About us

The Department of Humanities (DISUM) is one of the seven departments that constitute the Università del Piemonte Orientale, officially founded in 1998 but active since the early 1990s.
The department is located in Vercelli. Teaching and research activity is carried out in historic buildings, renovated and easily reached by public transport.

Here, you can follow unrestricted (open access) courses in Philosophy and Communication, Literature, Modern Languages or specialise in Philosophy, Politics and Cultural Studies, Modern, Classical and Comparative Philology, Modern Languages, Culture and Tourism. 
Since 2015-16, we also operate in Alessandria with the Literature programme.. Since 2018-19 you can also study Russian Language and Culture, Hispanic-American Literature, Pedagogy and Psychology, Environmental History and Chinese and Arabic Languages.

Our courses prepare you for work in a variety of professional fields: teaching, publishing, translations, cultural heritage, public administration, public and private organisations, libraries and archives, human resource management, public relations, advertising and marketing, journalism, cultural organisations in Italy and abroad, international organisations and industries, and the advanced tertiary sector.

We offer you the chance to study abroad with the Erasmus scheme. You can also pursue a bi‐national Italo‐French degree, attending the final year in Chambéry (Université Savoie Mont‐Blanc) and participate in internships and job placements.

Watch the  presentation video and … make yourself at home!

Key features

You can be the protagonist in your own education

• There is a low student:teacher ratio (approx. 16:1), so you can receive closer attention without being lost in the impersonal atmosphere of a large organisation
• Thanks to the tutoring system, we can help you make informed and responsible choices
• It is the University’s duty and mission to offer you a high-quality education and all teaching is informed by the most up-to-date research of our teachers who are also researchers. 
• in a welcoming and friendly atmosphere, you can study (in class and online), participate in cultural or research initiatives, collaborate with students and teachers, gain work experience with the web radio 6023, complete an internship in companies and organisations in Italy or abroad, contribute to the research studies that have placed our Department in third place of official rankings in terms of quality.

You will study in prestigious historic buildings, easy to reach and well-equipped 

• Teaching and research activity is carried out in renovated historic buildings (the convent wing of the Basilica of Sant’Andrea, Palazzo Tartara, Ex-Ospedaletto, educational hub of S. Giuseppe) in the historic city centre of Vercelli and very near the train station and bus routes.
• You will have access to equipped classrooms with the best technological systems, language and IT labs, audiovisual labs and labs for processing of texts and images, and research centres and laboratories
• You can have access to a library with around 60,000 books and 7,500 annual periodicals available for onsite reference (open shelf) and also online.

Some of the best research work around

You can follow the many research projects that place our University among the best in Italy.
DiSUM research studies received an excellent review in the Quality Assessment of Research survey (VQR 2011-2014) (source ANVUR).

Student satisfaction

The university’s courses fulfill student expectations: more than 91% of graduates declare themselves satisfied overall with their selected course.

More of our students graduate according to schedule...

According to the recent AlmaLaurea Report on the Profile of Graduates in Italian universities, DiSUM students follow courses regularly, graduate and find employment quickly. Specifically, 61% of our graduates finish their studies according to schedule (the national average is 58.4%).

... and find jobs quickly

According to the AlmaLaurea survey on employment status of graduates, employment rates for Master’s graduates is 55.6 %, and the period between graduating and finding the first job is just 4.8 months for Bachelor graduates and 3.5 months for Master graduates.

Statistics

These are the figures which make our Department a high-level and student-friendly educational institute. 

• around 2,000 students enrolled on courses
• over 100 tenured teachers and researchers, and contract teachers
• 3 Bachelor’s degree programmes
• 3 Master’s degree programmes
• 2 research PhD programmes
• over 250 teaching modules and lab activities
• 30 international cooperation agreements
• More than 40 Erasmus agreements all over Europe
• Over 10 research centres and laboratories
• numerous extra-curricular activities

• and also: IT labs, multimedia labs, library, and a highly digitalised environment to support teaching and administrative procedures.

• More than 100 places in university residential halls, paid student employment, internships and job placements, summer schools, theatre projects and choir in original language