Binghamton University.[5][8] He was naturalized as a U.S. citizen in 1979.[5]

Career and personal life

Buttigieg taught at New Mexico State University at Las Cruces starting in 1976 and there met Jennifer Anne Montgomery, also a new faculty member.[5] In 1980, they married and also joined the faculty of Notre Dame.[5][9]

Their son, Pete Buttigieg, was elected as mayor of South Bend, Indiana in 2011, ran for the Democratic nomination as presidential candidate in the 2020 election, and became the Secretary of Transportation under the Biden administration. Pete said in his first book, Shortest Way Home, that his father was called racial slurs, even though he was European, because of his darker skin.[10]

Buttigieg specialized in modern European literature and theory.[11] He was translator and editor of the three-volume English edition of Marxist philosopher and politician Antonio Gramsci's Prison Notebooks, published from 1992 to 2007 with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities.[12] He was a founding member and president of the International Gramsci Society, founded to facilitate communication among those who study Gramsci.[13] Buttigieg also served as chair of the English Department at Notre Dame and was promoted to William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of English.[8] He took emeritus status upon retiring in 2017.[8] He died on January 27, 2019.[14]

Bibliography

• Criticism Without Boundaries: Directions and Crosscurrents in Postmodern Critical Theory (University of Notre Dame Press, 1987).[15][16]
• A Portrait of the Artist in Different Perspective (Ohio University Press, 1987).[17]
• ed. with Carmel Borg and Peter Mayo, Gramsci and Education (Rowman & Littlefield, 2002).[18]
• ed. with Thomas Kselman, European Christian Democracy: Historical Legacies and Comparative Perspectives (University of Notre Dame Press, 2003).[19]
• ed. and trans. Prison Notebooks (vols. 1–3) by Antonio Gramsci (Columbia University Press, 1992–2007).[12][20]

Notes

1. Sometimes pronounced with a strong vowel as /-ɛdʒ/ -⁠ej, as reflected in his son Pete Buttigieg's Twitter re-spelling of "boot-edge-edge", or possibly /-ɪdʒ/ -⁠ij to approximate Maltese.[3][4]

References

1. Luperini, Romano (1997). "Otto Tesi Sull'attualità di Gramsci". Belfagor. 52 (6): 715–720. JSTOR 26147966.
2. "El Paso Times from El Paso, Texas on February 10, 1980". Newspapers.com. February 10, 1980. 435883803. Archived from the original on June 24, 2019. Retrieved September 20, 2019.
3. Stracqualursi, Veronica (January 23, 2019). "How to pronounce Pete Buttigieg". CNN Politics. Retrieved January 15, 2020.
4. Aggeler, Madeleine (March 25, 2019). "Wait, Sorry, How Do You Pronounce Buttigieg?". The Cut. Retrieved April 26, 2019.
5. "Joseph A. Buttigieg". Obituaries. South Bend Tribune. South Bend, Indiana. Archived from the original on February 13, 2019. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
6. MacGuill, Dan (Feb 10, 2020). "Was Pete Buttigieg's Father a Marxist Who Spoke Fondly of 'Communist Manifesto'?". Snopes. Snopes Media Group Inc. Retrieved August 29, 2023.
7. St. Martin, Victoria (January 27, 2019). "'It's been a good trip.' Father of Mayor Pete Buttigieg dies after illness". South Bend Tribune. South Bend, Indiana. Archived from the original on January 28, 2019. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
8. "Hesburgh-Yusko Scholars Program to seek new director to replace retiring Joseph Buttigieg". Notre Dame News (Press release). University of Notre Dame. December 15, 2016. Archived from the original on January 1, 2020. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
9. Fuller, Jaime (March 10, 2014). "The most interesting mayor you've never heard of". Washington Post. Archived from the original on March 6, 2016. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
10. "Professor reflects on son's mayoral victory". The Observer. November 10, 2011. Archived from the original on January 28, 2019. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
11. "Joseph A. Buttigieg // Department of English". english.nd.edu. University of Notre Dame. Archived from the original on April 13, 2019. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
12. Deacon, Roger (December 1, 1998). "Gramsci, Antonio. "Prison Notebooks", Volume II, edited and translated by Joseph E. Buttigieg (Book Review)". Theoria. 92: 163. Retrieved January 27, 2019.
13. "Buttigieg". University profile. Archived from the original on April 13, 2019.
14. Flake, Marie (January 27, 2019). "Mayor Pete Buttigieg mourns father's passing". ABC57. Archived from the original on January 28, 2019. Retrieved January 28, 2019.
15. Leitch, Vincent B. (1988). "Critical Genealogies: Historical Situations for Postmodern Literary Studies, and: Criticism without Boundaries: Directions and Crosscurrents in Postmodern Critical Theory (review)". MFS Modern Fiction Studies. 34 (2): 319–321. doi:10.1353/mfs.0.0707. ISSN 1080-658X. S2CID 143633192.
16. Bennett, James R. (Winter 1992). "After and beyond "new criticism"". Style. 26 (4): 678–686. JSTOR 42946012.
17. Feshbach, Sidney (Spring 1988). "Reviewed Work: A Portrait of the Artist in different perspective by Joseph A. Buttigieg". James Joyce Quarterly. 25 (3): 385–391. JSTOR 25484891.
18. Yip, Kwok Hung (September 2003). "Book reviews". International Journal of Lifelong Education. 22 (5): 542–554. doi:10.1080/0260137032000102878. S2CID 218497432.
19. Harper, William A. (January 1, 2004). "European Christian Democracy: Historical Legacies and Comparative Perspectives. Edited by Thomas Kselman and Joseph A. Buttigieg. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press, 2003. 352 pp. $40.00 cloth, $18.00 paper". Journal of Church and State. 46 (1): 143–144. doi:10.1093/jcs/46.1.143. ISSN 0021-969X.
20. Spanos, William V. (January 2006). "Cuvier's Little Bone: Joseph Buttigieg's English Edition of Antonio Gramsci's Prison Notebooks". Rethinking Marxism. 18 (1): 23–36. doi:10.1080/08935690500410593. S2CID 145511902.