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This volume offers samples of the literary and cultural productions of an innovative group of writers whose texts explore the processes of cultural hybridization taking place in contemporary Italy, following recent waves of immigration to Italy. The editors chose both short stories and selections from books that explore representation of otherness in contemporary Italian culture. Graziella Parati is the chair of Comparative Literature at Dartmouth College. Marie Orton is Associate Professor of Italian at Truman State University.
Contemporary Italian Diversity in Critical and Fictional Narratives brings together creative literary works and scholarly articles. Both address the changes and challenges to identity formation in an Italy marked by the migrations, populism, nationalism, and xenophobia, and analyze diversity and the affirmation of belonging.
This book argues for the importance of adopting a postcolonial perspective in analysing contemporary Italian culture and literature. Originally published in Italian in 2018 as Riscrivere la nazione: La letteratura italiana postcoloniale, this new English translation brings to light the connections between the present, the colonial past and the great historical waves of international and intranational migration. By doing so, the book shows how a sense of Italian national identity emerged, at least in part, as the result of different migrations and why there is such a strong resistance in Italy to extending the privilege of italianità, or Italianness, to those who have arrived on Italian soil in recent years. Exploring over 100 texts written by migrant and second-generation writers, the book takes an intersectional approach to understanding gender and race in Italian identity. It connects these literary and cultural contexts to the Italian colonial past, while also looking outwards to a more diffuse postcolonial condition in Europe.
This interdisciplinary work philosophically analyzes the role of positive duties in moral theory, the efficacy of theocratic republicanism, viable strategies for political revolutions, the implications of an enduring Sicilian ethos, and the profits and perils of the individual-community continuum, in service of distinctive interpretations of the lives and ideologies of Giuseppe Mazzini, Antonio Gramsci, and Salvatore Giuliano. Il Risorgimento Italiano, the national unification movement, refers to the period from 1821, the initial unsuccessful Milanese and Piedmontese insurrections against Austria, to 1870, the annexing of Rome into the Kingdom of Italy, which itself was established in 1861. ...
John Fante's work has consistently delved into profound themes, including the elusive American Dream, the delicate psychology of immigrants, and the intricate dynamics of Italian American families. This study reveals the ingenious manner in which Fante employs humor and satire as powerful rhetorical devices to breathe life into his Italian, Italian American, and American characters. Drawing inspiration from literary giants such as Luigi Pirandello and René Girard, the author embarks on a fascinating journey into Fante's rich literary landscape. When We Were Bandini also offers an engaging comparison between Fante's works and those of other authors like Cervantes, Hamsun, Bukowski, and even his own son, Dan Fante. This comparative analysis sheds light on the possible reasons behind Fante's unique status: he is a cult writer in Europe, relatively underappreciated in his home country, the United States. Challenging the conventional notions of Fante as a strictly autobiographical and confessional writer, the author urges readers to look beyond the surface and unravel the layers of his literary genius.
Enlightening Encounters traces the impact of photography on Italian literature from the medium's invention in 1839 to the present day. Investigating the ways in which Italian literature has responded to photographic practice and aesthetics, the contributors use a wide range of theoretical perspectives to examine a variety of canonical and non-canonical authors and a broad selection of literary genres, including fiction, autobiography, photo-texts, and migration literature. The first collection in English to focus on photography's reciprocal relationship to Italian literature, Enlightening Encounters represents an important resource for a number of fields, including Italian studies, literary studies, visual studies, and cultural studies.
Starting in the early 1900s, male and female elementary schoolteachers in Italy gained increasing awareness of the role of social workers in the fight against illiteracy and in creating civic consciousness based on widespread, qualified education. In 1900, the Unione Magistrale (the Teachers Association) was founded; in 1919, the Sindacato Magistrale (the Italian Teachers Union, a member of the General Confederation of Labor) was created. Inevitably, some of these teachers, firmly convinced of their duty, opposed fascism which, from the moment it originated, aimed at creating obedient boys who were loyal to fascist doctrine and trained in warfare, and girls ready to become the mothers and wi...
Who are “intellectuals”? What do they think their role and function in contemporary society is? Are they on the endangered-species list? Is equating conservatism with conservation becoming their dominant survival strategy? This book is a collection of essays that examines some of the changes in the activities, role, function and self-perception of Italian intellectuals since World War II (two major divides are considered to be the crisis of 1956–7 and the fall of the Berlin Wall). The first section examines some of the most influential figures in the early decades, the second the activities of contemporary intellectuals, a third gives voice to some contemporary writers, a fourth contains some comparative essays about the role of intellectuals in influential contemporary Western cultures and a final section is devoted to some cross-disciplinary forays and reflections on the relevance and possible future directions of these inquiries.
The Unpopular Realism of Vincenzo Padula provides a microhistory of life in a Southern Italian province in the decade following Unificationand of Vincenzo Padula, who wrote single-handedly from March 1864 to July 1865 — a period when pro-Bourbon loyalists were attempting to exploit the discontent of the Region’s poor masses by fomenting brigantry and reverse the Unification — Il Bruzio, a pro-Government periodical published in Cosenza. The pro-government reformist Padula pointed out not only the successes but also the shortcomings and failures of the Savoy regime, so as to consolidate their rule. He gave particular attention to the problems of daily life through the correspondence of a...
A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more. Emergency in Transit responds to the crisis framings that dominate migration debates in the global north. This capacious, interdisciplinary study reformulates Europe's so-called "migrant crisis" from a sudden disaster to a site of contested witnessing, where competing narratives threaten, uphold, or reimagine migrant rights. Focusing on Italy, a crucial port of arrival, Eleanor Paynter draws together testimonials from ethnographic research--alongside literature, film, and visual art--to interrogate the colonial, racial logics that inform emergency responses to migration. She also examines the media, discourses, policies, and practices that shape lived experiences of migration well beyond international borders. Centering the witnessing of Black Africans in Italy, Emergency in Transit reveals how this emergency apparatus operates and posits a vision of mobility that refutes the notions of crisis so often imposed on those who cross the Mediterranean Sea.