Cultures of Italian Migration

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

This course is offered at Georgetown's Villa Le Balze in Fiesole, Italy (just outside Florence) from June 5-27 2018. Surrounded on three sides by water, Italy has long been a zone of transit, refuge, and intercultural encounter and exchange. Tourists have visited Italy in large numbers from the mid-17th century to the present while Italians have also flowed out—13 million alone between 1880 and 1915, making Italy the scene of the largest recorded voluntary migration in world history. This class explores this dichotomy, examining cultural delineations of the global, the transnational, and the transatlantic by focusing on Florence and Italy. Specifically, we will address the three major categories of what scholars call “Italian mobilities”: tourism and the “Grand Tour”; emigration from Italy, especially to the U. S.; and the contemporary migration and refugee crisis. In addition to a range of scholarly essays on our subject, will read travel narratives, essays, and fictional works set in Italy by British and American writers who visited and sometimes lived in Italy; autobiographical narratives by Italian-American immigrant writers; and Italian narratives and films that depict contemporary immigration in Italy. Our study will be enhanced by train excursions to Lucca and Prato, visits to cultural sites and non-profit and community organizations in Florence (such as the RFK Human Rights Center)—as well as guided tours and guest lectures by local scholars and activists.