Nitya Chagti

HST 369 The World at War
HST 112 Napoleon to the Present
HST 210 The Ancient World
HST 211 Medieval and Renaissance Europe
COM 300 Democracy, Journalism & Citizenship

Nitya Chagti is a Ph.D. candidate in the History Department at Syracuse University with demonstrated experience in working as a peer educator, translator and researcher, and international outreach consultant. Currently, Chagti heads the Writing Lab for the Maxwell-in-D.C. program and is a graduate teaching assistant for Margaret Talev, Kramer Director at the Institute for Democracy, Journalism and Citizenship (IDJC), a joint endeavor of the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications in D.C.

In the past, Chagti served as a teaching assistant in the History Department from 2021 to 2023, as a writing tutor in the History Department's writing lab from 2022 to 2023, and as a freelance researcher at the Syracuse University's Special Collection Research Center (SCRC) for independent scholars, researchers and professors from 2022 to 2023.

Chagti's dissertation, entitled "Padua and the Politics of History: Tyranny, Empire, and Neoclassicism, ca. 1270-1318," explores Padua's remarkable intellectual and cultural dynamism as evidence of the burgeoning strains of neoclassicism in the commune during the Late Duecento and early Trecento. Her project focuses on the intellectual milieu of Padua and its connections to the Byzantine world to highlight a story of global interconnectedness and broadens the foundations of neoclassicism to the Eastern Mediterranean world. She is aided by her formal training in Ancient Greek and Classical Latin, Italian literature and paleography. Chagti's archival work was recognized by the History Department in October 2022 when she was awarded the Nelson Blake Research Award on the basis of promising graduate research.

Chagti graduated summa cum laude from Juniata College in 2019, where she received a bachelor of arts in the history of ideas—an interdisciplinary major comprising history, international studies and philosophy—with a minor concentration in art history. Bolstered by her background in eight languages, Chagti pursued a Ph.D. in classical studies at Boston University in 2019 before transferring to the History Department at Syracuse University in 2020.

In 2017, Chagti has served as an international outreach coordinator at the Moravian Gallery in Brno, Czechia, wherein she devised and completed an independent project focused on translating the gallery's entire permanent collection's public-facing information from Czech to English. Chagti has also worked in the Documentation Centre at the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), where she identified and recorded forgotten historical sites and locations in New Delhi, India.

Conferences

International Medieval Conference, Leeds, UK 2024: "Remembering the Tyrants: Albertino Mussato's Ecerinis in Trecento Padua"

120th Annual PAMLA Conference, Pacific Ancient and Modern Languages Association, Portland, OR, 2023

2nd Annual Boston College Conference: Graduate Student Voices, Boston College, Boston, MA, 2023: "Recentering the Renaissance: Albertino Mussato's Ecerinis in Trecento Padua"

14th Annual History Department Future Professoriate Program Conference: Silences and Politics of Representation, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY, 2023: "Contextualizing Albertino Mussato's Ecerinis: The Birth of the Paduan Renaissance"

13th Annual Syracuse University History Department Future Professoriate Program Conference: Disruption and Rupture, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY, 2022: "Ecerinis: Literary Evidence of Political Upheaval in Trecento Padua and the Birth of the Pre-Renaissance"

Events

Organizer, "Archival Research Across the Globe," Future Professoriate Program, History Department, Syracuse University, 2022.

Organizer, "Academic CV Writing Workshop," Future Professoriate Program, History Department, Syracuse University, 2022.

Organizer, "Digital Tools for Humanists and Research in Special Collections," Future Professoriate Program, History Department, Syracuse University, 2023.

Organizer, 14th Annual History Department Future Professoriate Program Conference: Silences and Politics of Representation, Syracuse University, 2023. 

Professional and Academic Activities

Graduate Teaching Assistant, Institute for Democracy, Journalism, and Citizenship, Syracuse University D.C. Campus

Graphic Design Consultant, Institute for Democracy, Journalism, and Citizenship, Syracuse University D.C. Campus

Writing Consultant, Maxwell in Washington, D.C. Program, Syracuse University D.C. Campus

Senior Faculty Liaison, History Graduate Student Organization, Syracuse University

Writing Tutor, History Department Writing Lab, Syracuse University

Freelance Researcher, Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University

Future Professoriate Program, History Department, Syracuse University

Early Modern Connected Histories Working Group, Syracuse University