SUBJECT:

Passing of Professor Emeritus and former Chair of History John Marino

It is with deep sadness that we inform you of the passing of John Marino, beloved colleague, researcher and educator at UC San Diego. John died peacefully on Wednesday, December 3, in San Diego. He was 68.

John was an emeritus professor of history effective July 1, 2014 and former chair of the department from 2006 to 2010. He was educated at the University of Chicago, where he earned the BA, MA, and PhD degrees, and he was the embodiment of that institution's powerful commitment to humanities teaching and scholarship. John completed the PhD at Chicago in 1977 after receiving a Fulbright Fellowship in Naples, Italy in 1974, a Visiting Assistant Professorship at Florida International University in 1976, and a Fondazione Einaudi Fellowship in Rome, Italy in 1977. John began his professorial career at UC San Diego's Department of History as an Assistant Professor in 1979.

John was an internationally respected scholar of early modern European history, Renaissance and Reformation Europe, the early modern Mediterranean world, Spanish Italy, the city and kingdom of Naples, and the Italian Mezzogiorno. Over the course of a distinguished career, John authored two important and widely acclaimed monographs on Neapolitan economic life and culture in what he termed the "long sixteenth century." He edited or co-edited an additional eight anthologies, journal volumes, and translations, and authored more than 40 scholarly articles on the economic, political, cultural, and religious history of southern Italy and the Mediterranean world in the early modern era.

A passionate teacher, a strong advocate of UC San Diego's college system, and a fierce defender of the role of the humanities in the modern university, John taught generations of undergraduate and graduate students in European history and the Humanities and was a teaching mainstay in the Revelle Humanities program, Sixth College's Culture/Art/Technology curriculum, and the Education Abroad Program in Rome. In addition to serving as chair of the History Department, John was also indefatigable in his service to the larger campus community, serving terms on Senate Council, the Committee on Academic Personnel, the Sixth College Faculty Advisory Committee, Revelle College's Humanities Advisory Committee, director of European Studies, and as co-director of Thurgood Marshall College's Dimensions of Culture Program.

John's wife, Cynthia Truant, a professor emerita of history, survives him. They met while attending the University of Chicago history PhD program. He is also survived by their children, Sara and Marc. The family is planning a memorial service for friends and colleagues on the campus that will be announced in the coming weeks.

Cristina Della Coletta Dean, Division of Arts & Humanities David G. Gutierrez Professor & Chair, Department of History