Between Italy and Argentina

206 Pages·2016·0.96 MB·English

by  Francesca Minonne

Between Italy and Argentina:

Circular Accents in Contemporary Migration Literature

by

Francesca Minonne

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
�(Romance Languages and Literatures: Italian)
in the University of Michigan�
2016

Doctoral Committee:

Associate Professor Giorgio Bertellini, Chair
Associate Professor Paulina L. Alberto
Professor Vincenzo A. Binetti
Associate Professor Katharine M. Jenckes
© Francesca Minonne 2016
Per Guido,

my mom, e mio padre

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Acknowledgements

First of all, I want to thank all of the friends, colleagues, and mentors who have
helped me laugh, learn, and grow as a teacher and a scholar. In particular, I want to
acknowledge everyone in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures and
everyone I have worked with at the Center for Research on Learning and Teaching, the
Sweetland Center for Writing, the Department of English, and the Department of
Classical Studies. Thank you Grandma, Peggy, Guido, Jim, and Vincenzo for attending
my oral defense.
The initial idea for this dissertation came out of a final paper I wrote in Alejandro
Herrero-Olaizola’s class Globalización, Consumo y Producción Cultural en América
Latina. Muchísimas gracias to Matías Beverinotti for introducing me to Antonio Dal
Masetto’s writing during that semester. Then a trip to Buenos Aires in 2012 gave me the
chance to access numerous primary and secondary texts, put me in contact with local
writers and scholars, and helped me experience firsthand the enormous influence Italian
culture has had on Argentina’s capital city. The staff at the Istituto Italiano di Cultura di
Buenos Aires, the Asociación Dante Alighieri, the Centro de Estudios Migratorios
Latinoamericanos (CEMLA), and the Biblioteca Nacional were friendly and welcoming.
A particular thank you to Adriana Mancini, Professor at the University of Buenos Aires,
who introduced me to the many small libraries of the University of Buenos Aires’
Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, gave me a list of bookstores where I could find primary

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texts, and gave me access to her own personal library. While in Argentina, I also
interviewed Italian-Argentine authors Roberto Raschella and the late Antonio Dal
Masetto, as well as conducted an e-mail interview with Mempo Giardinelli. Hearing
about their lives and their reasons for writing on Italian immigration to Argentina and
return visits to Italy gave me additional insight into their works and to the field of Italian-
Argentine migration literature in Argentina.
On a similar trip to Italy in 2013, I was able to speak with Dr. Ilaria Magnani
about Antonio Dal Masetto’s writing, meet with Dr. Martino Marazzi and look at many
of the books and articles in his office, and visit the Centro Internazionale Letterature
Migranti at the University of Udine, where I had a meeting with the center’s founder, Dr.
Silvana Serafin, and was gifted copies of many of the center’s publications. I also had a
lovely day at Orta San Giulio, where writer Laura Pariani invited me into her home, and
where she and her partner Nicola Fantini spoke of their visits to Argentina and of the time
they hosted their friend Antonio Dal Masetto in Italy.
I have had a number of mentors outside of the University of Michigan. Foremost
among them is my Grandma, Professor Emeritus Pat Belanoff, who read draft chapters
and articles and always had thoughtful questions that helped me clarify a point or push
my argument further. Professor Ana Cara has been a friend and mentor since she helped
me write my honors thesis at Oberlin College, and I can always count on her to answer a
question or look over my writing. Over the past two years, Assistant Professor Stiliana
Milkova has graciously read a draft article and invited me to give a guest lecture about
Italo-Argentine Clementina Sandra Ammendola’s writing for her class at Oberlin
College. Thank you Grandma, Ana, and Stiliana, for making my writing better and for

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always being available to share your own experiences with me. Thank you also to the
reviewers and editors at The Italianist and California Italian Studies who helped me
frame my research for a broader audience.
Thank you to my committee, who have helped me write this interdisciplinary
dissertation on a little-studied topic. Paulina, our conversations as well as the many
sources, and your own research, that you shared with me helped me better articulate the
history of concepts of race and ethnicity and how Italian immigrants and my primary
texts add to this ongoing discourse in Argentina. Vincenzo, your quick feedback and our
conversations helped me consider my primary texts from new viewpoints and to spend
more time reflecting on concepts like citizenship, community, and space. Kate, you
suggested useful secondary texts and pushed me to add another layer of analysis, which
made my argument more nuanced and significant. Giorgio, you have helped me shape
this dissertation from when I first approached you with a vague interest in Italy and
Argentina, always ready with concrete advice and supportive of my research decisions. I
especially appreciate your focus on the big-picture argument. You have made me a better
researcher and a better writer.
Finally, a big thank you to my parents, whose own binational Italian-American
lives have shown me how languages and cultures can interact with one another over the
years. Thank you for always encouraging me to learn, travel, and pursue my interests.
Guido, you have been there for the highs and lows of this dissertation process, and your
unwavering support and positive energy fill me with joy every day. As we work to find
our own balance between two countries, I’m excited to see where our lives will take us
together.

