Translated from the Italian. Includes bibliographical references and index.
Contents:
1. Introduction: Decolonizing Italian literature -- 2. Italian postcolonial literature : an overview. 2.1. Introduction ; 2.2. The first phase : migration literature (1990-1994) ; 2.3. The second phase (1994-2000) ; 2.4. The third phase (2001-2019) ; 2.5. The fourth phase (2019-) ; 2.6. Conclusion -- 3. Gender and its intersections. 3.1. Introduction ; 3.2. Intersectionality : a definition ; 3.3. Colonial imaginaries : Black Venuses ; 3.4. Postcolonial imaginaries : counternarratives ; 3.5. Alle Frauen werden Schwester? Relationships of power and (failed) sisterhood among women ; 3.6. Conclusion -- 4. Defying the chromatic norm : race, Blackness, (in)visibility, Italianness, citizenship. 4.1. Introduction ; 4.2. Between invisibility and hypervisibility ; 4.3. Different shades of Italianness : Blackness and citizenship in the narratives of second-generation authors ; 4.4. Strategies of invisibility and aesthetic practices of Italian transdiasporic Blackness ; 4.5. Conclusion -- 5. Geographies of diaspora and new urban mappings. 5.1. Introduction ; 5.2. Postcolonial urban countermapping ; 5.3. "Hate breeds hate": narratives from the periphery ; 5.4. Conclusion.
Summary:
"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."--Publisher's website.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.