Visits home : migration experiences between Italy and Australia

434 Pages·2001·54.446 MB·English

by  Loretta Baldassar

Iic ont

3 2106 01668 1634
visits home
migration experiences
between Italy and Australia

aH loretta haldaccar
Visits Home
Univ. Library, UC Santa Cruz 2003
Melbourne University Press
PO Box 278, Carlton South, Victoria 3053, Australia
[email protected]
www.mup.com.au
First published 2001
Text © Loretta Baldassar 2001
Design and typography © Melbourne University Press 2001
This book is copyright. Apart from any use permitted under the
Copyright Act 1968 and subsequent amendments, no part may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any
means or process whatsoever without the prior written permission
of the publisher.
Typeset in 11 point Berkeley by Melbourne University Press
Printed in Australia by Brown Prior Anderson
National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry
Baldassar, Loretta, 1965—- .
Visits home: migration experiences between Italy and
Australia.
Bibliography.
Includes index.
ISBN 0 522 84965 2.
1. Italian Australians—Biography. 2. Italians—
Australia—Biography. 3. Immigrants—Australia—
Biography. I. Title.
305.851094
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Contents
Acknowledgements ix
Introduction: The Road Home
20
1 Licence to Leave, Obligations to Receive
44
2 Nostalgia and the Signs of Separation
74
3 The Many Italies
110
4 The Social Construction of Campanilismo
150
5 Sistemazione and the Process of Migration
185
6 Campanilismo in the Host Country
209
7 The Rhetoric of Return
249
8 Second Generation Visitors
292
9 Rivalry and Repatriation
322
10 The Home Town Revisited
Appendices 341
Glossary 357
Notes 362
Bibliography 377
Index 390

