More than any other nation, Italy—from its imperial past to its subordinate present, from its colonial forays to its splendid isolation—embodies the myriad and contradictory historical forms of nationhood. This volume covers a range of subjects drawn from Italy and abroad to study the historical and contemporary formations of Italian national identity. In doing so, the work illuminates Italy past and present as well as the local and global dimensions of national identity in general.
Whether considering opera or Ninja Turtles, these essays reveal how cultural identity is constructed and manipulated-an issue made urgent by the influx of African, Indochinese, and Eastern European immigrants into Italy today. Exile, nationalism, and imagined communities are the topics of several essays, including Antonio Negri’s reflection on his own experience of political militancy and exile. Others focus on Italy’s colonial “unconscious,” Mussolini’s adventures in North Africa, and racism from the late nineteenth century to the present.
By analyzing Italy’s European and Mediterranean identities, its highly regional character, its north-south economic imbalance, and its ethnic complexity, this truly interdisciplinary volume resists the hierarchizing and monumentalizing of traditional Italian studies in the United States. It will inform and redirect our understanding of what constitutes “Italy.”
Contributors: Mohamed Aden; John Agnew, Syracuse U; Ayele Bekerie, Cornell U; Elaine K. Chang, Rutgers U; Antonio Marazzi, U of Padua, Italy; Francesca Miller, U of California, Davis; Antonio Negri, U of Paris VIII, France; Graziella Parati, Dartmouth College; Karen Pinkus, Northwestern U; Paul Robinson, Stanford U; Pasquale Verdicchio, U of California, San Diego; Marguerite R. Waller, U of California, Riverside; and David Ward, Wellesley College.