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Table of Contents

Dedication ..................................................................................................................................... ii
Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................... iii
Abstract ..................................................................................................................................... viii

Introduction: Italian-Argentines: A Binational Approach ...................................................... 1
Contemporary Migration Literature in Italy and Argentina ............................................. 4
Circular Accents .............................................................................................................. 10
Chapter Outline ............................................................................................................... 13
Chapter 1: Turn-of-the-Twentieth Century Ethnic Difference ............................................. 18
Race, Ethnicity, and Re-ethnicizing Italians .................................................................... 20
A Multiethnic Buenos Aires: Laura Pariani’s Dio non ama i bambini (2007) ................ 27
Transculturation in Rural Argentina: Héctor Tizón’s Luz de las crueles provincias
(1995) ................................................................................................................... 43
Limited Circularity, Persistent Accent ............................................................................. 56
Chapter 2: Translating Documents and Letters .................................................................... 58
Linguistic and Cultural Translation ................................................................................ 61
Performative Translations in Syria Poletti’s Gente conmigo (1961) ............................... 64
Cultural Translation in Mariangela Sedda’s Oltremare (2004) and Vincendo
l’ombra (2009) ................................................................................................................. 84

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Impermanent Circular Accents ....................................................................................... 96
Chapter 3: Remembering Two Lost Generations .................................................................. 98
Memory in Literature ..................................................................................................... 102
Narratable Traumatic Memory in Mempo Giardinelli’s Santo oficio de la
memoria (1991) ............................................................................................................. 107
Performative Cultural Memory in Massimo Carlotto’s Le irregolari (1998) ............... 122
Circular Accents for All ................................................................................................ 137
Chapter 4: Italian-Argentines Return Home ....................................................................... 140
Italo-Argentines in Italy ................................................................................................ 143
Nostalgia and Belonging in Laura Pariani’s Quando Dio Ballava Il Tango (2002) .... 146
Circular Movement in Clementina Sandra Ammendola’s Lei che sono io/Ella que
soy yo (2005) ................................................................................................................. 157
Non-places, Tourists, and Vagabonds in Antonio Dal Masetto’s Writing ................... 163
Inhabiting the Circular Accent ...................................................................................... 179
Conclusion: An Italian-Argentine Destination Culture ...................................................... 181
Bibliography ............................................................................................................................. 187

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Abstract

Migration has shaped both Italy and Argentina’s histories since the mid-
nineteenth century, and current migratory flows are transforming the ethnic, linguistic,
and cultural composition of both countries. Contemporary novels are one product of a
renewed interest in remembering the history of past migrations in order to better
understand the present situation and anticipate what the future holds. Through a
binational approach, my dissertation analyzes works of Italian and Argentine literature
published from the 1980s to the present that explore how Italian-Argentines have
negotiated between multiple languages and cultures for over a century. The critical
literature on this production is thin, but what does exist does not provide a means of
systematically examining these texts or of drawing connections between novels published
in Italy and ones published in Argentina. I introduce the expression “circular accent” to
describe the literary technique of creating a circularity between past and present, Italy and
Argentina, through accenting these countries’ histories. In the same way that a translation
serves as both a bridge between languages and marks the differences between languages,
a circular accent can delineate the borders between categories while also blurring those
very borders. Contemporary authors make use of this technique to reveal their characters’
struggles to negotiate multiple languages and cultures and, more broadly, to show the
crucial role that migration has played throughout these countries’ histories and the impact
this has had on discourses of national identity and belonging.

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My work establishes contemporary Italian Argentine migration literature as a
genre, united by the presence of circular accents, an exploration of the long history of
migration between Italy and Argentina, and the prominence of one or more Italian-
Argentine characters. In chapter 1, I focus on race and ethnicity at the turn of the
twentieth century, in chapter 2 on role of translation in the early to mid-twentieth century,
in the third chapter on the function of memory in the aftermath of the Argentine Dirty
War, and in the fourth chapter on Italian-Argentine identity from the 1990s to today. By
highlighting the hybridity and multiculturalism present in both countries since the
nineteenth century, these narratives suggest that categories such as Italian, Argentine, and
white, will continue to become more inclusive to account for the inhabitants of these
countries. Ultimately, they show that the latest migration by Italian-Argentines and others
is just the latest development in a continuously transforming network of global migratory
flows.

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