Illustrations
All unattributed photographs were taken by the author.
Plates
A Perth family house named San Fior following 84
Modern San Fior style for a house in Perth
Koalas, kangaroos and wildflowers at Grazia’s home
A San Fior church painting hangs in a Perth house
Young people in Perth identifying as Italian
Photograph by David Symons
The central frazione of Tarzo
Local postcard
A statue in Tarzo representing homecoming
Medallions commemorating the Festa dell’Emigrante
Australians visit an Italian monument to the
emigrated
Courtesy Alma Maree Cabassi
A monument in Tirano
A memorial in Innisfail, Queensland
Local postcard
viii Illustrations
A monument in Cue, Western Australia following 180
Courtesy Frank Merizzi
San Fiorese members of the Laguna Bocce Club, Perth
The church in San Fior di Sopra
The church in Castello Roganzuolo
Scrap-metal piles on a road in San Fior di Sopra
Photograph by Angelo Bianchet
A traditional farmhouse
Preparing a grave for All Souls’ Day
The Pan e Vin and Befana
Classe members with the Madonna of the Rosary
‘Valtellina night’ at the Laguna Social Club
Laguna Social Club after recent renovation
Maps
The Regions of Italy 15
The Veneto Region, Italy 16
Metropolitan Perth, Australia 163
Acknowledgements
I cannot adequately express my gratitude to the people whose stories
fill the pages of this book. Researching these migration histories was
both an honour and a pleasure. The people | interviewed generously
and enthusiastically shared their memories and hopes with me. I may
disappoint some of them because I have not used real names, nor have
I written a popular history. 1 hope, however, that I have captured
something of the shared meanings that illuminate the migration
experience and, in particular, the continued attachment to homeland.
The people who helped me begin the intellectual journey include
Basil Sansom, Patricia Baines and Barrie Machin. Those who assisted
and participated in my adventures in ‘the field’ include Don Canuto
Toso and the Fiorot, Brescacin, Tonon and Zambon families, who led
me to and into San Fior and into the homes of San Fiorese migrants in
Australia. Chiara Pasti, Paola Filippucci, Antonio Marazzi, Lisa Pollard
and Caroline Wraith provided welcome academic support and camara-
derie. A special acknowledgement is in order for Paola Pradal, Flaviano
Pradella and the Favero and Bottega families, who along with their
friends, neighbours and relatives provided me with unfailing hospitality,
help and friendship while I was in Italy. I would also like to thank
Caterina Grotto, Nicoletta Sbrojavaccha, Danilo Gardin and Mario
Marcon for their encouragement and support, as well as the staff and
students at the Oxford School of English, Vittorio Veneto, during the
years I taught there.
x Acknowledgements
The many people who assisted me in finding important reference
material include Dante Pinotti, Lazzaro and Myriam Bonazzi and Frank
Barbaro and local historians Antonio Favaro, Teofilo Gobato and
Luciano Caniato, as well as staff at the Ethnographic Museum in Tirano,
the Johnstone Shire Council, Innisfail, the Trevisani Nel Mondo Asso-
ciations in Perth and Treviso, and the Benetton Foundation library in
Treviso. A trip to Sicily in 1999 provided me with valuable compara-
tive data thanks to the generous help and hospitality of the Bivona,
Ceravolo, Cicirello, Faranda, Mordini and Occhiuto families.
Those who helped me develop and expand my ideas into this
book and who have been an enormous source of support, guidance
and encouragement include Cora Baldock, Antonina Bivona, Richard
Bosworth, Cheryl Lange, Ros Pesman, Zlatko Skrbis, the late Jackie
Templeton and, in particular, Michael Pinches. Many others provided
inspiration through debates, discussions, written comments and friendly
conversations, including Roberta Bencini, Gillian Bottomley, Victoria
Burbank, Antonina Buttitta, Marinella Caruso, Patrizia Dogliani, William
Douglass, Emilio Franzina, the late Joseph Gentilli, Frances Giampapa,
Gerald Gold, John Gordon, Susanna luliano, Laksiri Jayasuriya, John
Kinder, Renata Kokanovic, Angelo and Donaello Loi, Julie Manville,
Craig McFarlane, Dorothy Parker, Robert Pascoe, Nonja Peters, Val Colic-
Peisker, Lorenzo Polizotto and Nira Yuval Davis.
I benefited greatly from invitations to present my work in seminars
and courses including those organised by Jan Gothard and Malissa
Helms at Murdoch University, Marion Allbrook and Annalisa Orselli
Dickson at Edith Cowan University, Catherine Kovesi at the University
of Notre Dame, Jody Fitzharding at Curtin University, Glenda Sluga at
the University of Sydney, Rosita Henry at James Cook University and
Stuart Woolf at the University of Ca’Foscheri in Venice. Thanks also to
my colleagues and students in the Migration Research Network and in
the Department of Anthropology at the University of Western Aus-
tralia, who continue to provide me with a stimulating and supportive
working environment.
In preparing this work for publication I have tried to write in a style
that is accessible to the people whose lives I write about, as well as
being of use to students of ethnography and migration studies. For
assistance in this aim, I wish to thank Sally Nicholls, Jean Dunn and
Raelene Wilding for their editorial comments and encouragement.
Thanks also to Rick Armstrong for assistance with the maps, genealogies
and migration charts, Jane Mulcock, Mandy Wilson and Marianne Tylor,
as well as staff at Melbourne University Press, for editorial and adminis-
trative support. A special note of thanks is in order for Antonina Bivona
and Ian Bytheway, who helped me with the proofreading.
Acknowledgements xi
This book would not have been attempted, let alone completed, if it
were not for my husband, Brendan Jansen, and mother, Elizabeth
Baldassar, who made sure | had the space, energy and confidence to
undertake it. To them I am especially grateful and most indebted.
Special thanks to my zia Zita and nonna for their support, and to
Andrea and Cathy for sharing my enthusiasm for the subject. Thank
you to Tanya Mountford, Dario and Nicola Baldassar, Maureen, Jennifer
and Peter Jansen, Leah Burns, Joanne Servaas and Sally Ashbrook for
their interest and support (and babysitting). Finally, 1 would like to
add a special thanks to my son, Xavier, whose birth a week after the
first draft was completed has kept this publication and its time-lines in
a healthy perspective.
Loretta Baldassar