This multidisciplinary volume analyses key themes and topics related to the cultural encounters between Italy and its former colonies in the Horn of Africa (Eritrea, Ethiopia and Somalia). The multi-faceted relations between the Horn of Africa and Italy were initiated during the colonial period but have also been shaped more recently through migration. In eleven chapters by experts in comparative literature, cultural studies, history, migration studies, political philosophy and postcolonial theory, the volume highlights how the legacy of colonialism permeates Italian society as well as influencing the construction of national identities in the Horn of Africa. The analysis of this transnational encounter opens up new possibilities for comparative research and critical synergies in Italian studies, African studies and beyond.
Author(s): Simone Brioni, Shimelis Bonsa Gulema
Series: Italian Colonialism (New Comparative Criticism Series)
Edition: 1
Publisher: Peter Lang
Year: 2018
Language: English
Commentary: «This collection can be particularly useful for Italian Studies scholars who might not be as familiar with the African perspective on and response to Italian colonialism as they are with the Italian. Furthermore, its call for the colonial legacy to be placed in a transnational framework gestures toward a promising new direction for studies on Italian colonialism and postcolonialism.» (Jessica L. Harris, Quaderni d’Italianistica, 39.1)
Pages: 168
City: Oxford
Tags: Italy; Somalia; Eritrea; Ethiopia; colonialism; Italian colonialism; postcolonial; Italian; race; migration; diaspora; racism; cultural studies; Horn of Africa; Simone Brioni; Shimelis Bonsa Gulema; Olindo de Napoli; Wu Ming 2; Lee Cassanelli; Sara Marzagora; Antonio Morone; Daniele Comberiati; Emma Bond; Maaza Mengiste; Nadifa Mohamed; Igiaba Scego
List of Figures vii
Acknowledgements ix
A Note on the Text xi
Simone Brioni and Shimelis Bonsa Gulema
Introduction: A Transnational Cultural Encounter 1
Part I Colonialism 45
Olindo De Napoli
1 Law: The Myth of Progress and Differentialism
in the Liberal Age 47
Wu Ming 2
2 Landscape: Somalia as Seen in Italian Colonial Literature 73
Lee Cassanelli
3 History: Italian Fascist Visions of Somalia’s Past and Future 93
Part II Postcolonialism 107
Shimelis Bonsa Gulema
4 Urbanism: History, Legacy, and Memory of the
Italian Occupation in Addis Ababa (1936–1941) 109
vi
Sara Marzagora
5 Nationalism: The Italian Occupation in Amharic Literature
and Political Thought 141
Antonio Maria Morone
6 Racism: Meticci on the Eve of Colonial Downfall 167
Daniele Comberiati
7 Decolonization: Representing the Trusteeship
Administration of Somalia 193
Part III Transnationalism 215
Lorenzo Mari
8 Heroes: A Transnational Reconsideration of Mohammed
Abdulle Hassan and Omar al-Mukhtar in Literature and Film 217
Milena Belloni
9 Diaspora: A ‘Postcolonial’ Migration? An Analysis of
Eritrean Mobility Trajectories 241
Simone Brioni
10 Sport: Leisure, Representation, and Politics
of Exclusion and Inclusion 265
Emma Bond
11 Photography: Memorial Intertexts in New Writing by
Maaza Mengiste, Nadifa Mohamed, and Igiaba Scego 295
Notes on Contributors 319 Index 323
