Tag: Italian American

Seeking Objects Made by Italian POWs in the United States

Posted on by Sian Gibby

In April 2025 the Calandra Institute will mount an exhibit on the artistry of World War II Italian POWs in the United States. The exhibit will feature handcrafted objects, paintings, photographs, letters, newspapers, and other artifacts documenting creativity under captivity. During the war more than 51,000 Italian military personnel were held throughout the country, from Massachusetts to Hawaii. The curators, Laura E. Ruberto (Berkeley City College) and Joseph Sciorra (Calandra Institute), are looking for items, especially crafts and artwork, for possible inclusion in the exhibit. While the exhibit will focus on the United States, objects from other parts of the world concerning Italian POWs are also of interest. Such artwork may have been made while in a POW camp or after the war as a reflection of wartime captivity and experience. The exhibit is co-sponsored by the John D. Calandra Italian American Institute (Queens College, CUNY), the Australian Research Council, and the Mellon/ACLS Community College Faculty Fellowships.

Please contact both Dr. Ruberto (lruberto@peralta.edu) and Dr. Sciorra (joseph.sciorra@qc.cuny.edu) directly with any leads, examples of artifacts, or questions.

George Guida reads from The Uniform (Guernica World Editions, 2024) Alexander Sammartino reads from Last Acts (Scribner, 2024)

George Guida reads from The Uniform (Guernica World Editions, 2024)

Alexander Sammartino reads from Last Acts (Scribner, 2024)

Two writers explore the expectations and realities of modern masculinity. In George Guida’s novel, a brutal racist attack in 1950 drives Alfie Bagliato’s family from their small town to New York City, where the sixteen-year-old dreams of escaping his Italian American enclave through a career in music and a romance with his cousin Adeline. All too quickly, disappointment and frustration lead Alfie to join the military, to follow Adeline to San Francisco, and then to become a New York City cop. The clash with protesters during the 1968 Columbia University student uprising forces him to confront his inherited bigotry and fear as he wrestles with his love for Adeline and desire for a new life. Alexander Sammartino’s satirical tale follows David Rizzo, proprietor of a failing firearms store in Phoenix, who nevertheless has reason to feel optimistic. His son, Nick, has just recovered after a near-fatal overdose, which prompts Rizzo to use Nick’s resurrection to create a television commercial for his gun emporium. But the relationship between father and son is fragile, mired in mutual disappointment. And when the pair embarks on their scheme to avoid bankruptcy, a high-stakes crash of hijinks, hope, and disaster ensues.

Discussion led by Fred Gardaphé, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute, Queens College, CUNY.

Calandra Institute’s Dr. Joseph Sciorra Wins Bishir Prize

Posted on by Sian Gibby

The Vernacular Architecture Forum has awarded Joseph Sciorra its 2024 Catherine W. Bishir Prize for his article “‘The Strange Artistic Genius of This People’: The Ephemeral Art and Impermanent Architecture of Italian Immigrant Catholic Feste,” published in the Fall/Spring 2023 issue of Buildings & Landscapes: Journal of the Vernacular Architecture Forum.

Sciorra looks at late nineteenth and early twentieth-century mobile shrines and street chapels—Baroque confections as tall as sixty feet or as wide as buildings, shaped like altars, towers, or even land-faring boats. Italian American craftsmen created these for their immigrant community feste, or—as Sciorra calls them—“cultural-religious extravaganzas.” He shows the reader these works through the eyes of their intended audiences, as well as those of outsiders—photographers, journalists, visual artists—whose potential biases he carefully considers. Sciorra examines, “how these transient objects of devotion … enacted and proclaimed a diasporic community of believers that challenged hegemonic notions of artistry, religion, the built environment, and the public sphere.” He further expands his gaze to contextualize his hand-crafted sources of study as, in his words, “part of the Progressive era’s xenophobic climate and, in particular, the picturesque gaze that racialized and othered Italian immigrants.”

An online copy of the article is accessible here.

Call for Papers for Calandra’s 2025 Conference: The Bitter Bread of War: Multidisciplinary Perspectives from Italy and the Diaspora

Posted on by Sian Gibby

April 25–26, 2025

War has been foundational to the shaping of modern Italian history, memory, and culture—from the wars of the Risorgimento to colonial and Fascist wars of expansion up to and including the two world wars. Furthermore, in all these Italian war efforts, emigrant and diasporic communities have played significant roles whether through moral and material support, serving in the Italian military, or through their opposition to Italian wars. As such, scholars are increasingly turning their attention to the theme of war and its importance to our understanding of the history of Italy, the Italian diaspora, and former colonial subjects. This interdisciplinary conference is open to a wide range of topics concerning war from an Italian—broadly understood—perspective. As in the past, the Institute’s conference proposes an inclusive approach to Italy and Italian mobilities, including inhabitants of the nation-state, members of the diaspora, current immigrants in Italy and their descendants, and former colonial subjects.

