Silvia Ruzzi holds a PhD in Cultural Studies and History from Humboldt University, Berlin.

She currently lives in Berlin and works as a translator and reviewer for academic journals. Her passion for writing and reading, where possible in the original language, continues, and she is working on new writings on space and its representation in literature.

She is passionate about languages and literature. Her journey in literary studies began with a three-year degree in Latin American and North American Studies at Ca' Foscari. Interested in the world of the Americas, she graduated in 2008 with a thesis on comparative literature, with a study between the work of María Luisa Bombal and William Faulkner. The journey continued with a master's degree in Latin American Studies at the University of Salamanca. Here, too, the comparative interest between the Americas was the leitmotif of her master's thesis: Mexico-U.S. Border Literature, from which the essay "Al otro lado de Heriperto Yépez: Percepciones desde y sobre la frontera México-Estados Unidos" (2014) was published.

With interest and civic engagement, she began to analyze the topic of borders, migration routes, and migrant rights in more depth. At the end of her second master's degree at the Free University of Berlin in North American Studies (2015), she submitted a comparative literature thesis on the Mexico-U.S. border, which led her to investigate the political and sociological discourse of borders in detail, mainly from the perspective of Chicana and U.S. border literature. Her academic interest and commitment to the dissemination of ideas about borders have led her to present her findings at numerous conferences in Spain, Italy, Germany, and beyond.

The academic journey culminated in a dissertation on the Mediterranean as a border in migration literature published from 2005 to the present. The analysis focused primarily on the symbolism of the sea as a bordering barrier for migrants attempting to cross from North Africa to European shores. It was not only a literary thesis, but also a political one, highlighting how the use of the fluidity of the sea and its sea nomos is used to block migrants during the crossing through inhuman actions that violate their rights. The analysis throughout her dissertation emphasized the intimate connections between the geopolitical implications of border imaginaries and aesthetic practice.

Many articles and essays have been published in this regard, including "Necropolitics at sea: a reading from Mediterranean border fiction" (2023), "Crimes at the Maritime Border: Miguel Pajares's Aguas de venganza [Waters of Revenge]" (2023), "The Mediterranean Sea as b/order space in African Titanics: a geo-literary analysis" (2022), "B/ordering the Mediterranean Sea, aesthetics and geopolitics" (2020), "Speculations on the Mediterranean borderscape: Le Baiser de Lampedusa" (2019), and finally the book of her dissertation, "The Mediterranean Sea as border space: a geo-literary analysis."

Her keen interest in the intricate relationship between geopolitics, spatial order, and aesthetics has continued unabated following her doctorate. This ongoing fascination is exemplified by her recent contribution of a compelling chapter to the forthcoming book, "Hospitality at the Mediterranean Border: Giulio Cavalli's Carnaio [Carnage]." In this chapter, Silvia critically engages with the complex and often paradoxical theme of hospitality versus 'hostipitality' extended to migrants upon their fraught arrival after traversing the treacherous Mediterranean Sea, exposing the ethical dilemmas embedded in contemporary migration policies.

Currently, Silvia applies her profound insights into migration and societal dynamics in a vital role at the Bundesamt für Migration und Flüchtlinge (BAMF—Federal Office for Migration and Refugees) in Berlin, where she serves within the Department of Integration. This position allows her to directly engage with and contribute to practical policies and initiatives that address the complex realities of integration in Germany. In addition to her professional duties, her continued engagement as a reviewer and contributor to academic journals sees her writing extensively on a diverse array of subjects that resonate with her expertise, including politics, migration, culture, cinema, and music. These varied contributions underscore her multifaceted analytical lens and her ability to connect seemingly disparate fields through a shared understanding of human experience and societal structures.

For Silvia Ruzzi, the profound importance of literature in the analysis of society and culture is a fundamental conviction. She firmly believes that literary productions are not merely artistic expressions but powerful vehicles that can rethink critical issues driving global politics, continue the essential search for new ways of conceptualizing space, and courageously explore ever-new modes of writing, seeing, and perceiving space and its transformative role in societies. In many instances, Silvia argues, well-crafted fiction offers a far more nuanced and plausible representation of complex human feelings and understandings than many of the more conventional artifacts typically utilized by academic researchers. Her work consistently champions the unique capacity of literature to illuminate hidden truths and foster deeper empathy in a rapidly changing world.

During her academic studies and between master's degrees, she worked as a translator and as a teacher of English in Madrid, of Italian for foreigners at Cà Foscari University, and of Italian in Berlin. She spent a year in Australia working for Co.As.It (Italian Australian Welfare Association), organizing workshops to promote Italian culture abroad.