Anna Giacalone graduated from the
University of Florence in 1959, subsequently studying
Indo-European linguistics,
Sanskrit and
Germanic linguistics at the
University of Würzburg and
Saarland University, before taking up a position as teaching assistant (1962–1968) and then assistant professor (1968–1975) at the
University of Cagliari. During the 1970s she held professorial positions at the
University of Messina and the
University of Milan; she spent most of her career as full professor at the
University of Pavia, first in
glottology (1976–1996) and then in general linguistics (1996–2010). She retired in 2010. She has served as President of the International Society for Historical Linguistics (1983–1985), of the Società Italiana di Glottologia (1991–1992), and of the
Societas Linguistica Europaea (1999–2000). In 2008 she was the recipient of a
festschrift. ==Research==