H-NET BOOK REVIEW
Published by H-Italy@h-net.msu.edu (January 2008)

Aliza S. Wong. _Race and the Nation in Liberal Italy, 1861-1911:
Meridionalism, Empire, and Diaspora_. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2006. x +
154 pp. Notes, bibliography, index. $69.95 (cloth), ISBN 978-1-4039-7421-1.

Reviewed for H-Italy by Katarina Andersson, European University Institute,
Florence

Race, Language, Nation

Reading _Race and the Nation in Liberal Italy, 1861-1911: Meridionalism,
Empire, and Diaspora_ by Aliza S. Wong brought to my mind Tancredi's
declaration in _Il Gattopardo_: "Se vogliamo che tutto rimanga come è, bisogna
che tutto cambi."[1] This expression may be especially Sicilian, reflecting
the belief that political and economical changes can come and go, while Sicily
and its soil always remain the same. More than 150 years have passed since
Italian unification but, still, as Wong stresses, a cultural, political, and
economical gap divides northern and southern Italy.

Italian unification was closely watched by other nineteenth-century nations.
German nationalists often saw the Italian project as an inspirational model.
During the 1860s in Sweden the questions regarding Scandinavian union and
parliamentary reform became more intense than ever, and Swedish radical
liberals also considered Italy and Giuseppe Garibaldi as a model for
Scandinavian unification, with Sweden as a new Piedmont and King Charles XV as
a new Victor Emanuel II.[2] However, even if Italy provided a model for
unification, it seems to have experienced greater post-unification problems in
its quest for national identity and homogeny. This year's bicentennial
celebration of Garibaldi's birth is providing a framework for further
discussion and debate on the _Risorgimento_. Last summer an exhibition in
Florence called _Garibaldi: immagini di un mito_, organized under the auspices
of the Fondazione Spadolini Nuova Antologia, presented Garibaldi as a hero who
transgressed continental spheres (South America and Europe) as well as Italian
domestic political spheres, in an effort to bridge conservative and radical,
north and south. Aliza S. Wong's study underlines the importance of that
north-south relation in the future construction of Italy and its national
identity.

Wong's monograph makes an interesting contribution to the research about
cultural, economic, and political divisions between northern and southern
Italy, especially as she focuses on the language of race in different
discourses during the liberal period. Wong wants to expand the scope of
research on Italian nationalism, imperialism, and differences between the
north and the south, by placing these movements in a larger context, the
discourse of race and "otherness" (pp. 2-3). Here she wants to not only
concentrate on the concept of race, but also see it as a "subset" in a broader
"ethnocentrist analysis" (p. 3). This framework for examination of language
and its uses in the post-unification era strengthens the study by putting it
in a broader nationalist context. Wong has taken up Edward Said's model of
"otherness" as an analytical tool within Italy and its regions.

Wong examines the use of language by dividing up the crucial metaphors adopted
to describe and define the relationship between northern and southern Italy
(the latter part of her study does the same with the relationship between
emigrants and the homeland). This linguistic analysis is interconnected with
the concept of otherness in an attempt to reveal how contemporaries perceived
the _Mezzogiorno_ in the second half of the nineteenth century. Otherness was
also constructed and used by northerners to define their own identity within
the new nation. Here we see the metaphors of the North as the big brother and
protector of the South; the North as the doctor who needs to cure the sick
patient in the South; the South as suffering from a disease, a sort of plague,
that is paralyzing the whole nation; the North as conqueror, not liberator;
the South as a "rebellious Africa." Southerners were viewed by contemporary
positivists in the North as parasitic, born criminals, etc. The people of the
_Mezzogiorno_ had criminality in their genes, according to positivist
criminologists (pp. 50ff). Wong here quotes how Francesco Torraca, writing
about the _camorra_, said, "Vice is in the blood as they say, that is, in the
character" (p. 62).

The use of familial and medical symbols and metaphors is a quite common way to
describe a nation or society. In a monarchic society one usually referred to
the father of the house and his children when talking about the king and his
people, but the French Revolution generated new language referring rather to
the brothers and sisters of the nation.[3] As Italian unification was very
much inspired by the radical nationalist tendencies of the post-revolutionary
period, it is understandable that the metaphors here refer to brothers and
sisters in an effort to emphasize modernity in the newly created Italian
nation. Yet a more patriarchal pattern can be seen in the use of metaphors
such as conquerors and colonizers. This is probably due to the era of
colonization during the second half of the nineteenth century, when colonizers
became the dominators in less developed and conquered countries and
revolutionary language gave way to a more traditional and patriarchal symbolic
language.

The most interesting part in this study is indeed the concept of race and
otherness as tools to explain the seemingly endless economic, political, and
cultural lag between north and south. It was generally believed that the
solution to the problem with the _Mezzogiorno_ would be critical to the
further development of national identity and unity, yet the North-based
driving force for unification failed to develop and modernize the southern
regions and, in fact, exploited them. In this context race became important in
the definition of and explanation for southern backwardness.

Wong is very interesting when she applies the concept of otherness to
emigration. Populations from the southern regions dominated emigration to
North America and South America due to poverty and lack of opportunities. Wong
shows how southern Italians, already constructed as the "other" at home, also
experienced otherness abroad, as they became an often stigmatized minority in
the New World. Emanuele Crialese's 2006 film _Nuovomondo _ is an interesting
parallel showing how Wong's discussion of the southern question is still
applicable in Italian culture as well as politics. The film brilliantly
illustrates the old, almost pre-modern, spiritual society full of prejudices
that was reality in southern Italy, even though it should have developed into
a modern society. The clash with the new, rational, world upon arrival to
America turns into a traumatic experience, especially for Salvatore's mother
who in Sicily had been a village healer.

Overall, Wong's monograph is an innovative study of Italian post-unification
society. As she notes in her conclusion, much remains to be learned about the
relations between the northern and southern regions. Yet, I would have
appreciated more discussion regarding the choice of sources in the
introductory chapter. Given her analysis of the use of language in different
political and scientific texts as well as newspapers, a more detailed
discussion of methodology would have improved the study. This would have made
it possible to link symbolic language to broader historical and linguistic
contexts. Wong furthermore continuously underlines the importance of
unification to the problems between the northern and southern regions; a
clearer presentation of the unification process and how it contributed to the
gap between north and south would have strenghtened her argument. Unification
was a complex process that was central to the problems that would arise during
the liberal post-unification era.

Notes

[1]. Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, _Il Gattopardo_ (Milan: Feltrinelli, 1999
[1958]).

[2]. Katarina Andersson, _Making Politics in the Streets: Political Rituals
and Rhetoric in 19th-Century Sweden_ (Florence: European University Institute,
2004).

[3]. Lynn Hunt, _Politics, Culture and Class in the French Revolution_
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984).




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