Suggested paper topics include but are not limited to:

  • Italian military history
  • Italy’s reaction to other nations’ wars (e.g., Vietnam War, Russian-Ukraine War)
  • Anti-war movements and statements (e.g., Scorsese’s 1967 The Big Shave)
  • Colonial wars and anti-colonial responses
  • Domestic warfare, e.g., brigands, partisans, Years of Lead
  • Diasporic involvement with Italy’s military and wars
  • Italian immigrant and descendants’ participation in host country’s military
  • Displaced persons and refugees
  • Internment, e.g., POWs, US government’s enemy alien designation, Fascist concentration camps in Libya
  • Gendered approaches to war
  • Creative accounts and depictions, e.g., memoir, fiction, film, visual arts (e.g., Mengiste’s 2019 The Shadow King)
  • War as metaphor, e.g., class wars, war on organized crime, war on migrants
  • Memory, oral history, and historical revisioning, e.g., the foibe, Fosse Ardeatine, the Shoah

This is an in-person event without virtual presentations.

The official language of the conference is English. All presentations are limited to twenty minutes, including audio and visual illustrations. Thursday evening is dedicated to welcoming comments and reception; sessions and panels will take place all day Friday and Saturday.

NOTA BENE: There are no available funds for travel, accommodations, or meals. There is no conference registration fee. The conference does not make arrangements with local hotels, so participants are responsible for booking their own accommodations.

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS: SEPTEMBER 15, 2024. Abstracts for scholarly papers (up to 500 words, plus a note on technical requirements) and a brief, narrative biography should be emailed as attached documents by September 15, 2024, to calandra@qc.cuny.edu, where other inquiries may also be addressed. We encourage the submission of organized panels (of no more than three presenters). Submission for a panel must be made by a single individual on behalf of the group and must include all the paper titles, abstract narratives, and individual biographies and emails.

Notice of acceptance or rejection will occur in early November 2024.

This year’s conference title comes from Arturo Giovannitti’s poem “Anniversary II.”

“Translating Italian Mobilities”: Calandra Annual Conference a Success

Posted on by Sian Gibby

Scholars and interested participants began gathering at the Institute on April 26 to listen to presentations by speakers from around the world on the theme of this year’s conference, Translating Italian Mobilities. All sessions were livestreamed. With ten panels and individual presentations on topics related to translation and a keynote (“Rescue, Restore, Redeem: On Translating I Promessi Sposi“) by Michael F. Moore and Lawrence Venuti (“The Bourgeois Shudder: Translating Dino Buzzati’s Politics of Fantasy”)(with discusant Loredana Polezzi), the conference lasted two full days and provided ample material and opportunities for lively and collegial discussion. To review the program and see all the presenters and their topics, click here. Click here to see more photos from the conference.

Luisa Del Giudice at Calandra

Posted on by Sian Gibby

Thursday, April 11, Luisa Del Giudice, author and independent scholar, presented her new book In Search of Abundance: Mountains of Cheese, Rivers of Wine, and Other Gastronomic Utopias (2023 Bordighera Press), in which she outlines the fascinating and complex journey of ideas about plenty and scarcity in the history of Italian diasporic cultures. The book is available via Bordighera Press.

Dean Tamburri To Address Supreme Court of the State of New York

Posted on by Sian Gibby

Today Calandra’s dean, Anthony J. Tamburri, will speak to the Appellate Division, Second Department, of the Supreme Court of the State of New York. His topic is “Italian Americans: Who We Were and Who We Are.”

Dean Tamburri Gives a Talk at Casa Italiana Zerilli Marimò on Italian American Film

Posted on by Sian Gibby

 

On March 4, Calandra’s dean Prof. Tamburri spoke about the film Big Night (1996) from the perspective of identity. Through a comparative analysis of the three main characters (Primo, Secondo, and Pascal), we come to understand how Italian immigrants negotiated differently the challenges of the host country. Even of the same generation, we see how these three characters represent three different types of individuals, from one person to the next. Click here to see the entire presentation.

Intergenerational Memories of World War II: Italian and Italian American Captivities

Delve into the multifaceted narratives of World War II Prisoners of War (POWs) as their descendants share compelling insights during this roundtable discussion. Through a hybrid format blending online and in-person participation, this event offers a unique opportunity to explore the scholarly, artistic, and visual representations of their fathers’ and grandfathers’ captivity experiences.

Speakers: Yemane Demissié, New York University; Laura E. Ruberto, Berkeley City College; Mark Pedri, United States; Anton Pulvirenti, Australia; Elisa Longarato, Italy

This event is part of a series on “Memory, Memories, and Memorialization of WWII Italian Captivity” organized by Elena Bellina (New York University) and Giorgia Alù (The University of Sydney) and co-sponsored by NYU’s Casa Italiana Zerilli-Marimò, The University of Sydney, The John D. Calandra Italian American Institute (Queens College, CUNY), and the Centre for Italian Modern Art (CIMA). The events aim to investigate how World War II Italian POWs have narrated their long captivity experiences, as well as how these narratives have been recollected and memorialized in Italy, America, Australia, Asia, and Africa.

Those attending in person please RSVP by calling (212) 642-2094.

For online participation, please register in advance for the webinar:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_MrgGaW3QS8ieLZk0tHcv-Q

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.

For details, please contact Elena Bellina (elena.bellina@nyu.edu); Giorgia Alù (giorgia.alu@sydney.edu.au)

Calandra’s Stephen Cerulli Talks Italian Americans and Ethnicity on NYTN Podcast

Posted on by Sian Gibby

Podcaster Danielle Romero invited Calandra college assistant Stephen Cerulli, who is getting his PhD in Modern History at Fordham University, to talk about matters relating to Italian Americans and ethnicity.