Matteo Lancini | Bodies that speak: how to relate to adolescents

Festival Sconfinare 2025 OLTRE IL MURO | SATURDAY 11 OCTOBER | 5:00 p.m.

Social media is full of perfect bodies, images of lives and physiques sculpted by digital retouching, with inhumanly flawless curves and shapes. On the other hand, there are real bodies: naturally imperfect ones, which sometimes suffer, speak, are pierced, cut, overfed, or underfed. Bodies that become silent megaphones of pain that cannot find a voice. A clash between what a teenager ‘should’ be – in the eyes of adults and society – and what they really are. So perhaps we should not only talk about the problems of teenagers, but also those of adults. Matteo Lancini guides us on a journey through the relationships that shape – and distort – the younger generations. A dialogue that proposes to rethink the role of adults.

The conference will be moderated by Giovanni Pellegri, science communicator.

Matteo Lancini is a psychologist and psychotherapist. He is president of the Minotauro Foundation and a lecturer at the University of Milan-Bicocca and the Catholic University of Milan. He collaborates with various newspapers and writes for La Stampa. He is the curator of the “Crescere” section of the Turin International Book Fair. His latest publications include: Sii te stesso a modo mio. Essere adolescenti nell'epoca della fragilità adulta (Be yourself in my way. Being teenagers in an era of adult fragility) (Raffaello Cortina, 2023), Chiamami adulto. Come stare in relazione con gli adolescenti (Call me an adult. How to relate to teenagers) (Raffaello Cortina, 2025).