Immigrant Identity Formation, A Transnational Approach: Italian Americans in New York City, 1880-1930
Year: 2024
Type: conference-paper
Abstract: Of the Italian immigrants arriving in America during the Great Migration (1880-1924), few understood themselves as “Italians.” On paper, Italian unification took place in 1861, but the creation of Italy as a unit of politics was not the creation of Italians as a unit of nation. Even decades later, immigrants landing in New York City understood themselves in regional terms—as Calabrians, Sicilians, and Neapolitans. “Italian national identity” remained an idea confined to the imaginations of wealthy and educated Italian nationalists. In the years that followed the Great Migration, immigrants reshaped Italian-American identity as they grappled with American ideas of race and national belonging. Here, a transnational analytical framework is applied to the study of Italian-American identity formation to understand how the social and economic connections migrants forged between their hometown villages and overseas enclaves transformed experiences of identity. From the strictly regional affiliations immigrants arrived with, Italian ethnic identity was redefined by transnational experiences of nation into something truly novel, an immigrant identity that produced vivid experiences of feeling Italian-American. Part of the panel: Exploring Global Cultural Identities Moderator: Professor Bright Alozie
Author: Vena, Amelia J
Language: English
Subfield: Demography
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W6982329784